Philip Martin (pianist)
Philip Martin (born 1947) is an Irish pianist, composer, and Professor of Music.
Philip Martin was born in Dublin and won an Associated Board scholarship to the Royal Academy of Music in London where he studied with Franz Reizenstein. Reizenstein was a pupil of Solomon, Hindemith and Vaughan Williams. While there, Martin won many prestigious awards and prizes. He later studied under Lennox Berkeley, Richard Rodney Bennett and Louis Kentner. He went on to a dual career as both a pianist and composer.
Among his compositions are four piano concertos. The Nine Orders of Angels, his third piano concerto, is dedicated to his wife, Julia, whilst his fourth is a dedicated concerto for youth orchestra. Through Streets Broad and Narrow for piano and chamber orchestra, a concerto for harp dedicated to the Irish harpist Andreja Maliř, a symphony, much chamber music including seven piano trios and over 250 songs. Major choral works include "Thalassa" and a Chamber of commerce commission to celebrate the millennium, In Dublin's Fair City.
His music has been included on eight CDs, and his recordings for Hyperion Records include the complete piano music of the colourful 19th-century pianist and composer, Louis Moreau Gottschalk. One major interest is his passion for American music and he has given many first performances in the UK of works by William Schuman, Lukas Foss, Leonard Bernstein, and the first performance in Ireland of Samuel Barber's piano concerto.
Martin's CD featuring the piano music of the English composer Billy Mayerl who died in 1959 was released in 2012 with volume 2 due for release in June 2015 by Somm Recordings.
Martin's interest in art led to him gaining an Open University degree in art history in 2009. He is also an Honorary Fellow of the Royal Academy of Music in London and a member of Aosdana, Ireland's academy of creative artists. In 2012 he was awarded a professorship by the City University of Birmingham, England, for his outstanding contribution to the arts.
Among his best known piano works are The Rainbow Comes And Goes and In a Thousand Valley's Far and Wide, both commissions from the GPA (now AXA) International Piano Competition in Dublin.
Martin continues to be in demand as a pianist, composer and teacher.