Jonathan Freeman-Attwood

Professor Jonathan Freeman-Attwood is the 14th Principal of the Royal Academy of Music in London, and was appointed in 2008. Alongside his commitment to education, he is also writer, recording producer, broadcaster and freelance trumpet player.

He read music at the University of Toronto and graduated with First Class Honours before embarking on research at Christ Church, Oxford. He served for thirteen years as Vice-Principal & Director of Studies at the Royal Academy of Music under his predecessor Sir Curtis Price after a period as Dean of Undergraduate Studies between 1991-5 when he was responsible for launching the first Bachelor of Music performance degree in the sector, with King's College London, and under the aegis of the Centre of Advanced Performance Studies.

For over a quarter of a century in senior posts at the Academy, Jonathan Freeman-Attwood has played a leading role in launching pioneering programmes, major international relationships – nurturing a fifteen-year collaboration with the Academy’s sister-conservatoire in the USA, The Juilliard School – as well as several professional development initiatives, including the founding in 1997 of the Academy recording label (now with thirty titles to its name) to introduce talented young artists to the creative challenges of the studio. He has also assembled a roster of eminent international musicians as permanent staff or visiting professors. A close involvement in the artistic strategy of the Academy has led to the inauguration of successful community concert series, namely ‘Free on Fridays’, 400+ and, with the Kohn Foundation, a ten-year project to perform all of Bach’s sacred and secular cantatas. During his Principal-ship the Academy was granted Degree Awarding Powers from the Privy Council (2012) and has recently embarked on a number of transformational capital projects, including two new practice facilities and, from 2015, a major theatre and recital hall project to be completed in early 2017.

As a trumpet soloist Jonathan Freeman-Attwood has released nine solo albums, the majority with Linn Records, and has attracted wide critical acclaim for their musical originality and effective ‘re-imagining’ of the trumpet as a chamber instrument in reconstructions of works from c.1600 to the 20th Century. Initially with John Wallace and Colm Carey in 2003 he recorded The Trumpets that Time Forgot (Rheinberger and Elgar) before conceiving a series of programmes with pianist Daniel-Ben Pienaar: La Trompette Retrouvée (2007), Trumpet Masque (2008), Romantic Trumpet Sonatas (2010), A Bach Notebook for Trumpet (2012) and The Neoclassical Trumpet (2014).

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