Cellist and pedagogue Emma Ferrand has died aged 78

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The British cellist and pedagogue Emma Ferrand died on 26 October at the age of 78. She taught at the Royal Northern College of Music (RNCM) in Manchester for 42 years, from September 1976 until July 2018. She was made a Fellow of the RNCM in 2008.

Born on 1 October 1948 in London, Ferrand began playing the cello at the age of twelve, and attended London’s International Cello School. She studied with Douglas Cameron at the Royal Academy of Music, and from 1967 worked with Pierre Fournier as a postgraduate. She received an award from the National Federation of Music Societies in 1974, and the same year participated in a televised masterclass with Paul Tortelier.

Ferrand was a founder member of the Camden Chamber Orchestra, which became the Orchestra of St John’s Smith Square (now known as Orchestra of St John’s). She toured and recorded with the ensemble extensively. In the 1970s she also gave several solo performances at Wigmore Hall. With her husband, violinist Richard Deakin, and pianist Catherine Dubois she formed the Deakin Piano Trio, which toured regularly and made various recordings for Meridian Records.

During the 1980s and 90s, Ferrand assisted her close friend and colleague Ralph Kirshbaum at both the Manchester International Cello Festival, and the International Musician’s Seminar at Prussia Cove, Cornwall. In the mid-1990s she participated in an academic exchange with the Eastman School of Music in New York, and was also invited to sit on juries for several international music competitions, in countries including South Africa, Germany and Croatia.

In the 2000s Ferrand recorded two volumes of the Bach Cello Suites at Rydal Church in the Lake District, citing a particular appreciation of the building’s natural acoustic. She also recorded Northern Lights, a collection of works by Manchester-based composers, with pianist Jeremy Young.