Timothy Ridout

Biography

Born in London in 1995, Timothy Ridout is one of today’s most sought-after viola players.
Highlights of his 2024/25 season include the world premiere of Mark Simpson’s Viola Concerto, Hold Your Heart in Your Teeth, at the Berlin Philharmonie with the Deutsches Symphonie-Orchester Berlin under Robin Ticciati. He is also performing Bartók’s Viola Concerto with the Orchestre Philharmonique Royal in Liège, Orchestra dell’Opera Carlo Felice in Genoa, Norrlandsoperan Symfoniorkester in Sweden, Orquesta Sinfónica de Tenerife, and Taipei Symphony; Walton’s Viola Concerto with the Tokyo Symphony Orchestra and Berner Symphonieorchester; and Mozart’s Sinfonia Concertante with the Ensemble Resonanz, Mozarteumorchester Salzburg, and Verbier Festival Chamber Orchestra.
Recent seasons have seen Ridout on tour throughout Europe, Asia, USA, Canada, South America, and Australia, appearing with orchestras including the Bavarian Radio Symphony, BBC Symphony Orchestra, Tokyo Metropolitan Symphony Orchestra, Netherlands Chamber Orchestra, hr-Sinfonieorchester, Tonhalle-Orchester Zürich, Chamber Orchestra of Europe, Hamburger Symphoniker, Camerata Salzburg, Orchestre de Chambre de Lausanne, the Hallé, Orchestre National du Capitole de Toulouse, WDR Sinfonieorchester Köln, BBC Philharmonic, and Philharmonia Orchestra. Across his engagements, he has worked with conductors such as Sir Simon Rattle, Sakari Oramo, Andrew Manze, Riccardo Minasi, Sir András Schiff, Lionel Bringuier, Sylvain Cambreling, Nicholas Collon, David Zinman, and Kazuki Yamada.
A committed chamber musician, Ridout continues to present both solo and ensemble programmes across venues such as Wigmore Hall, Concertgebouw Amsterdam, and Alice Tully Hall in New York. His partners include Janine Jansen, Isabelle Faust, Kian Soltani, Pablo Ferrández, Denis Kozhukhin, Benjamin Grosvenor, Federico Coli, and the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center. In addition to these engagements, in 2024/25 Ridout begins his tenure as part of Konzerthaus Dortmund’s ‘Junge Wilde’ series, which champions young rising stars in the classical music world. He also appears at festivals across Europe, including Verbier, Salzburg, Mecklenburg-Vorpommern, and Rosendal and has a residency at the Ryedale Festival in summer 2025.
Ridout regularly records for the harmonia mundi label and has won a 2023 Gramophone Award (in the ‘Concerto’ category) for his recording of Elgar’s Cello Concerto in Lionel Tertis’s arrangement for viola and orchestra. In 2024, he released an entire album celebrating the great violist Lionel Tertis; this was followed in February 2025 by his first album for unaccompanied viola with works by Britten, Shaw, Telemann, and Bach. It builds on his already impressive discography, which includes A Poet’s Love, comprising transcriptions of works by Prokofiev and Schumann, and a recording of Berlioz’s Harold en Italie with John Nelson and the Orchestre Philharmonique de Strasbourg.
A graduate of the Royal Academy of Music and Kronberg Academy, he has earned accolades such as First Prize at both the Lionel Tertis and Cecil Aronowitz International Viola Competitions. Ridout is a former BBC New Generation Artist and a recipient of a Borletti-Buitoni Trust Fellowship. He was the inaugural recipient of Hamburger Symphoniker’s Sir Jeffrey Tate Prize and also took part in the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center’s Bowers Program.
Ridout performs on a viola by Peregrino di Zanetto (c.1565–75) on loan from a generous patron of the Beare’s International Violin Society.