Our Patrons
Introducing our patrons, their experiences of the therapeutic use of music and how they are supporting Key Changes
Roderick Williams OBE
Roderick Williams is one of the most sought after baritones of his generation. He performs a wide repertoire from baroque to contemporary music, in the opera house, on the concert platform and is in demand as a recitalist worldwide.
He enjoys relationships with all the major UK opera houses and has sung opera world premieres by David Sawer, Sally Beamish, Michael van der Aa, Robert Saxton and Alexander Knaifel. Recent and future engagements include the title role in Eugene Onegin for Garsington, the title role in Billy Budd with Opera North, Papageno for Covent Garden, and productions with Cologne Opera, English National Opera and Netherlands Opera.
Roderick sings regularly with all the BBC orchestras and all the major UK orchestras, as well as the Berlin, London and New York Philharmonic Orchestras, Deutsches Symphonie-Orchester Berlin, Orchestre Philharmonique de Radio France, Ensemble Orchestral de Paris, Accademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia in Rome, Cincinnati Symphony, London Symphony and Bach Collegium Japan amongst others. His many festival appearances include the BBC Proms (including the Last Night in 2014), Edinburgh, Cheltenham, Bath, Aldeburgh and Melbourne Festivals.
Roderick Williams has an extensive discography. He is a composer and has had works premiered at the Wigmore and Barbican Halls, the Purcell Room and live on national radio. In December 2016 he won the prize for best choral composition at the British Composer Awards.
In 2015 he started a three year odyssey of the Schubert song cycles culminating in performances at the Wigmore Hall in the 17/18 season and has subsequently recorded them for Chandos.
He was Artistic Director of Leeds Lieder in April 2016, is Artist in Residence for the Royal Liverpool Philharmonic Orchestra from 2020/21 for two seasons and won the RPS Singer of the Year award in May 2016. He was awarded an OBE in June 2017.
It gives me great pleasure to be associated with Key Changes, based in the wonderful city of Winchester where for some time, not one but both of my brothers were based. My new involvement with Key Changes gives me even more reason to strengthen my connection with Winchester.
I actually began my career as a classroom music teacher, some thirty-five years ago, and while life took a different direction for me, the teaching of music (and the use of music for teaching in far more general terms) has remained important to me ever since. At the same time that I observe how political, governmental interest in and valuing of state music education appears to be on the wane, I am also aware of the growing amount of evidence that demonstrates what I’m sure we all knew instinctively to be true; that creative arts are hugely important to human existence, to learning and development, and that of those arts, music has a very particular, almost magical power to make connections with all sorts of people, young, old, able-bodied, disabled those needing mental and physical support – the complete range of human beings. It’s the perfect example of a ‘no-brainer’.
I look forward to lending my support in whatever way I can to the work that Key Changes does, work that is fundamentally important in bringing enhanced quality of life and experience not just to the people on the receiving end of the therapy, but those musicians giving it too.
Helen Odell-Miller OBE
Helen Odell-Miller OBE is a researcher and clinician in music therapy. She is Professor of Music Therapy and Director of the Cambridge Institute for Music Therapy Research (CIMTR) at Anglia Ruskin University in Cambridge, United Kingdom.
Odell-Miller, was instrumental to early development of the music therapy profession in the UK, negotiating with the government and achieving professional recognition for music therapists. She was involved in the establishment of the Courses Liaison Committee for the Association of Professional Music Therapists, as well as the training standards for the Council for Professions Supplementary to Medicine Arts Therapists’ Board, served as the advisor to the Department of Health for music therapy for 11 years, and took a lead role in the documentation for the Health Professions Council (now known as the HCPC) for Standards of Practice and Standards of Education for Arts Therapists. Once the profession had gained greater recognition, she advocated for the switch from Postgraduate Diploma to MA level training to practice as a music therapist, thereby aligning the UK with European curriculums. In 2016 she was awarded Officer of the British Empire (OBE) for her services to music therapy.
I have watched Key Changes expand for many years, and I am proud to be a patron of this wonderful innovative music therapy organisation. As current Director of the Cambridge Institute for Music Therapy Research at Anglia Ruskin University, and previously Head of Arts Therapies in one of the earliest and largest mental health NHS arts therapies services; including contributing to the establishing of music therapy as a profession in the early 1980’s, I can see how pioneering Key Changes is. Regional and national presence is key to developing music therapy in key areas for people in populations where music therapy can make a difference. Key Changes is doing this in field of children and families, healthy ageing and mental health. In addition, Key Changes is leading dissemination of research in their nationally recognised regular conferences, with leading key music therapist researchers and clinicians as keynote speakers.