Staff A-Z

Tony Swainson is a senior brass lecturer and Former Principal Tuba for the  BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra. He has seen many of his students go on to prestigious professional positions around the world. He is a graduate of the Royal Manchester College of Music, now the RNCM, where he studied tuba with the renowned tuba player, Stuart Roebuck, as well as piano and composition.

Aileen is a Glaswegian composer and accordionist who studied at the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland. Her recent success at The Scottish Awards for New Music, saw her accordion concerto Winter win the award for ‘Large Scale New Work’ sponsored by PRS in 2023 as well as Above the Stars performed by The London Philharmonic Orchestra, winning two years prior.

Iseabail is a lecturer on the Traditional Music course.

Shilpa is a working freelance director and dramaturg, as well as the co-Artistic Director of Bijli Productions. She is also a PhD candidate at RCS.

Her directing and dramaturgy practice specialises in new writing. She trained at the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland and values collaboration, respect, rigor and curiosity. She is especially interested in stories which reflect big scale political and social issues through the most personal and everyday occurrences. She approaches directing and dramaturgy from a core ethos of asking challenging questions with kindness.

She has worked with many Scottish companies as a director and dramaturg including Playwrights’ Studio Scotland, A Play, A Pie, and A Pint, Independent Arts Projects, the National Theatre Scotland, the Traverse Theatre, Perth Theatre, and Catherine Wheels. Her research investigates the process of using new plays to explore our relationship to historical narratives.

Hiroaki Takenouchi’s has appeared on many concert platforms including Wigmore Hall, Tokyo Opera City and the South Bank Centre, and has given recitals across Europe and North America. He his a Blüthner Artist and owns a 1922 Blüthner piano.

Ray has a background in cinematography and began his journey into education provision in 2008.

Born in Malta, Geoffrey Tanti studied piano with Cynthia Turner before moving to Glasgow to study at the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland, where he graduated with a Masters in Piano Performance with Distinction and a Masters in Répétiteur Studies. He studied with Jonathan Plowright and Julia Lynch and worked for a year as a Junior Fellow accompanist at the RCS. During his studies, Geoffrey won many solo and accompaniment prizes.

Betsy is a founder member of the highly acclaimed Glasgow String Quartet and is also an active member of the RSNO Chamber Music Series. She teaches at the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland at both the Junior and Senior Departments. She has performed as Guest Principal Cello with the BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra, Royal Liverpool Philharmonic Orchestra, London Soloists Chamber Orchestra, RSNO, BBC Symphony Orchestra, Manchester Sinfonia and the Northern Sinfonia.

Member of the Audit and Risk, Finance and General Purposes and Fundraising Committees

They are part of the lecturing team for BA Performance (for Deaf and HoH Actors) – having previously helped to revise the course curriculum. They lecture in theatre making techniques as part of the Performance Maker module and they are module coordinator for Professional Presentation – guiding our graduates into the industry.

Music has always been central to Kate’s life, and most of the jobs she has done have had the arts woven through them. Her first role during and after college was with a Jazz Festival, where she looked after everything from admin to press and marketing.

Since then, Kate has worked as a Marketing Officer in London for a major charity and at a Theatre and Arts complex in Surrey, and in corporate PA roles where event management was a big part of her day. She also spent many years as Strings Administrator at RCS, often stepping up as a coordinator to help bring projects together.

Kate has picked up a mix of qualifications along the way — an HND in Communication Studies, an Advanced Diploma in Arts Management, and a NEBOSH certificate in Health and Safety — but she likes to remind people that not every career path is straightforward or planned.

Here at Fair Access, Kate loves organising the events you come to, whether that’s an Open Day or a weekly workshop, and making sure you feel welcome. Outside of work, you’ll usually find her at a gig, in a dance fit class, or outdoors as much as possible.

Jess Thorpe is a Lecturer in the Arts in Justice at the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland, where she designs and delivers creative projects in prisons and with communities impacted by the criminal justice system.

Outside her work at RCS, Jess was the Associate Director (Engage) of Dundee Rep and Scottish Dance Theatre (2020-2024). She is Co-Artistic Director of Glass Performance, through which she also developed long-term initiatives such as young people’s performance company Junction 25 and Polmont Youth Theatre, the first youth theatre in a Scottish prison. In 2015, Junction 25 won a CATS Whiskers for an outstanding contribution to Scottish theatre. Jess has published several works on theatre including ‘A Beginners Guide to Devising Theatre’ (for Methuen) which won a Drama and Education prize in 2021.

Josh (he/him) is head of Fair Access and Community at RCS and loves his job. He has worked as an interdisciplinary teaching artist and storymaker for over 30 years. His work, research and approaches are filled with play and collaboration – and through this, he thrives.

MA (Oxon), MLitt

Pippa currently plays as Principal Harp with the Royal Scottish National Orchestra and appears regularly with the BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra and the Scottish Chamber Orchestra.

She is a Harp Lecturer at the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland and has over 20 years of experience as a teacher at various institutions and privately at all levels. She is a regular coach for NYOS.

Amy Turner currently holds the position of Section Principal Oboe of the Orchestra with the Orchestra of Scottish Opera, a position she has held since 2015.

Dr J Simon van der Walt is a composer and Head of Taught Postgraduate Programmes in Music at the Conservatoire. His artistic research inhabits a broad span of work, ranging from score-based composition to installation, sound art, and devised musiktheater. Current preoccupations include Indonesian gamelan music, live coding in SuperCollider, and reconstructing the career of his fictional alter ego Edward ‘Teddy’ Edwards, unsung hero of British light music electronica.