David Wood’s daughter is a professional percussionist who began performing when she was very young. She won an under 10 year old piano category in a music festival [aged 7] and whilst at primary school, played percussion in the ‘National Children’s Orchestra of Great Britain’; played piano in a jazz trio at the ‘Music for Youth Proms’ at the Royal Albert Hall in London; and aged ten, gained a place to study both percussion and piano at the junior depatment at the Royal Northern College of Music in Manchester. Whilst at Junior RNCM, she achieved 146/150 in her ABRSM Grade 8 percussion exam; became the principal percussionist with the ‘National Youth Wind Orchestra of Great Britain’ (when she was aged 15); was a finalist in the Keldwyth Cumbrian Young Musicians Award; and won her way through to the televised percussion final in the 2014 BBC Young Musician competition.
In 2015, she won a highly coveted scholarship to study percussion at the World-famous ‘Royal College of Music’ in London and has since been featured and quoted in the college’s prospectus. Whilst at RCM, she was a member of their percussion quartet ‘PERCM’; was principal percussionist for an orchestral project; timpanist for Tchaikovsky’s 5th symphony; placed in a project alongside the London Sinfonietta; played on a Hyperion Records recording of Vaughan Williams works (CDA68190); and was recipient of the 2019 Bell Music Award. She left the Royal College of Music with a RCM 1st class BMus(hons) degree and the prestigious RCM ‘Tagore Gold Medal’ for the female student who was judged to have made outstanding contributions musically and in other important ways to the life of the college.
Outside of college, she played on the UK Tour of the musical Evita; had the percussion chair on Wizard of Oz at the Storyhouse (Chester); played for The Best of the West End at Royal Albert Hall (London); played with the Royal Philharmonic orchestra, the Philharmonia orchestra; and was involved in function bands including her brother Harrison’s The Groove Membership. After leaving RCM in 2019; she got her first percussion chair in the West End at the London Palladium for the production of Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat. She moved on to Back to the Future The Musical in Manchester which sadly closed in March 2020 due to the Covid19 pandemic. In 2021, she formed a female percussion duo and play original percussion works and their own arrangements of popular and classical music. She was also one of the percussionists for the Brit Award nominee and Ivor Novello-winning artist RAYE [at her Royal Albert Hall concert] and has played for the west end shows: ‘Back to the Future: The Musical’, ‘Aspects of Love’, and ‘Hello Dolly’.