An afternoon personal guided-excursion of the city to calm the nerves and help settle the mind from yesterday's day of masterclasses; a hearty Russian soup and dumplings to shake off Saint Petersburg’s chilling wind; and a rehearsal followed by Russian pastries and tangy green apples to keep energy levels up – it can only mean one thing... In a few hours Guildhall School musicians Alexandria, Emelia, Ugne, Jonathan and Liam would be making their Russian #debut! R to L: Jonath

Have you ever thought you were being ‘helpful’ only to find that your meddling was… unhelpful? This blog post is a bit of a fly-on-the-wall moment looking at this. In it you can have a glimpse of the kind of work I've been putting in behind the scenes with the Guildhall School students as part of the Year of Music UK-Russia project ‘A Voice between Nations’. As musicians we often like to think of ourselves as that helpful link between a composer’s ‘idea’ or concept, and the