Gillian Blair

British Saxophonist Gillian Blair holds Bachelors and Masters degrees from the Royal Northern College of Music where she studied with Rob Buckland, Carl Raven and Andy Scott. She is now on the teaching faculty at the Junior Royal Northern College of Music and the Universities of Sheffield and Huddersfield.

In addition to one-to-one saxophone lessons, Gillian has given masterclasses in the UK, Europe and USA and has run workshops and education projects for the RNCM Saxophone Day, Chester Festival, Piccadilly Symphony Orchestra, the Royal Northern Sinfonia and RNCM Young Saxes, as well as being an artist for Yehudi Menuhin's 'Live Music Now' scheme.

Gillian has won competitions including the International Young Musician Competition (Llangollen Eisteddfod), the D’Addario Single Reed Competition and the RNCM Woodwind Soloist Competition. She has performed at festivals and concert series' including the BBC Proms, World Saxophone Congress (St Andrews, Strasbourg, Zagreb), EurSax (Porto), Koganei Miyajigakki Hall (Tokyo) and regular recitals around the UK. As a concerto soloist she has performed with ensembles including the Band of the Coldstream Guards, Commonwealth Youth Orchestra and the City of Peterborough Symphony Orchestra.

Gillian performs with the Borealis Saxophone Quartet and Polaris Duo (Saxophone & Harp) as well as larger ensembles including Opera North, BBC Philharmonic Orchestra, Tenor Saxophone Collective and the European Union Youth Wind Orchestra.

Gillian is a Henri Selmer Paris Artist and a Vandoren UK Artist.