Biography
Brighton-born pianist Berniya Hamie is currently undertaking postgraduate studies at the Guildhall School with Katya Apekisheva, Ronan O’Hora and Charles Owen as the Frederic William Trevena Award Holder, supported by the Countess of Munster Musical Trust Derek Butler Award, a Help Musicians UK Postgraduate Award, a Wayne Sleep Foundation Award and a Craxton Memorial Trust Award. The recipient of numerous prizes, including the Yamaha Music Foundation of Europe Piano Scholarship 2024, she has performed extensively across the UK and abroad, including at Wigmore Hall, the Royal Albert Hall and the Purcell Room.
Berniya is a founder member of the award-winning Astatine Trio, recently named BBC Radio 3 New Generation Artists for 2025-27. They won second prize and special prize for best performance of the prizewinning set work at the 2025 Franz Schubert and Modern Music Competition – the first UK-based group to win a main prize in the competition’s history – and their other awards include first prizes at Birmingham International Piano Chamber Music Competition, International Virtuoso & Belcanto Chamber Competition (Lucca, Italy) and Senior Intercollegiate Trio Competition in 2022. The trio were also the youngest finalists of the 2023 Lyon International Chamber Music Competition and were awarded the SEAM prize for contemporary music. They were Britten Pears Young Artists for the 2023/24 season, appearing on BBC Radio 3 In Tune in February 2024, and are Kirckman Society artists for 2025/26. Most recently, they have been appointed Hans Keller Chamber Fellows at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama. From 2022-25, the trio were privileged to be mentored by Alfred Brendel at his personal invitation.
As a concerto soloist, Berniya’s performances include the Grieg Piano Concerto with the Brighton Youth Orchestra under Andrew Sherwood as part of the 2018 Brighton Festival and Rachmaninov’s Piano Concerto No.2 with the Worthing Philharmonic under Dominic Grier in March 2023. She gave the closing recital of the 10th edition of the Torre de Canyamel Piano Festival (Mallorca) in 2024 and has also performed across Italy and France. She was a junior recording artist and cover model for the 2017-18 ABRSM Grade 1 Piano Syllabus and gave the world premiere of Karen Tanaka’s Masquerade at the ABRSM Spectrum 5 launch in 2015. Berniya was also as a Tabor Piano Ambassador for the Leeds International Piano Competition in 2021.
