Originally trained as a composer and baroque violinist, Frances toured and recorded for over seventeen years with the leading Baroque chamber orchestras of Britain and Holland. At the same time she developed her skills as a complementary health practitioner, and has been working as a healer since the early 90s. In the Frances Turner Clinic she treats patients using Healing, Acupuncture, and Chinese Herbal Medicine. She has much experience working with musicians’ problems, in particular musculo-skeletal problems of the upper body, and performance stress. She also has a special interest in working with patients with menopausal, gastric and respiratory problems.
Frances has a Masters degree from Exeter University in the study of the English language used in the teaching of Chinese medicine in Britain, and she is using this research in curriculum development at the London College of Traditional Acupuncture (LCTA) in North London (affiliated to Portsmouth University), where she is a senior lecturer. At LCTA she co-ordinates the teaching of Chinese Medicine Theory, runs a student led discussion group called the Learning Space is a tutor of Chinese Herbal Medicine and supervises in the student clinics. In particular she has developed lectures and workshops on the 3 Step System of pulse reading, with an accompanying 3 Step System Pulse CD illustrating the Chinese Pulse Characters. Frances sits on the Accreditation Committee of the British Acupuncture Accreditation Board (BAAB), and is a member of the both the British Acupuncture Council (BAcC) and the Register of Chinese Herbal Medicine (RCHM).
Recently Frances has written and recorded the Song of the Mountains. Inspired by shamanic work in the Rocky Mountains in Canada, and scored for voice, percussion and baroque strings, this music explores the bringing together of the music and the healing that have been central to Frances’s life and work