As a solo
cellist, Lowri Blake has broadcast over one hundred and fifty recitals
and concertos on BBC Radio and Television, including televised
performances of the Dvorak cello concerto, Vivaldi concertos and of
Peter Sculthorpe's Threnody. She has appeared as soloist with
major British orchestras including the London Philharmonic Orchestra in
performances of the Elgar Concerto at the Royal Festival Hall in London
and with the BBC National Orchestra of Wales, BBC Scottish Symphony
Orchestra and BBC Concert Orchestra. Lowri has given many solo recitals
in the Wigmore Hall and South Bank Centre in London, and other major
venues in Europe and the USA.Lowri's own CD label Lowri Records shows the diversity of her musical interests. An eclectic mix, the recordings include the sonatas of Elgar and Bridge, music for cello and harp entitled Song of the Black Swan; The 1948 Sonatas (Myaskovsky, Carter and Poulenc); and Captain Cook’s Cello, with specially-commissioned music for solo cello and voice by Australian and British composers. Visible Bass Line, with her duo partner Peter Buckoke as A Man, a Woman and a Double Bass, is an entertaining mix of classics, contemporary and cabaret in which Lowri sings and plays at the same time! She has also recorded a number of CDs on the Pearl and Etcetera labels of music for cello and piano by Bridge, Busoni and Fauré, and her disc of Saint-Saëns sonatas was awarded a Diapason d’Or.
Lowri has made many appearances on the popular BBC Radio 3 programme CD Review, as writer and presenter of the features Building a Library and New Chamber Music Releases, and has often been heard interviewed on other favourite BBC Radio programmes including Woman’s Hour, In Tune and Lebrecht Live. She has appeared on BBC4 TV as a guest commentator on the Proms, live from the Royal Albert Hall. In 2007 Lowri presented Page to Performance, a series of music programmes for BBC Radio 4 that explored the genesis of Wagner’s Prelude and Liebestod and Gershwin’s I Got Rhythm Variations through to their first performances. She presented a further series of three programmes in 2008, and Debussy's Summer of 1912 on BBC Radio 3, all of which were chosen for Radio 4's Pick of the Week. Most recently, Lowri was writer and presenter of Hidden Composers on BBC Radio 3, uncovering the chamber music of two largely forgotten French women composers, Mel Bonis and Louise Héritte-Viardot. A further series of Page to Performance follows in 2011.
Until her move to the south of France in 2005, Lowri was professor of cello at the Royal College of Music and Trinity College of Music, London. Her publications include The Really Easy Cello Book and editions for Faber Music, and writings on music and musicians in the Guardian, ESTA journal, Sheet Music Review, and academic publications. Lowri is a regular participant at Open Chamber Music at the International Musicians Seminar, Prussia Cove, Cornwall, and at Dartington International Summer School (returning in 2010), giving cello masterclasses and recitals.
Major musical influences include her cello teachers Prudence Ashbee, Christopher Bunting, Jacqueline du Pré and Johannes Goritzki, and composer Hugh Wood, with whom she studied Music at Cambridge University.
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