Yorkshire-born musician, Hannah French is a musicologist, broadcaster, and baroque flautist. Primarily her musical passions lie in the historical context of the Baroque era and how music from the 18th century has subsequently been performed. Her PhD (2014, University of Leeds) focused on Sir Henry Wood as an interpreter of the music of Johann Sebastian Bach – it specifically examined his approach to the orchestral works at the Proms and the subsequent lasting impact on the Bach revival in England. A research summary can be viewed here.

She broadcasts regularly on Radio 3, presenting The Early Music Show, Early Music Late, the Lunchtime Concert, and featuring on Record Review.

Hannah has been associated with the TV coverage of the BBC Proms since 2010, and first appeared as a presenter for BBC4 in 2016.

She featured on the BBC2 documentary The Choir: Military Wives (2014) with Gareth Malone as music historian and pianist in preparation for the BBC War Horse Prom, and prior to that appeared in the BBC4 documentary ‘How to be a Composer’ (2009) as teacher to arts commentator, Paul Morley.

She has given public lectures and pre-concert events in venues such as Kings Place, the Royal Academy of Music, and the Higher Education Academy in London, Symphony Hall, Birmingham, The Oxford Lieder Festival and Tafelmusik at Trinity St Paul's, Toronto, on a wide range of topics including: the life, works, and interpretations of J.S. Bach, Sir Henry Wood and the Proms, Recordings and Period Performance, the history of the Royal Academy of Music.

Hannah has recently completed a collaborative research project based at Tate Britain investigating the musical elements in a portrait by Thomas Gainsborough which can be viewed online here.

From 2004-2016 Hannah was a Lecturer and Tutor at the Royal Academy of Music, and from 2011-2016 was both External Examiner and Advisor for the BMus at the University of Chichester. In 2017 she was engaged to teach at the Royal Conservatory of Music in Toronto.