Virginia Taylor & Timothy Kain
Biography Virginia Taylor & Timothy Kain
Virginia Taylor
is recognised internationally as a leading pedagogue, flute performer and musician.
After winning 1st prize in a number of prestigious competitions, including the Symphony Australia Young Performers Awards, the Annual Pan Pacific Scholarship Award, and the Australian National Flute Competition, Virginia’s solo career began which has seen her perform concerti, solo recitals and chamber music across many countries.
As an orchestral musician, Virginia performed as Principal Flute with the Australian Chamber Orchestra for over 10 years, as well having been guest principal flute with many of the major symphony orchestras within Australia and overseas.
Virginia has released a number of CDs on ABC Classics, Tall Poppies, Move Records and a number of other labels. As part of a classical flute and guitar chamber duo with guitarist Timothy Kain, Virginia has been instrumental in commissioning many new Australian works for this combination and with Timothy, has given many world premiere performances, including works by Elena Kats-Chernin, Nigel Westlake and Mark Isaacs. In April 2017, their latest CD “First Milonga , Last Tango” was digitally released by the ABC. In 2018, Virginia also released a jazz-crossover CD with pianist Simon Tedeschi, released on the Move label.
Virginia is a regular performer at music festivals throughout the region, including the Hong Kong Youth Music Festival, the Tutti Beijing Festival, The Townsville Festival and the Canberra International Music Festival. She is also Artistic Director of the bi-annual Australian Flute Festival.
Timothy Kain
Initially inspired by popular music and flamenco to start playing the guitar, Timothy Kain’s first classical guitar lessons were with Sadie Bishop at the Canberra School of Music. After graduating, he lived in Spain and England where he studied with Jose Tomás and Gordon Crosskey, and won first prize in the Third International Guitar Competition in Alicante, Spain, and the Royal Northern College of Music Bach prize.
Tim’s performing and teaching activities have taken him all over the world, building an international reputation both as a soloist and chamber musician. In 1992 he was invited to join John Williams’ seven piece group “Attacca” and subsequently formed a duo with John, touring extensively in the UK and Australia and releasing internationally their award-winning CD, “The Mantis and the Moon” on Sony Classics.
A major focus of Tim’s musical activities has been a long-standing interest and involvement in Australian music. This has seen many fruitful collaborations with some of Australia’s leading composers, and commissions and performances of a large number of solo, chamber and concerto works for the guitar. Many of these have been recorded on the Sony, ABC Classics, Tall Poppies and CSM labels. His solo release, “Mirrors of Fire”, a CD of almost entirely specially commissioned pieces, forms an especially important addition to the catalogue.
Tim has performed and recorded with many of Australia’s leading musicians, including flautist Virginia Taylor (with whom he has recorded four CD’s), David Pereira, David Nuttall, Miwako Abe and Barbara Jane Gilby, as well as concerto performances with all of Australia’s symphony orchestras.
Tim was made a member of the Order of Australia, AM, in June 2013.
