Biography
Tasha Watson is a professional musician and pianist. She started playing the piano aged 3, inspired by a musical family: her mother played the piano in a jazz band called Fish Out of Water, and supported disabled musicians with her record label Stream Records. Her Dad, a music author, wrote two books entitled Irish Rock and Ambient Century, plus copious articles for professional music magazines across his career. Music was and is a massive part of her life. Her mother taught her piano until grade 3, aged 8, and she was taught by Gareth Davies up to grade 8 level, aged 17.
Natasha read music at Goldsmiths College, University of London, and graduated with a first class honours degree in 2014. She focused her time on orchestration, performance and composition, taught by Maria Kravenski, Alexander Ivashkin and Alistair Zaldua. Her interests diversified with her study of African and Asian music with Barley Norton, which took her interests into Malian, Indonesian and North Indian Music, and she embarked on an Ethnomusicology degree at SOAS University of London. Here, she picked up the kora and immersed herself in West African and Cuban music. Whilst there, she played in the kora ensemble Mande Strings, and majored in kora performance and voice. She graduated in 2019 with distinction.
Natasha’s interests in music also include choral singing. She had a choral scholarship to sing in St. Margaret’s Church from 2011-2014, singing in annual cathedral visits around the UK, and she continued to sing with the choir for a few years afterwards, now visiting most years for Christmas evensong. Natasha is now a member of The Royal Choral Society (2016 and 2021-present), and has enjoyed singing in venues including the Royal Albert Hall, Royal Festival Hall, Chelmsford Cathedral and St. Giles, Cripplegate.
Natasha also played Indonesian gamelan with Sekar Enggal based at City, University of London from 2016-2022, partaking in concerts in Wales and King’s College Cambridge. Lastly, Natasha is a keen kora player.
