Sophia Rahman

Known for her ‘supreme chamber-musical responsiveness’ (The Arts Desk), pianist Sophia Rahman is the artistic director of Whittington Festival, working since 2020 with world-class artists and mentoring some of the brightest instrumental and vocal talents of the younger generation.

A champion of the culturally under-represented, Sophia made the first UK recording of Florence Price’s piano concerto, for broadcast on BBC Radio 3 with the BBC National Orchestra of Wales. Several of her recordings of Rebecca Clarke and Dorothy Howells have been featured on BBC Radio 3, including on Composer of the Week.

Sophia played harpsichord in Chamber Domaine’s Brandenburg Project at Deal Festival, a three-concerts-in-one-day series repeated at the Wigmore Hall in 2025. She completed a 56-show run playing the upright piano solo part in Matthew Bourne’s The Red Shoes at Sadler’s Wells in January 2026. Sophia has appeared at top festivals like Gstaad, Pärnu and Kuhmo, collaborating with world-class musicians including Klaus Mäkelä, Augustin Hadelich and Steven Isserlis, whose class she has played at IMS Prussia Cove since 2011, and where she has also worked with a host of distinguished artists including Kim Kashkashian. Her interest in this field originated as a class pianist for the legendary cellist and teacher William Pleeth at the Britten-Pears School.

After attending the Yehudi Menuhin School, Sophia took a first-class honours degree in English from King’s College, London, completing postgraduate studies at the Royal Academy of Music and winning the Royal Overseas League’s collaborative and chamber music piano awards in consecutive years. ‘The best Bartok Contrasts I ever expect to hear’ David Nice in I’ll Think of Something Later.