Hannah began piano lessons at the age of 7 and started learning the cornet at Mount Charles Junior Band a few years later. She joined St Austell Youth Band in 1999 and St Austell Town Band in 2001, becoming principal cornet later that year. She has also played with the Cornwall Youth Wind Orchestra, Cornwall Youth Jazz Orchestra and Cornwall Youth Brass Band.
In 2003, she moved away to study music at the University of Salford, where she was fortunate enough to learn from some leading figures in the brass band movement including Prof. David King, Prof. Peter Graham and Dr. Roy Newsome. While living in Salford she spent some time playing with Stalybridge Old Band and travelled home to play with St Austell for contests and concerts. Her main areas of study in her final year at Salford were the history of the Cornish brass band movement and arranging for brass band. She graduated with First Class Honours in 2006 and returned home to Cornwall.
As a pianist, Hannah began accompanying soloists and vocal groups at an early age. She became the accompanist of the ECC Ladies Choir (now Imerys Singers) at 15 and resumed this position on returning to Cornwall after her degree as well as working with St Austell Amateur Operatic Society, St Austell Music Festival and some of the local Solo and Quartet contests.
Hannah teaches piano and brass and has arranged a lot of popular tunes for her pupils, these are published through ArrangeMe and are available at Sheet Music Plus and Sheet Music Direct. Her first published arrangement for brass band was a cornet solo of “Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas” which is available from Pennine Music Publishing and has been very popular with bands since its release in 2013. She has since written many arrangements for brass band and brass ensembles, which have proved useful in the staged return to full banding after the pandemic. Most of these are also available from Sheet Music Plus and Sheet Music Direct.
Many of her compositions and arrangements are shown on her website: https://www.sheetmusicplus.com/publishers/hannah-hawken-sheet-music/3005134?aff_id=538225
In 2021, Hannah was commissioned by the Cornish National Music Archive to arrange four tunes for brass band: Frogpool, Point, Sunny Corner and Trevince. These traditional Cornish pieces are often referred to as “Tea Treat Music” and were almost certainly once played by brass bands as well as traditional groups. The new arrangements were premiered by St Austell Town Band for the Cornish National Music Archive Tea Treat project.
Video recordings of these four pieces being played by St Austell Town Band can be viewed here.
In 2022, Hannah was commissioned by the Cornish National Music Archive to arrange the Rescorla Snail Creep for brass band. It was premiered by St Dennis Silver Band at the launch of the Cornish National Music Archive project, Music from the Clay Country, on the 9th July 2022 at the Wheal Martyn Clay Museum.
