Kris’s Music Story
Kris grew up in Sheffield and first started playing the piano at about age 5, influenced by his mother who was an enthusiastic amateur pianist. By age 8 he had decided though that he really wanted to play a brass instrument and so started playing the euphonium, then moved from this to trombone at about age 12.
Kris is a great example of someone who did not go to specialist music school but still has successfully achieved a career in music. He played and learnt trombone at school and played in lots of local brass bands, school music groups and played in the City of Sheffield Youth Orchestra. It was not until he was 16 that he had additional lessons every couple of weeks at the Royal Northern College of Music. The teacher there encouraged him to apply for the Guildhall School of Music, which is where he later went onto study.
Since graduating from the Guildhall School of Music, he studied in Germany with Fabrice Millischer, a renown trombone soloist. Fabrice’s teaching focussed more on being a soloist, in contrast to the Guildhall where it had been much more about how to blend the trombone sound with others in a section; about playing in orchestra and in a section. Since graduating Kris has won the Gold medal of the 2019 Royal Overseas League Music Competition and was first prize winner of the 2019 Jeju International Music Competition, 2018 International Tenor and Bass Trombone Competition in Budapest, the 2018 International Juozas Pakalnis Competition of Wind and Percussion Instruments in Vilnius and the 2019 International IPV Trombone Competition in Germany.
Kris has since stayed in Germany, currently working in Cologne. He has performed with several orchestras there and since 2021 is the solo trombonist of the WDR Symphony Orchestra, and previously a member of the German Radio Philharmonic Orchestra from 2016-2021. Germany has about 130 professional orchestras, more than any other country, whereas the UK has just 44 so it is a great place to be part of the orchestral scene. He still does work for the City of Sheffield Youth Orchestra, as well as teaching privately online and in person.