The Contessa Fund

Raised in Salford, Joe Duddell is a composer, arranger and conductor who is at home in a wide range of genres and music worlds.

His works and collaborative projects have been performed by major ensembles in venues such as the Royal Albert Hall, Barbican Centre, Carnegie Hall and Sydney Opera House. He has been commissioned to write for Colin Currie, The King’s Singers, The Scottish Ensemble and the Carducci Quartet among others. He has also collaborated with the artists Chicane, Daughter, Elbow, Richard Hawley, James, Steve Mason, Alison Moyet, Nero and New Order.

Joe has been commissioned several times by the Manchester International Festival and the fashion brand Burberry. In 2023 he co-curated the BBC Northern Soul Prom at the Royal Albert Hall which has gone on to become the most watched Prom on the BBC iPlayer and subsequently toured extensively throughout the UK under Joe’s direction. His last premiere was given at the 2024 Three Choirs Festival written as a tribute to his teacher Steve Martland.

He currently teaches Songwriting and Composition at the Liverpool Institute of Performing Arts and is a member of the groups Drift Chamber, Ex Catalogue, Pullover and Stella Martyr.

Deborah Pritchard is an award-winning British composer known for her synaesthesia. Her music has been performed worldwide by ensembles including the London Symphony Orchestra, BBC Symphony Orchestra, BBC National Orchestra of Wales, London Sinfonietta, Philharmonia, BBC Singers, Gesualdo Six, the Choir of New College Oxford and soloists including Natalie Clein OBE, Nicola Benedetti CBE and Jennifer Pike MBE. She won a British Composer Award for her solo violin piece Inside Colour in 2017 and has been commercially released by NMC, Signum, BIS, Nimbus, Hyperion and Linn Records.Deborah received her DPhil from Worcester College, University of Oxford and holds Associate Membership of The Faculty of Music, Oxford and the Royal Academy of Music. She was Visiting Fellow at Keble College, Oxford from 2022-2023.

As a synaesthetic composer Pritchard has written in response to the artworks of Kandinsky, Turner,
Chagall and contemporary artists Maggi Hambling CBE and Hughie O’Donoghue RA. Her large-scale work Kandinsky Songs was premiered at the Forbidden City Concert Hall in Beijing, China in 2024 and her violin concerto Wall of Water, after paintings by Maggi Hambling, was performed at the National
Gallery in 2015 as Hambling exhibited, described by Gramophone as a ‘work that will take one’s breath away’. Her own paintings, created through her synaesthesia, have been described in The Times
as ‘beautifully illustrated…paying visual homage to those wonderful medieval maps of the world.’ She has exhibited at Keble College, Oxford, the Royal Academy of Music and has spoken at both the United Nations, New York and the RA

For a donation of £300 or more, you will be thanked with the following:
• Digital updates featuring behind-the-scenes content
• A dedicated contact within the Development team
• A total of four complimentary tickets to book for both concerts at Kings Place with drinks vouchers for the Rotunda Bar & Restaurant (your allocation will be managed by the Development team)
• Receive a signed programme by the composer and musicians
• Join us for two online Q&As hosted by Artistic Director Sam McShane in conversation with the composers
• Attend our 2026 Unwrapped Opening Weekend celebrations

For a donation of £500 or more, you will be thanked with all the above plus:
• Join us for two open-rehearsals at Kings Place or another London venue
• Step behind the scenes with members of our creative team on a technical building tour of Kings Place

For a donation of £1,000 or more, you will be thanked with all the above plus:
• A total of six complimentary tickets to book for both concerts at Kings Place with drinks vouchers for the Rotunda Bar & Restaurant (your allocation will be managed by the Development team)
• Meet with our senior creative team to learn more about our work with composers and the wider programme
• Meet the musicians at both concerts in 2026