This opportunity is designed for individuals from underrepresented backgrounds, including those based on age, civil or family status, disability, gender, membership of the Traveller Community, race, religion, sexual orientation, and socioeconomic status.
The bursary supports The Arts Council’s Equality, Diversity, and Inclusion Implementation Plan, acknowledging the unique challenges faced by these artists as they work to advance their careers and enhance their artistic practice. By offering financial support, the bursary provides the successful applicant with the freedom to concentrate on developing their practice and, if applicable, a specific project.
Violinist Maria Ryan is this year’s recipient of the Arts Offices new EDI Bursary.
About Maria Ryan
Award winning violinist and a native of Kilkenny, Maria is a member of the Banbha Quartet, supported by the National String Quartet Foundation, the recently founded Marble Collective and performs in Duo partnerships with Ciara Moroney and Dr. Gabriela Mayer. She also performed with the Prizm Trio as part of the Cork Orchestral Society Series and in Music for Kilkenny Spring series 2023 with Ciara Moroney.
In 2010, Maria moved to London to join Southbank Sinfonia; there she was awarded the position of Leader, and chosen to perform in their chamber music showcase at Wigmore Hall. Over the following ten years, Maria worked with some of the UK’s most prestigious orchestras, including the BBC Concert and Symphony Orchestras, the English Chamber Orchestra and the Philharmonia Orchestra, performing all over the world including Carnagie Hall New York, Konzerthaus Berlin and Shostakovitch Philharmonic Grand Hall St. Petersburg to name a few. She performed and tutored on a Music Network Residency in St. John’s Arts Centre Listowel with the Marble Collective in 2022, a Banbha Quartet Irish tour in 2023, and most recently created and delivered a five week education project with the Banbha Quartet and Music Generation Kilkenny in January 2024. The Banbha Quartet look forward to an extensive Irish tour in November 2024.
Maria is a recipient of the RDS Music Bursary, winner of the Heineken Violin Competition and she was awarded the Agility Grant by the Arts Council of Ireland in 2021. She studied at the CIT Cork School of Music with Ruxandra Petcu-Colan and subsequently at the Hochschule für Musik und Tanz in Cologne with Emilian Piedicuta.
Maria also works regularly with the Irish Chamber Orchestra, the National Symphony Orchestra, the RTÉ Concert Orchestra, Irish National Opera, Camerata Ireland and is a part time Lecturer at the MTU Cork School of Music.
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