Hailed as an artist of ‘magnificent pianism’ with an ‘engaging personality’, Guernsey-born pianist Tom Hicks has been praised for his ‘brilliantly evocative’ and ‘gorgeously creative playing’ that ‘transports the listener to another place and another time’.
Hicks is a gold medalist in competitions including the Wales International Piano Competition, Croydon Piano Concerto Competition, EPTA UK Piano Competition, Evanston & North Shore Scholarship Competition and Connecticut Young Artist Piano Competition. He was also a finalist in the New York International Piano Competition and a semi-finalist in the Ferruccio Busoni International Competition. In addition, he has won awards such as the Gold Medal Award and Peter Frankl Piano Prize from the Royal Northern College of Music; the Faculty of Humanities Outstanding Academic Achievement Award, the Keith Elcombe Prize for Best Overall Performance and three Proctor-Gregg Performance Prizes from the University of Manchester; and the Richards’ Prize for Piano and Musicianship and the Dennis Midwood Keyboard Prize from Chetham’s School of Music.
After lessons in Guernsey with Mervyn Grand, Hicks studied with Murray McLachlan at Chetham’s School of Music in Manchester and continued with him on the prestigious joint course at The Royal Northern College of Music and Manchester University, graduating with the highest mark in the history of the department. Since 2015 he has been based in America, studying with Boris Berman at Yale University’s School of Music and with James Giles at Northwestern University’s Bienen School of Music. He has performed in masterclasses with musicians including Emanuel Ax, Joseph Banowetz, Michel Beroff, Andrea Bonatta, Philippe Cassard, Peter Donohoe, Christopher Elton, Peter Frankl, Stephen Hough, Leslie Howard, Eugen Indjic, Yoheved Kaplinsky, John Lill, Jon Nakamatsu, Steven Osborne, Pascal Rogé, Martin Roscoe, Boris Slutsky, Kathryn Stott, Vladimir Tropp and Simon Trpčeski.
Hicks has an expansive repertoire and has appeared as recitalist in venues such as The Wigmore Hall, St John’s Smith Square and St Martin-in-the-Fields in London, The Pump Rooms in Bath, The Bridgewater Hall in Manchester and in many other venues throughout Europe and the United States. He has appeared as concerto soloist on more than 50 occasions. This includes two complete cycles of Rachmaninoff’s Piano Concerti, most recently with the Stockport Symphony Orchestra. His performances of late Romantic masterpieces and the music of early 20th Century English, French and Russian composers have been particularly celebrated by critics.
In 2019, Hicks released a recording of John Ireland and Tchaikovsky, supported by the John Ireland Charitable Trust. The CD has been celebrated by critics writing for magazines including International Piano, Fanfare, Piano Journal and Classical Music Daily. In March 2022, Hicks will release an album for Divine Art featuring Liszt's Sonata in B minor and Ireland's Piano Sonata. This album also explores underrepresented colleagues of John Ireland: Charles Stanford, Samuel Coleridge Taylor and Rebecca Clarke. Hicks is also working with Camden Reeves, Professor of Composition at the University of Manchester, on an album of new music for the Métier label in 2022. This follows premières of Reeves’ Tangle-Beat Blues in 2014, Nine Preludes in 2016 and Blue Sounds in 2019. Hicks’ interest in new music has led to collaborations with many other composers and in December 2019, he performed a new work for solo piano by American composer Augusta Read Thomas.
Hicks is a skilled accompanist and chamber musician. He has enjoyed coaching from Boris Berman, Hung-Kuan Chen, Leonard Elschenbroich, Mark Steinberg and Ralph Kirshbaum. Performance highlights include piano quintets by Schumann and Dvorak with the Coull Quartet in 2017 and 2018, a vocal-piano recital of Victor Hugo song settings with Casey-Joe Rumens in 2012 and a performance on two pianos of Stravinsky’s Rite of Spring with Eylam Keshet in 2016.
In 2019, Hicks gave the launch recital as Artistic Director of the Fanny Davies International Piano Series, an ambitious project bringing inspiring masterclasses and recitals to students and audiences in Guernsey. Guest artists have so far included Harry the Piano, Joanna MacGregor and Alexander Panfilov. He also co-founded Guernsey-based modern music ensemble Terra Nova in 2012 and has since overseen local premières of Bartok’s Sonata for Two Pianos and Percussion, Reich’s Different Trains, Stravinsky’s Rite of Spring and has commissioned new works from several British composers including Josh Cottam, Lydia Pugh, Will Roberts and Jack Sheen (the 2011 BBC Young Composer of the Year).
As a teacher, Hicks has taught piano performance at Yale University and currently lectures at Northwestern University while teaching a private studio in Evanston, USA.