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Who We Are

Management Team

Issie Barratt

Issie Barratt

Exec. Artistic Director

Issie Barratt is a multi-award winning internationally active composer, arranger, conductor, baritone player, record producer and educator. Ranked by BBC Radio 4’s Women in Music Power List 2018  as one of the 40 most influential women in the music industry,  Issie has performed at a majority of leading venues and festivals in Northern Europe. South-East India, Central America and the east coast of Canada. Known for her genre-fluid approach to composition, her diverse catalogue of commissions includes works for orchestra, big band, choir and chamber ensembles, often featuring internationally acclaimed soloists.

Issie runs her own three ensembles – A 21-piece jazz orchestra, Meinrad Iten Quartet and her ground-breaking ensemble INTERCHANGE (championing the music of women jazz composers performed by a diverse collective of female improvisers) and is the founding Director of Fuzzy Moon Records with a catalogue of 15 CDs championing a roster of over 100 performing artists.

Maia Fakolujo

Programme Manager

Maia is a composer and pianist who graduated in 2023 with a First-Class Honours Degree in Music Composition from the University of West London, where she was a recipient of the Laurence Llewellyn Scholarship and the Patricia Evans Composition Award. She has several years experience working in arts administration and project planning, and is delighted to join the NYJC team as Programme Manager.

Chris Wright

Chris Wright

Finance Manager

Chris Wright is a financial specialist with over 20 years’ experience of the charity sector, of small non-profit organisations, and of small to medium commercial ventures. He offers a bespoke service to his clients, tailored to their specific needs, and is happy to explore with them a wide range of accounting services.

Chris has a particular, but not exclusive interest in music, both as an accountant and as a professional singer.

Nadja von Massow

Nadja von Massow

Consultant Web Developer

Nadja is a digital communication strategist and creative consultant to the Jazz community, following a 20 year career heading up creative and digital teams in a number of leading eCRM and brand agencies.

Her agency, nadworks ltd. covers the entire ARM (Audience Relationship Management) spectrum for international artists and organisations such as the Scottish National Jazz Orchestra, Claire Martin OBE, Joe Locke, Terreon Gully, Basho Music, Jazz from Scotland, as well as various record labels including LSO Live, Universal and Motéma.

As an artist management agency, nadworks also represent vibes player Joe Locke and provide tour management for small groups in Europe and in the US.

Harry Brain

Summer School Project Manager & Marketing Officer

Harry graduated from Cardiff University in 2021 with a First Class Honours Degree in Music, before moving on to a Master’s Degree at BIMM Institute Bristol & achieving a Merit in 2022. During his time at university, Harry played with multiple jazz and big bands as well as sitting on Cardiff University’s Jazz Society Committee.

Highlights of Harry’s professional career include performing with the Greater Gwent Youth Jazz Orchestra at Royal Albert Hall on multiple occasions. Travelling abroad to the Maldives to play guitar on a private island and playing with his own function band, Rock the Mike, across the UK.

Since graduating, Harry has continued to work as a freelance musician and guitar tutor, performing with his own function band regularly and working with many other function bands across the UK and abroad. Harry is now the Marketing Officer for NYJC and will be the project manager for NYJC’s 2023 Summer School’s.

President and Vice Presidents

Dave Holland, NYJC President

Dave Holland

President

Our President is jazz luminary Dave Holland – known for his work with many of the most formative names in jazz. Dave has regularly taken time to visit us from his home in New York, and takes part in our our National Youth Jazz Summer School.

Over the course of a nearly five-decade career, bassist/composer Dave Holland has never stopped evolving, reinventing his concept and approach with each new project while constantly honing his instantly identifiable voice. From the electric whirlwind of Miles Davis’ Bitches Brew-era band to the elegant flamenco of his collaboration with Spanish guitar legend Pepe Habichuela; accompanying the great vocalist Betty Carter in her last years to forging a new sound with the pioneering avant-garde quartet Circle alongside Chick Corea, Anthony Braxton, and Barry Altschul; standing alongside legends like Stan Getz, Hank Jones, Roy Haynes, and Sam Rivers to providing early opportunities to now-leading players like Chris Potter, Kevin and Robin Eubanks, or Steve Coleman; Dave Holland has been at the forefront of jazz in many of its forms since his earliest days.

Sir Karl Jenkins

Sir Karl Jenkins

Vice Presidents

Sir Karl Jenkins is one of the most performed living composers in the world. Educated at Gowerton Grammar School, Cardiff University and the Royal Academy of Music, London, The Armed Man: A Mass For Peace alone has been performed over 2000 times in 20 different countries since the CD was released while his recorded output has resulted in seventeen gold and platinum disc awards.

A Doctor of Music, he holds Fellowships, Honorary Doctorates and Professorships at five universities or conservatoires, including the Royal Academy of Music, where a room has been named in his honour. In November 2009 he was given the Cymru For The World Award and in March 2010 was honoured with the Hopkins Medal given by the St. David’s Society for the State of New York.

In 2015 he was confirmed as the most popular living composer in Classic FM’s ‘Ultimate Hall of Fame’ and holds the Classic FM ‘Red f’ award for ‘outstanding service to classical music’. He was awarded a Knighthood in the 2015 Queen’s Birthday Honours for “services to composing and crossing musical genres” and his autobiography Still with the Music was published by Elliott & Thompson. His music is published exclusively by Boosey & Hawkes.

Julian Joseph

Julian Joseph OBE

Vice President

Acclaimed as one of the finest jazz musicians to emerge this side of the Atlantic, Julian Joseph has devoted his long career to championing the music across the British Isles and into the far corners of the globe. He has forged a reputation beyond his formidable skills as a composer and performer, and is universally recognised as a highly knowledgable and engaging broadcaster, musical ambassador and cultural advocate. His charitable work and generous skills as an educator have made a major contribution to Britain’s cultural landscape and heritage.

Through his patronage of a variety of educational programmes, Julian has become a formative presence in the dissemination of jazz music and its heritage to children of all ages. Since the launch of the ABRSM jazz syllabus in 1998, he has been at the forefront of initiatives to introduce jazz into mainstream music education, culminating in the foundation of his own Jazz Academy in 2013. His work has been recognised by many major cultural organisations, including the British Academy of Songwriters, Composers and Authors, which awarded him a Gold Badge in 2010.

Norma Winstone

Norma Winstone

Vice President

Since emerging on the London jazz scene in 1966 with an engagement at Ronnie Scott’s Club opposite Roland Kirk, Norma Winstone has worked with many of the major names on the British and European scene. Her voice could be said to define an entire era of British and European Jazz, from reinventions of The Great American Songbook to more abstract excursions into vocal timbre. She recorded five albums for ECM with the group Azimuth, with John Taylor and Kenny Wheeler. Her own album for ECM, “Somewhere Called Home” with John Taylor and saxophonist/clarinettist Tony Coe, has become almost a classic. Her voice has become an important part of Kenny Wheeler’s big band writing and can be heard in this context on the ECM recording “Music for Large and Small Ensembles”

She is a gifted lyricist and has written lyrics for many compositions by Steve Swallow, Kenny Wheeler and Ralph Towner. Her lyrics for the Jimmy Rowles composition “The Peacocks”, which she re-titled “A Timeless Place” has been recorded by many singers including Mark Murphy, Tierney Sutton and The Swingle Singers. She recorded it herself with the composer on an album called “Well Kept Secret” also with George Mraz and Joe LaBarbera. A collaboration with pianist Fred Hersch resulted in an album of his compositions with her lyrics called “Songs and Lullabies”.

Having won the Melody Maker Poll for Best Jazz Vocalist in 1971, she won the same category in the first BBC Jazz Awards in 2001, was nominated again in 2007 and 2008.

She was awarded an MBE in the Queen’s Birthday Honours List for services to music in 2007 and in 2009 won the Jazz Ahead Prize for her contribution to European jazz.

Her newest group is a trio featuring Italian pianist Glauco Venier and German saxophonist/bass clarinettist Klaus Gesing.

Their ECM album “Distances received a Grammy nomination as Jazz Vocal CD of 2008.

Board of Trustees

Dan Mar-Molinero

Dan Mar-Molinero

Trustee

Dan Mar-Molinero is a musician, composer and educator. He works part-time at the University of Southampton where he is Head of Jazz and Pop Performance. Dan’s work spans jazz and pop. Alongside his own jazz projects, he has performed and written with major artists across genres. His music has appeared on films, TV and includes top twenty hit records.

Dan is an experienced jazz educator, having taught in many different settings including NYJC. He has won national awards and recognition for his education work, much of it with the hugely successful SYJO.

Christine Allen

Christine Allen

Trustee

Christine runs Basho Music and works on projects with a number of British and international artists. She manages pianist/composer Gwilym Simcock, and the international supergroup “The Impossible Gentlemen”. Basho has produced a number of major tours including Kenny Wheeler’s 75th and Mike Gibbs’ 70th birthday big band tours, and a touring project with children’s Laureate Michael Rosen with the Homemade Orchestra. Basho Records has just released its 60th album.

For seven years Christine Allen was trustee of Jazz Services until April 2014, and Chair of the Jazz Services International Advisory Group.

James Joseph

James Joseph

Trustee

James is an artist manager, record producer, educator and impresario integral in the creation of major label jazz artists from the UK – Jason Rebello, Cleveland Watkiss and his brother, Julian. He continues to play a key role in guiding the careers of many other British jazz greats, as well as global artists including Nina Simone and Cassandra Wilson.

He has consulted for BBC Worldwide and has co-produced television and radio shows for the BBC and ITV. Film and the stage are important facets of his reach as an executive producer for projects in Opera and Ballet including collaborations with critically acclaimed choreographer Sheron Wray whose company, JazzXchange when resident at the Royal Opera House commissioned music from contemporary Jazz heavyweight maestros Byron Wallen, Julian Joseph and Wynton Marsalis.

James advocates quality music making with a record of supporting and creating music series’ on television (Jazz with Julian Joseph) concert venues (Wigmore Hall, Barbican). A founder of the Julian Joseph Jazz Academy, trustee of National Youth Jazz Collective, supporter of HMDT Music, and a powerful adherent of WHBMA and Sahana’s vision for empowering young people through musical excellence. He also lectures at music academies, universities and conservatoires on the music business and focussed career planning for the music profession. James is a passionate proponent of excellence in the arts believing that music enriches and our society immeasurably and must be valued, encouraged, protected and championed.

He sits on several boards including those of the PRS Foundation and the Mayor’s Music Music Fund.

ruth herbert

Dr Ruth Herbert

Trustee

Dr Ruth Herbert is Director of Research and Head of Performance at the Centre of Music and Audio Technology, University of Kent, UK. A music psychologist and professional pianist, her research specialisms encompass music education, music in everyday life, music, health and wellbeing, music and consciousness and performance psychology. Publications include an edited volume on music and consciousness (OUP, 2019) and a book on the psychology of everyday music listening (Routledge, 2016), numerous chapters and journal articles plus mainstream magazine articles on aspects of music teaching and education She has undertaken consultancy work for the Daily Telegraph and the BBC.

A committed educator, Ruth is a Senior Fellow of the Higher Education Academy and an external examiner for the Guildhall School of Music and Drama and the Royal Academy of Music

Trustee

Bob Blizzard

Bob Blizzard

Trustee

It’s with great sadness that we announce the death of our dear Trustee, friend and passionate supporter of jazz & young people, Bob Blizzard. Bob was instrumental in helping NYJC grow, and loved both the music and musicians.

Bob was a Member of Parliament from 1997 to 2010. He set up and organised the Parliamentary Jazz Awards, the Yamaha Jazz Scholars Awards and the annual performance of a Youth Jazz Band (with a professional) in Parliament. Some say he turned the House of Commons into a kind of jazz club.

He also put on the annual Lowestoft Jazz Weekend in the town where he lived.