Alice Giles

Alice Giles
Born	1961 Adelaide
Nationality	Australian
Occupation	Harpist

Alice Giles (born c. 1961) is an Australian classical harpist.

She was born in Adelaide, and trained with June Loney at the Sydney Conservatorium of Music. In 1982, aged 21, she won the 8th International Harp Contest in Israel. She was awarded a Churchill Fellowship and an Australia Council grant to study overseas. There she studied with Alice Chalifoux of the Cleveland Orchestra, and also with Lydia Shaxson and Judith Liber.

She has performed in many countries throughout Europe, the Americas, Israel and her home country. Her New York debut was at the Merkin Hall in 1983, and she has also performed at the Wigmore Hall in London.

Luciano Berio described her as "the most intelligent, sensitive and technically accomplished harpist" he had ever met. Berio considered her the foremost interpreter of his Sequenza II.

After touring and living overseas (mainly in Germany) for some years, Giles and her husband, the Israeli pianist Arnan Wiesel, returned to Australia permanently in 1998. Giles and Wiesel both taught at the ANU School of Music in Canberra, Giles from 1998 and Wiesel from 2000 as Head of the Keyboard Department. In 2012 they were both made redundant as part of funding cuts. They were advised they did not have the requisite set of skills. She now teaches at the Sydney Conservatorium and the Australian National Academy of Music in Melbourne.

She is the Artistic Director of the Seven Harp Ensemble. She is founder and director of the Harp Centre Australia, a not-for-profit organization dedicated to promoting the harp in Australia.

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