Staff A-Z

Principal Oboe, Orchestra of Scottish Opera

Ruta is an active initiator of experimental music projects: she was director of the Druskomanija festival and workshop series the Process in Lithuania for several years, facilitator of New Music Incubator in Nordic and Baltic countries and across the EU, facilitator and tutor at ComposersPlus summer academy in Lithuania, and currently – initiator of CoMA, Contemporary Music for All, Glasgow branch.

Nadja works to empower the next generation of musicians, teaching Music Business on the Jazz course at the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland.

After graduating with distinction from Queen Margaret University College in Edinburgh he has worked as a Lighting Designer on productions in many genres, including devised theatre, stand-up, cabaret, corporate events, car and product launches and fashion shows.

After reading Music at Kings College, Cambridge, and Composition at the Royal Academy of Music, John held a variety of Trumpet positions in London Orchestras, and enjoyed a wide-ranging and successful solo career. In 2002, John returned to Scotland and became Principal of the RSAMD (now RCS) a position which he held until he retired in 2014 after a period of huge influence on the institution. John is now an Emeritus Professor of Brass at RCS.

Jan Waterfield read music at Girton College, Cambridge, where she was also a choral scholar. This was followed by postgraduate studies in harpsichord and piano with John Toll and David Willison at the RAM in London, where she won prizes for both lieder accompaniment and continued playing.

As Principal Cello in some of the world’s leading ensembles English Baroque Soloists, Orchestre Revolutionnaire et Romantique, the Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment, the Philharmonia Orchestra and the Scottish Chamber Orchestra David Watkin has played a key role at the heart of some ground-breaking performances.

He has conducted ensembles at the Royal Academy of Music, The Guildhall School of Music, the Royal Welsh College and the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland.

Ms Wells is an advocate for increasing access to musical training. She was involved with several inner city initiatives in Baltimore and served as Chair of the Board of TUBA: The Uganda-Baltimore Alliance, providing mentorship to a brass band project in rural Uganda.

Peter Wesley was brought up in Gloucestershire where he was lucky enough to be taught by Frank Read, a retired Army Bandsman and freelance bassoonist. After briefly considering a career in the Biological Sciences he went to the Royal College of Music to study with Kerry Camden and John Burness, and after a few years freelancing in London he joined the BBC Philharmonic in Manchester as their Contrabassoon player. Whilst there he taught at the Royal Northern College of Music, and in 2007 he and his family moved to Scotland where he currently plays with the BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra. Peter also holds a degree in Psychology from the Open University and plays on a pre-war Mollenhauer bassoon, purchased in Berlin in 1945 by his first teacher.

Innes is a lecturer on the Traditional Music course.

In the UK Philip has worked as a guest on the music staff of the Scottish Opera, English National Opera, Welsh National Opera and Longborough Opera and he is currently Head of Music for Grange Park Opera.

Find out more about Dr Whiteside on the Pure Portal

Find out more about Carole on the Fair Access microsite

Duncan has had a relationship with the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland for the last 20 years as both a teacher and visiting coach and has now taken up the post of full-time coach in the Opera Department.

Tom was born in Manchester in 1957. In the 1970s, he studied composition at the Birmingham Conservatoire with Andrew Downs. In the 1980s, as a student at Goldsmiths University of London, he spent five years studying composition with Melanie Dakin and Edward Gregson. For ten years he was Head of Woodwind and Tutor for Academic Music at Uppingham School in Rutland. Since 1989, Tom has lived in Glasgow and Musselburgh, where he teaches composition at the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland and St. Mary’s Music School in Edinburgh.

Konrad is a Saxophone lecturer on the Jazz course at the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland.

Bill trained as an actor at the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland (then RSAMD) in 1990. After several years of professional work on stage, screen and radio, he began to teach Performing Arts at Coatbridge College. He joined the Centre for Voice in Performance CViP at the Conservatoire in 2007 and after engaging in further voice work with Nadine George of Voice Studio International, he became an accredited teacher in 2012.