Harriet Petherick Bushman

Harriet Petherick Bushman is a composer and musician. She was born and raised in London and started composing while at St. Paul’s Girls’ School under John Gardner. She later trained at the Royal Academy of Music in London and in Florence and Rome, Italy, and Lausanne and Geneva, Switzerland. Following her training, she toured as a solo pianist and chamber musician mainly in the Middle East where she and her husband lived for ten years.

Upon returning to England, she scored documentary music for BBC and Channel 4 TV. She also accompanied and wrote for choirs, and with lyricist Marita Phillips, she composed her first musical. In 2006, she and her husband and two sons moved to Kuwait. In Kuwait, she collaborated with Alison Shan Price and a talented youth theater group to create musicals, songs, and music for Shakespearean plays including Othello and The Winter’s Tale. Her impressive list of compositions includes: Now Behold (1987, a cantata), Pomes Penyeach (1987, a song cycle on the cycle of 13 poems by James Joyce), Hymns for the Soul (2001, a CD and Songbook (mp3) with singers Alex Boyé and Fiona Smith), The Dream Dealer (2002, musical written for Devonshire House School, London for children 11-13 years and performed in the United Kingdom, Japan, Australia, and the Middle East), 1856 Long Walk Home (2006, a concert opera to commemorate the 150th anniversary of the Willie and Martin Handcart Company), and The Little Prince (2007, a musical). She has collaborated with poet Susan Howe on several projects.

Bushman also serves as executive director of Agapanthus and she creates designer silk scarves, coats, ties, and other items that she sells to profit various beneficiaries. She also performs in charity concerts.

Pianist and composer Harriet Petherick Bushman has three children and lives with banker/opera conductor husband Richard in Kuwait City, Kuwait. She is a member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and has served as Relief Society president in her branch in Kuwait.

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