Anna-Maria began the violin at the age of four while living in London. At the age of eleven, she started at the Royal College of Music Junior Department (‘RCM JD’), where she studied violin with Gemma Farmer and Hilary Sturt and developed strong orchestral and chamber music skills, performing in several front desk orchestral roles.
At 18, she went to Cambridge to study Archaeology and Anthropology. While there, she continued her studies part time with Hilary Sturt and immersed herself in both orchestral and chamber music performance.
Solo work
After passing her grade 8 violin at the age of 15 with a high distinction, Anna-Maria concentrated her solo work on expanding her repertoire.
At the age of 17 she made her debut solo recital performance in Salisbury and continued to give solo recitals during her time in Cambridge. She also made her debut concerto performance while at University, where she performed Mozart’s G Major Violin Concerto.
Orchestral work
At the RCM JD Anna-Maria’s orchestral roles over the years included principal second of the Symphony Orchestra and co-leader of the Chamber Orchestra. Meanwhile her holidays included leading the Symphony Orchestra of the East Kent Holiday Music Trust from the age of 13 – 18 and leading the Mercury Orchestra in the Little Orchestra Group for several years.
After leaving school Anna-Maria went on to lead one of the Cambridge University Music Society Orchestras and co-lead Cambridge University Symphony Orchestra as well as performing with Isis, the Twentieth Century Music Society and freelancing with numerous other music societies.
While living in Nottingham from 2006 to 2014, Anna-Maria performed on an ad-hoc basis as a freelance orchestral and chamber music performer. She was a member of Nottingham Philharmonic Orchestra, in which she held the Principal Second Violin position for the January 2014 Family Variety Concert. She also worked regularly for Nottingham Chamber Orchestra, which she led in 2013.
Chamber music
In addition to orchestral work, Anna-Maria enjoys taking part in chamber music. She has done a significant amount of piano trio and quartet work, both as a freelance musician throughout the UK and during her education. In particular at RCM JD, where she performed some world premieres as part of a modern composers series, and then as a founder member of The Eclipse Trio at University, with whom she performed Messiaen’s Fin du Temps.
Teaching work
Anna-Maria began teaching violin after moving to the Nottingham area and quickly found that she got a huge amount of enjoyment from helping others develop a shared enthusiasm and love of playing. However, she put her teaching work on hold in 2014 while she took a few years of sabbatical, travelling in Spain and Italy to immerse herself in the cultures and learn Spanish and Italian, before moving permanently to Spain in 2018 to teach English.
She briefly returned to violin teaching via Zoom for a select few students during the COVID pandemic, and continued working with those students for a couple of years before her band work took over her schedule!
Rock and metal bands
Soon after moving to Barcelona, Anna-Maria gave in to a childhood dream and bought herself an electric violin. She was then approached in 2022 by a former English student to collaborate with his heavy rock band, Sixstrings, in their new acoustic song, “Kids of the War”. This collaboration quickly developed into a permanent position in the band, both playing violin and providing backing vocals.
Soon after her initial collaboration with Sixstrings, she also joined the alternative metal band, Azalea. The last two years have been spent working with Azalea, creating violin parts for all their current songs, collaborating in the composition of additional new songs, and recording their first album during 2024. The first songs from the album will be released from late November 2024 onwards, and the full album will be released in early 2025.
As well as the violin, Anna-Maria plays the piano and sings soprano. When not teaching English or away from home performing concerts with Sixstrings and Azalea, she also enjoys an active outdoors life: hillwalking and cycling; and she loves practising her Spanish and Catalan!
