Pleyel Ensemble
was formed in Manchester in January 2011. We are friends and colleagues who draw on a wealth of experience gained through many years of music-making. Since our formation, we have given over 200 concerts, and have an enormous and varied repertoire of chamber music. The Pleyel Ensemble is delighted to be chosen as Making Music Recommended Artists for 2018/’19 for the second time in three years and has appeared at Music Societies and Festivals all over the UK.

We take our name from the Classical composer Ignaz Pleyel (1757-1831), a brilliant musician and businessman, who, in addition to writing a large body of accessible chamber music, helped increase the popularity of this wonderful kind of music-making amongst amateurs and professionals as both music publisher and piano manufacturer in the early nineteenth century.

As an ensemble comprising wind, strings and piano we are able to offer a diverse repertoire with many instrumental combinations available. From a Trout to a Bumblebee or an Archduke to a Gypsy, anything is possible!

We make British music a priority. Between us we have commissioned or premiered more than a hundred works and recognise both the importance and necessity of continuing this work.

Benedict Holland
studied at the Royal Academy of Music with Manoug Parikian and was subsequently a prize-winner at the Royal Northern College of Music, where he studied with Yossi Zivoni.

He was a founder member of the Matisse Piano Quartet and the Music Group of Manchester, broadcasting regularly for the BBC, recording, and undertaking British Council tours and is a member of the Victoria String Quartet whose acclaimed début concert took place in 2017. Also an experienced orchestral leader, he has guest-led many of the UK’s major orchestras, including the Hallé, Royal Liverpool Philharmonic, Northern Sinfonia, Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra, City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra, Scottish Ensemble, Orchestra of Opera North and BBC Philharmonic.

Ben has always championed contemporary music, working with composers Harrison Birtwistle, John Casken, Brett Dean, Oliver Knussen, Steven Mackey, Anna Meredith, Mark Simpson and Duncan Ward, and has been Psappha’s violinist since 2010. Personal highlights with Psappha include collaborations with Peter Maxwell Davies, taking Klas Torstensson’s Violin Concerto to a residency at the Hong Kong Academy for Performing Arts, premiering Mark Simpson’s chamber opera Pleasure, a tour to Israel of Maxwell Davies’ Eight Songs for a Mad King and a recent recording for the BBC of Charlotte Bray’s evocative concerto Caught in Treetops.

Ben has been the leader of chamber orchestra Sinfonia ViVa since 2001 and the orchestra’s Artistic Advisor since 2006, appearing as both director and soloist. Recent solo appearances include works by Beethoven and Schubert, and a performance of Mozart’s A major concerto, broadcast on Classic FM.

Ben teaches at the RNCM, where he was awarded a professorship in 2016, Junior RNCM, and Chetham’s School of Music. He gives consultative classes in orchestral and contemporary techniques at Birmingham and Trinity Laban Conservatoires and professional development classes for string teachers throughout the UK. He plays on a rare violin by Rogeri of 1710.