Our Work

Since our initial fundraising concert in July 2024, Clare has performed to 945 school children at six schools, and 70 prisoners at three prisons. Teachers reported that children were “mesmerised” by the music and one prisoner that it was the “only hour in four years in prison where I have felt any joy… where I have felt human again”.

We have a further twelve school concerts scheduled in March 2025 and a new project running at two prisons in Staffordshire in the spring. Composer Michael Betteridge will join Clare in workshops to co-create music for solo piano with prisoners, to be performed at prisons and concert venues across the UK in the 2025/26 season. The GPT will be supporting this work alongside Arts Council England and the Marchus Trust.

Responses from schools

"It was so refreshing for the children to have access to this sort of experience. It’s been a very long time since we did anything like this, and it is so important for them to have these enriching experiences. Every child was engaged though the session; the rapt expressions on their faces were so lovely to see and one of our budding pianists was positively bouncing with excitement. She hasn’t stopped talking about it!"

"She turned our school piano into a thing of magic and many of the children have said that they wish to write about her playing and add it to our ‘awe and wonder’ board. Thank you again for providing this high quality musical experience to our tiny school and inspiring our pupils."

"I was so excited ‘cos I am learning piano. I’m not very good yet but Miss Hammond was brilliant. She played so fast ….. she used all the piano and stretched her hands really wide in the very difficult piece by the composer from Korea. I don’t know how she remembers all that. I want her to come again - and I am going to try to practise more!"

Responses from prisons

"The best day I have had in Prison in four years. I have mental health problems and Clare Hammond's performance lifted my spirits massively. Music and art feed the soul."

"To witness such beauty in this environment was something I will never forget. It reminds you how certain human experiences cross all boundaries - even prison walls."

"[The concert] is about both appreciating that people outside the prison care about us and helps me respect people."

"Afterwards, talking with the audience, there's a mixture of contentment, excitement and bemusement that they have been part of such a wonderful thing in such a sorrowful place."

Read articles on Clare's prison concerts by Jailhouse Moose and in the Classical Music Magazine.