The Kanneh-Mason Family in Concert
Start time: 8pm
Approximate running time: 116 minutes, no interval
Please note all timings are approximate and subject to change.
This performance is subject to government guidelines.
Harriet Smith unpacks the success of the seven gifted Kanneh-Mason siblings.
What makes the Kanneh-Mason siblings so remarkable? Is it the fact that all seven of them seem equally obsessed with music? They are, by order of age, Isata (24), Braimah (22), Sheku (21), Konya (20), Jeneba (18), Aminata (15) and Mariatu (11), and all play either piano, violin or cello or a combination. Or is it the fact that their parents Stuart and Kadiatu – neither of them musicians but both musical – didn’t go down the more obvious hot-housing route with specialist music schools but instead opted for state education in Nottingham at a school that truly integrated music into the curriculum? Or is it the fact that they are equally at home playing Bob Marley, Mozart or medleys from the musicals?
One of the most striking things about the family is the way that music is music – they are as comfortable in their trio arrangement of the African-American spiritual Deep River as performing the classical greats. They grew up listening to all varieties of music – reggae, rap, rock, country & western, as well as classical. That was undoubtedly the secret to their semi-final success in Britain’s Got Talent in 2015, where, after their medley of Tchaikovsky, Prokofiev and Clean Bandit, even the famously prickly Simon Cowell waxed lyrical, commenting that the six of them (Mariatu was too young to participate at the time) were ‘probably the most talented family in the world’. Fellow-judge Amanda Holden hit the nail on the head when she summed up their performance with the observation: ‘So many younger people might think this music is stuffy and you give it personality and character and fun: I think you could probably introduce it to a whole new audience of people who have never really appreciated that kind of music before.’
How right she was, and in the five years since then the siblings have made their mark both individually and as a family. In 2016 cellist Sheku Kanneh-Mason was the first-ever black musician to win the coveted BBC Young Musician, a competition that has been running since 1978. But he’s not the only one in the family to have made his mark there, with pianist sisters Isata and Jeneba reaching the keyboard finals in 2014 and 2018 respectively. The family have also performed at the BAFTAs and in 2018 Sheku reached an audience of two billion worldwide when he played at the wedding of Prince Harry and Meghan Markle. Sheku and Isata have both made best-selling recordings and all seven will shortly release a new album built around Saint-Saëns’s Carnival of the Animals with new poems by Michael Morpurgo, of War Horse fame, read by Morpurgo and Olivia Colman, together with irresistible illustrations by Emma Chichester Clark.
But before we get carried away by the fairy-tale aspect of the Kanneh-Masons, let’s not forget that this has come about through a mix of talent, hard work and a certain amount of sacrifice too, as Kadiatu relates in her recently published book House of Music. She doesn’t like the word ‘talent’ very much though. ‘I think all children actually have genius … and it’s all about championing that. What we saw in Isata, our eldest, was incredible facility and we decided to channel it in music, and absolutely encourage it.’ She explains: ‘Genius is something you really, really want to do, which is probably more important than something called “talent”. It’s loving something, wanting to do it, having the thirst to do it, and then channelling that hard work. It’s not something you are born with, because if you do nothing about it, it goes nowhere.
So clearly she’s of the nurture rather than nature way of thinking. What impresses, whether watching the siblings perform together or as individuals, is a down-to-earth quality that is immensely engaging, which comes across very vibrantly in Alan Yentob’s documentary about the Kanneh-Masons as part of BBC1’s Imagine series created over Zoom during lockdown.
This period was clearly as intense an experience for the Kanneh-Masons as for any other family in the country (though with better music!). The siblings proceeded to stream concerts, as well as sharing, as restrictions eased, impromptu outdoor socially distanced busking sessions. As Isata explained to Alan Yentob: ‘We’ve been kept sane by playing music together.’ And it proved a time of opportunity as well as limitation, with pianists Isata and Jeneba learning all the Chopin studies between them. The arrangement from Fiddler on the Roof, for instance, with which today’s concert ends, was also created during that time. It was a musical they watched a lot when growing up and, Konya says, ‘we were thinking about new medleys that all of us could play so we didn’t have to play Monti’s Czardas for ever, so this one came to mind.’ Perhaps the last word should go to Braimah: ‘Music teaches you so much – listening, hard work, perseverance – whether you want to pursue music as a career or just for fun’. You can’t say fairer than that.
Approximate running time: 116 minutes, no interval
Please note all timings are approximate and subject to change.
This performance is subject to government guidelines.
Programme and performers
Dmitri Shostakovich Piano Trio No 1 in C minor
Franz Schubert Impromptu No 4 in A-flat major, D899
Impromptu No 4 in F minor, D935
Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky Mélodie, Op 42 No 3
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart Piano Trio in B-flat major, K502 Mvt III)
Samuel Barber Sonata for Cello & Piano, Op 6 Mvt III
George Gershwin Three Preludes
Eric Whitacre The Seal Lullaby (arr Simon Parkin)
Jerry Bock Fiddler on the Roof medley (arr Kanneh-Masons)
Isata Kanneh-Mason piano
Braimah Kanneh-Mason violin
Sheku Kanneh-Mason cello
Konya Kanneh-Mason violin/piano
Jeneba Kanneh-Mason cello/piano
Aminata Kanneh-Mason violin
Mariatu Kanneh-Mason cello
Sheku and Isata Kanneh-Mason appear by kind permission of Decca Records
Artist biographies
Isata Kanneh-Mason’s debut album, Romance, was released in July 2019 to critical acclaim, entering the UK classical charts at No. 1. A graduate of the Royal Academy of Music, Isata Kanneh-Mason now performs worldwide as a solo recitalist, concerto soloist, and chamber musician. She also continues to perform with her siblings, including regular duo recitals with her brother, Sheku. From the 20/21 season, Isata will be Young Artist in Residence at the Royal Liverpool Philharmonic. Forthcoming highlights include debuts with the Gothenburg, Vienna Tonkünstler, and Baltimore Symphony orchestras, among others, and solo recitals at the Wigmore Hall, Queen Elizabeth Hall, Salzburg Mozarteum, Bergen Festival, and on tour in the US and Canada. A category finalist in the 2014 BBC Young Musician, Isata has since performed several times on television and radio, and made her BBC Proms television presenting debut in 2019.
Braimah Kanneh-Mason has recently graduated from The Royal Academy of Music, and is currently taking lessons with Mateja Marinkovic. He was a scholarship student with Jack Liebeck at the Royal Academy of Music, where he was winner of the Harold Craxton Chamber Music Prize.
Braimah has performed as a soloist with orchestras throughout the UK. With the Kanneh-Mason Piano Trio, he has played at venues such as The Wigmore Hall, The Elgar Room at The Royal Albert Hall, St John’s Smith Square and in Europe, USA and the Caribbean. He has also played at several international chamber music festivals.
Braimah has recordings with Atlantic/Warner and Decca Classics, including the Kanneh-Mason album, Carnival.
Braimah currently performs on a Jean Baptiste Vuillame, kindly lent to him by the Beare’s International Violin Society.
2016 BBC Young Musician, Sheku is in demand from orchestras and concert halls worldwide, and famously performed at the Wedding of the Duke and Duchess of Sussex. In January 2020, released his second album, Elgar, featuring the composer’s Cello Concerto with Sir Simon Rattle and the London Symphony Orchestra, which reached No. 8 in the overall UK Official Album Chart.
Sheku has made debuts with the Atlanta, Baltimore, BBC, Frankfurt Radio, Seattle symphonies, the Japan, London, and Royal Liverpool philharmonics, the Orchestre Philharmonique de Radio France, and the NDR Elbphilharmonie Orchestra. Forthcoming highlights include the BBC Scottish Symphony Cleveland, City of Birmingham Symphony, Czech Philharmonic, Deutsches Sinfonie-Orchester Berlin, and Stockholm Philharmonic orchestras.
Recital performances include Wigmore Hall, Zurich Tonhalle, Lucerne Festival, Théâtre des Champs Elysées Paris, Teatro della Pergola Florence, and a tour of North America including New York’s Carnegie Hall. Upcoming debuts include L’Auditori Barcelona, Madrid’s Auditorio Nacional, and the Berlin Philharmonie.
Sheku is an ambassador for Music Masters, Future Talent, and JDRF. He is a student of Hannah Roberts at the Royal Academy of Music and was appointed an MBE in the 2020 New Year’s Honours List.
Konya Kanneh-Mason is 20 years old and holds The Gilling Family Scholarship at The Royal Academy of Music, studying piano with Tessa Nicholson.
Konya plays solo and chamber music, and has performed in concerts around the UK and in the Caribbean, including at Marlborough House and at The BAFTAs, 2018. Her concerto performances include Mozart K414, Shostakovich Piano Concerto No 2, Schumann Piano Concerto and Mozart’s Triple Piano Concerto No 7 (K242). She will play Beethoven Concerto No 1 in 2021, and perform in concert tours of Antigua and Australia. Konya has appeared with her siblings on numerous television and radio programmes, most recently on BBC Radio 3 and in the Imagine documentary for BBC1, This House is Full of Music.
Konya has recorded on the Decca Classics album, Carnival.
Jeneba Kanneh-Mason is eighteen years old and holds the Victoria Robey Scholarship to The Royal College of Music, studying piano with Vanessa Latarche. She also plays cello.
Jeneba was a Keyboard Category Finalist in BBC Young Musician 2018, and has won the Murs du Son Prize at the Lagny-Sur-Marne International Piano Competition in France, and the Iris Dyer Piano Prize at The Royal Academy of Music.
She is a recital, chamber and concerto soloist, playing around the world, most recently at The Royal Festival Hall. She will undertake concert tours of Australia and Antigua with the Kanneh-Masons in 2021.
Jeneba has appeared on several television and radio programmes, including Radio 3, The BAFTAs, The Royal Variety Performance, the BBC documentaries, Young, Gifted and Classical, and This House is Full of Music. She has recorded for the album, Carnival, with Decca Classics.
Jeneba is grateful to Lady Robey, The Nottingham Soroptimist Trust and to The Nottingham Education Trust.
Aminata is fifteen years old and attends Trinity Catholic School in Nottingham and The Junior Royal Academy of Music, studying violin with Lorraine MacAslan and piano with Sarah Pickering.
Aminata has performed throughout the UK, and in the Caribbean, playing solo, chamber music and as a concerto soloist. She has forthcoming concert tours to Australia and Antigua with the Kanneh-Masons.
Aminata has appeared on several television and radio programmes with her siblings, including the BBC4 documentary, Young, Gifted and Classical, and the BBC1 Imagine documentary, This House is Full of Music. She has also recorded on the album, Carnival, for Decca Classics.
Aminata is very grateful to The Nottingham Soroptimist Trust and to the Nottingham Education Trust for their support.
Mariatu is eleven years old and attends Trinity Catholic School in Nottingham. She studies cello with Ben Davies, and piano with Fiona Harris at Primary Royal Academy of Music. She has Grade 8 distinction on the cello and is working towards Grade 7 piano.
She has performed with the Kanneh-Masons in a series of concerts around the U.K. and in Antigua and Barbuda and has forthcoming concert tours with the Kanneh-Masons in Antigua and Barbuda, and Australia.
Mariatu has appeared on several television and radio programmes with her siblings, including BBC 1 The One Show and the BBC4 documentary, Young, Gifted and Classical, CBS Sunday Morning (USA), ITV Royal Variety Performance, and the Imagine documentary for BBC1, This House is Full of Music. She has also recorded for the Decca Classics album, Carnival.
