Rachel Stott is a viola player and composer. She played for many years with the Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment, London Classical Players and other period instrument orchestras while also exploring new music with Music Projects of London, Ensemble Exposé and the New Music Players. She performs with chamber music groups The Revolutionary Drawing Room, The Bach Players and Sopriola and explores repertoire for viola d’amore with both contemporary and baroque ensembles.
Rachel’s compositions have been performed at the London South Bank, Wigmore Hall, St John’s Smith Square, in UK festivals and abroad in Europe, America and Japan. Her first string quartet, Quiet Earth, was commissioned for performance by the Fitzwilliam String Quartet at the 2002 Swaledale Festival and a second quartet, The Enchanted Lyre, was performed by the Dante String Quartet at the Wigmore Hall in 2005. Winds Through a Symmetry, composed for the Callino Quartet, was composed during a residency at the Banff Centre for the Arts in Canada in 2015, and her most recent quartet, Euphonia, was written for the Revolutionary Drawing Room during the lockdown in London, spring 2020. She has recently completed a commission from the Society for Strange and Ancient Instruments for their trumpet marine project.
Aside from her work as a viola player and composer, Rachel recently completed an MA in Creative Writing at Royal Holloway, University of London. She is interested in projects which combine musical and literary skills. She has written a series for BBC Radio 3 entitled Harmony and Invention, adapted the script for the Revolutionary Drawing Room’s CD, A Viennese Quartet Party, and created the text for the recent Omnibus Classics release, Odysseus and the Sorceress.
Visit Rachel’s website here: