Katalin Kertész, violin
Katalin Kertész, violin, was born in Budapest. After four years at the Béla
Bartók Conservatoire, she studied in Germany with Eckhard Fischer
and Annette-Barbara Vogel. Additional studies with André Gertler,
Tibor Varga and Nelly Söregi-Wunderlich also provided important
musical influences. Since moving to the UK she has performed on
both period and modern violin in a multitude of chamber groups
and ensembles, including The Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment,
The City of London Sinfonia, The Philharmonia, The London Handel
Orchestra, The Hanover Band, The Brook Street Band (including two
albums on the Avie label) and Ensemble Burletta (including an album
of chamber music for clarinet by Hans Gál for Toccata Classics).
Katalin has performed in such prestigious venues as the Wigmore
Hall, Southbank Centre, the Royal Albert Hall (at the BBC Proms)
and the Barbican and has given concerts in Europe, South Africa,

New Zealand, China and South America. She has appeared on the

BBC programme ‘In Tune’ and played at the Kuhmo Chamber Music

Festival in Finland.

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Jean Paterson, violin
Jean Paterson, violin, was born in north Pembrokeshire into a farming
family, moving later to Hampshire, and now lives in Oxford. She read
music at St Hugh’s College, Oxford, studying the violin with Emanuel
Hurwitz, and at the Royal Academy of Music with Manoug Parikian.
She later took up the Baroque violin with Micaela Comberti, and plays
with several period-instrument ensembles, including Florilegium, the
London Handel Orchestra, English Baroque Soloists, the Orchestra of
The Sixteen, Oxford Bach Soloists, and Oxford’s new period-instrument
orchestra, Instruments of Time and Truth. For several years she led the
period-instrument orchestra of English Touring Opera, The Old Street
Band, in their series of Handel operas. She has had a long association
with the Hampshire County Youth Orchestra, for which she was violin
coach for many years. In addition to her playing career, she is an active
teacher.

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Nichola Blakey, viola
Nichola Blakey, viola, was born and raised in Manchester, before
moving to London to begin her studies at the Royal Academy
of Music with James Sleigh. She took up the historical viola in her
second year with Jane Rogers and, since graduating, has enjoyed a busy
and diverse freelance career. She gives concerts and recitals across the
UK and abroad with ensembles and orchestras as diverse as Ex Cathedra, Collegium Musicum 90, the Brook Street Band, Solomon’s Knot, the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra and the BBC Philharmonic Orchestra. She has performed in the Royal Albert Hall (at the BBC Proms), Symphony Hall, Birmingham, and the Bridgewater Hall, Manchester, and toured Europe with various international non-classical artists. She has made several recordings for general release, including Handel’s Dixit Dominus with the Brook Street Band and the choir of Queen’s College Oxford for Avie, and has broadcast on BBC Radio 3 and Classic FM, as well as Capital Radio. Nichola is also a member of Ensemble Burletta. She coaches musicians at the New London Music Society Summer School.



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Cressida Nash, cello

Cressida Nash, cello, studied music at St Anne’s College, Oxford,
and cello with Ula Kantrovich at the Guildhall School of Music and
Drama, continuing as a postgraduate at Trinity College of Music,
London, with Lowri Blake. As a soloist, she has performed in France,
Germany, Greece, India and South Africa, and has travelled regularly
to the Netherlands to give recitals with Trio de L’Aer. In 2007 she
became a founder member of Musicians South West, with whom
she has performed widely, including a recital in Leipzig of sonatas
by Mendelssohn and Moscheles as part of the 2011 Gewandhaus
Mendelssohn and England Festival. She has been much in demand
as a continuo player, working regularly with The Bath Consort, Wells
Bach Society and Beaumont Singers and Orchestra, performing
alongside Gareth Malone in both the St Matthew and St John Passions,
and with Sophie Bevan in the Christmas Oratorio and Mass in
B minor. She joined the Kertész Quartet in 2015 and plays regularly
with Ensemble Burletta, with which she has recorded the clarinet
chamber works by Hans Gál for Toccata Classics.

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