Sally Whitwell

Whitwell was born in 1974 and grew up in Canberra. She learned to play the piano on her grandmother's "imposing beast of an instrument", including "Cockles and Mussels" and "Wedding of the Painted Doll".[1] In the 1980s she had piano lessons where "a classical tuition is what you would receive".[1] She also studied bassoon but from the age of 16, she concentrated on the piano.[2]

Whitwell attended Canberra Girls' Grammar School,[2] then the Australian National University's School of Music and completed a Bachelor of Music with Honours in 1997.[3][4] She completed further studies at Sydney Conservatorium of Music for a graduate diploma in accompaniment.[2] During her time at university she also worked part-time, both as a solo performer on the cabaret circuit and as part of ensembles.[5][6]

During the 2000s Whitwell provided session work for the Australian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC), whenever they wanted "something slightly left-field, or crossover, or contemporary".[1] By 2004 Whitwell provided piano for The Elizabethan Sydney Orchestra and their performance was included on an album by Various Artists for ABC Classics, Felix and Me: Musical Highlights from ABC Classic FM Breakfast.[7] In the following year she was one of the contributors to The Classic 100 Piano, a set of eight CDs, with piano-based tracks selected by listeners to ABC Classic FM.[8] She has also been involved closely with Gondwana Choirs as an accompanist for over ten years.

In 2009 she contributed Spiegel im Spiegel, with Sally Maer on cello, for the soundtrack to ABC-TV documentary special, Bombora – The Story of Australian Surfing, which describes a history of the sport and the 1963 instrumental single "Bombora", by The Atlantics.[9] In 2010 Whitwell released "Roadtrip", a self-composed score for flute and piano.[10] She was inspired by "the train commute I make weekly from Sydney to a university teaching job in Newcastle".[10]

For three days in November 2010, Whitwell worked at the ABC's studios to record her debut solo album, Mad Rush: Piano Music of Philip Glass, which was issued on 3 June 2011 by ABC Classics.[1][11] For the album she utilised a 102-note piano crafted by Australian company, Stuart & Sons.[1][12] Melissa Lesnie of Limelight noted in August that the album of works written by minimalist composer, Philip Glass, had become a "surprise hit, not least thanks to Glass's broad appeal across genre and age divides".[13] Whitwell told Lesnie that the Stuart & Sons piano "allows so many colours, such subtle gradations of dynamics, that you can't get on another instrument in my experience. A Stuart sound is like crystal, yet it's very flexible".[13]

At the ARIA Music Awards of 2011 Whitwell won the Best Classical Album award for her debut album.[14] In December The Australian's Mark Coughlan described her interpretation as "excellent throughout this disc, going beyond mere notational accuracy to breathe life and shape into the music".[15] Stephen Eddins writing for Allmusic declared "[her] disregard for conventionality bubbles through just about every aspect of her recording ... surprising rhythmic emphases may make anyone familiar with the piece sit up and do a double-take, and her tempo is about 25% faster than Glass' version ... [s]he brings acute intelligence and sensitive musicality to each of the pieces, most of which have a delicately melancholy tone".[12]

On her second album, The Good, the Bad and the Awkward (18 May 2012), Whitwell played piano, toy piano, harpsichord, recorder, and melodica.[16] Its theme was cinema-based music from various feature films including The Hunger (1983), The Portrait of a Lady (1996), Amélie (2001), The Hours (2002), and Twilight (2008).[17] The Canberra Times' Ron Cerabona summarised her selection "[s]ome are pieces of classical music; others are from original film scores and she associates each of them with a particular character".[2] At the ARIA Music Awards of 2012 she was nominated for The Good, the Bad and the Awkward as Best Classical Album.[18]

Whitwell has worked with Nadia Piave on vocals (soprano) as the duo une fois seule! and they performed on the Musica Viva series of concerts.[19] In February 2013 Glass performed the world premiere of his Complete Piano Etudes at the Perth Concert Hall.[20] Whitwell joined Glass and Japanese pianist, Maki Namekawa, on stage to present the 20 etudes.[20] Whitwell played seven of the etudes and according to Elizabeth Howard at theMusic.com.au "[she] surprised classical dilettantes with her serene style and humble manner. Her interpretation exhibited a softness that suggested an introspective exploration of Glass’s compositions" .[21] Coughlan described her style "[p]erforming from memory, she brought a fluid, organic approach to the musical structures, crafting the repetitive note patterns into elegant phrases that subverted the music's mechanical drive. With excellent control of tone colour, she played with warmth, brilliance and delicacy".[20]

On 6 September 2013 Whitwell issued her third solo album, All Imperfect Things: The Piano Music of Michael Nyman, which was engineered and produced by Virginia Read. At the ARIA Music Awards of 2013 she won another Best Classical Music category; Read won Engineer of the Year and was also nominated for Producer of the Year.[22]