Education: MA Music Performance at University of Chichester, CPD at Guildhall School of Music and Drama, BA(Hons)Film Studies at Solent University.

Patrick Ytting (born 1981) is half Danish, half Swedish. He started piano lessons with Japanese pedagogue Kyoko Kato and after only a year placed second in his local Steinway piano contest. Study followed with Danish concert pianist Nikolaj Koppel, for some time musical director of Tivoli’s Concert Hall in Copenhagen and with Juilliard graduate, pianist Christina Bjørkøe. Patick studied theory of composition with Bodil Westergaard, assistant professor at the Royal Danish Academy of Music. In the UK Patrick has been fortunate to benefit from the guidance and encouragement of concert pianist Duncan Honeybourne and composer/pianist Terence Allbright. Patrick attended a masterclass with the head of keyboard from the Royal College of Music, Vanessa Latarche.

Whilst gaining Ba(Hons) in Film Studies in Southampton, Patrick’s interest in composing for film and media continued to develop. His final year project, for which he composed the original score, won first prize for documentary in the SI JVC Student Video Awards in 2003. Playing live, Patrick has collaborated with French flamenco guitarist and fellow enthusiast of ethnic music, Josselin Vauchelin, forming a world music ensemble with piano, flamenco guitar, flute and three-piece percussion section. The group’s performance at the Southampton Access Festival was described in a review on the BBC website as having “hit the spot”.

Patrick holds a Master of Arts in Music Performance awarded by the University of Chichester in 2008. His degree recital comprised of concert works by Chopin and Liszt and Patrick also gave a lecture recital named “Ziryab – Modern Culture and the History of Flamenco”, charting the historical development of flamenco music from its roots in the 8th Century Spain, which was then under Moorish rule, through to the music’s later varied amalgamations with influences such as Romano Gypsy and Sephardic music, right up until the present day, showing that its origins have influenced our wider contemporary culture and traditions, whilst performing live demonstrations on Oud (Middle Eastern lute), Maroccan double-reed flute, Peruvian box percussion and playing flamenco arrangements and transcriptions on the piano.

Patrick’s piano debut took place on the 16th of November 2008 in Petworth, at a joint concert devised to extend the Petworth Festival, hosted by former festival artistic director, Terence Allbright, and sponsored by the Wiggonholt association. Patrick played a programme which included his own piano transcription of flamenco guitar work Luna De Cristal by Gerardo Núñez. Patrick is currently preparing rare Scandinavian piano works, some resurrected directly from the composers original manuscripts and possibly never before heard in concert. Patrick has completed continued professional development for instrumental and vocal teachers at music conservatoires and university music departments, which was held jointly at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama and the Institute of Education in London.