Career highlights include:

I, Joan at Shakespeare’s Globe Theatre, Olivia Dean, Women’s Euros 2022, Hackney Colliery Band, selling out The Roundhouse with UK House and Garage Orchestra, and backing Gloria Jones and many other Motown artists with The Signatures/ Northern Soul Live.

She feels very at home in the jazz scene in both large and small ensembles, ranging from duos with singers, all the way up to large big bands – in which they’ve sat comfortably on all trombone chairs. Hannah also combined her compositional and performance facets with her grunge-jazz band, Yeoja, who played at EFG London Jazz Festival, Manchester Jazz Festival and Funk and Soul Weekender amongst other gigs the year before the pandemic hit. Yeoja wanted to showcase the power and talent of female/non-binary lower brass players, and has a core of women at its centre, featuring Hanna Mbuya on tuba and Rosie Turton on trombone. Hannah is also available as a session musician and has played on several recordings, such as Raquel Martins’ EP ‘The Way’ and with Mom Tudie working on his live versions of studio numbers.

Hannah has played in brass bands of all shapes and sizes – ranging from the hip-hop-influenced BYOB, to the weird and wonderful Hackney Colliery Band, to the Bollywood Brass Band, to the more traditional sounds of The Royal Greenwich Brass Band. Balkan brass will always have a place in her heart, Op Sa! Balkan Band and Mimika Orchestra were her window into the professional world, and with them she has had a whole range of experiences, from playing live on BBC Radio 3 to performing at the Royal Albert Hall, Royal Festival Hall and Royal Opera House, to recording charity singles for refugee week, to performing at an array of music festivals. More recently she has been combining her love of football with trombone playing, performing at The Emirates for Arsenal FC’s home games and at the Women’s Euros 2022 Lioness’ matches.

Improvisational music has always had a strong part to play in Hannah’s career, especially in the underground contemporary classical movement, playing improvised film scores in a variety of spaces such as the Regent Street Cinema and Latitude Festival, as an ensemble member in a sound painting orchestra, and also as a solo performer – putting their trombone through a range of effects pedals.

Hannah has been stretching her performance talents recently, appearing as a regular guest feature host on Hangsang Radio, a show dedicated to showcasing hip-hop, R&B and K-Pop talents from Seoul and beyond.

As a composer, Hannah has a range of accolades under her belt. Since winning the BBC Young Composer of the Year in 2011, she worked closely with the Aurora Orchestra leading to two Radio 3 performances of original works. They’ve also worked with Max Reinhardt on several occasions with his Instant Orchestra, had pieces performed at Kings Place through Women in Music, and at the Jazz Café with Stompy’s Playground. As an arranger and orchestrator, she has worked in a variety of settings, including for composer Isobel Waller-Bridge and the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra.