Composers

Malcolm Archer has had a distinguished career in church music which has taken him to the posts of Organist and Director of Music at three English Cathedrals: Bristol, Wells and St Paul’s, and for eleven years, Director of Chapel Music at Winchester College. He has for many years directed the choir for the Jean Langlais Festival in France. His active career as a conductor and composer has taken him all over the globe, directing choirs and courses in the USA, Canada, New Zealand, Australia, South Africa and Europe. As an orchestral conductor, he has worked with the London Mozart Players, City of London Sinfonia and the BBC Concert Orchestra in addition to many other professional groups. He conducted a performance of John Rutter’s Requiem for the composer’s 70^th birthday concert in the Temple Church, London, in the presence of the composer and recorded by Classic FM, and for several years, his choir in Winchester sang for the Classic FM Carol Concert. He also conducted the 20^th anniversary performance of Andrew Lloyd Webber’s ‘Requiem’ in St. Paul’s Cathedral. Over the years, his BBC Radio 3 broadcasts and commercial recordings have won many plaudits, and his Christmas recording with St. Paul’s Cathedral Choir was editor’s choice in The Daily Telegraph. He has recorded with labels such as Warner Classics, Hyperion and Convivium, and his disc of Herbert Howells choral music with Wells Cathedral Choir and Hyperion has received wide acclaim. His recordings are frequently played on BBC Radio 3 and Classic FM including his recording of Mozart’s Requiem with Winchester College Chapel Choir and the London Mozart Players. He has worked with some of the world’s finest singers and has recorded with Dame Emma Kirkby, James Bowman CBE, Sarah Fox and John Mark-Ainsley. As an organist and harpsichordist he is in frequent demand and has given solo concerts all over the world, including concert tours in the USA, Canada, New Zealand and in Europe. His performances with orchestra have included Poulenc’s Organ Concert and Saint-Saens Organ Symphony, Brandenburg Concerto No. 5 and the Bach keyboard concertos, and he has performed with the London Symphony Orchestra in a classic rock concert in the Royal Albert Hall. He has an extensive concert repertoire and has recorded a wide variety of works, including J.S. Bach organ works and Messiaen’s La Nativite du Seigneur as well as his own compositions. Malcolm Archer’s choral works are performed in many countries and are respected for their approachable singability, interesting harmonic character and understanding of the singing voice. He is often commissioned to compose works for special occasions, which have included the 80^th birthday service of HM the Queen in St. Paul’s Cathedral, the dedication of the Churchill Memorial Gates at St. Paul’s Cathedral, the Corporation of the Sons of the Clergy, the 800^th anniversary of Magna Carta, and the Southern Cathedrals’ Festival. He has over 250 published works and amongst other companies, he publishes with Oxford University Press, with whom he has also co-edited two very successful books: Advent for Choirs and Epiphany to All Saints for Choirs. He was also editor of Carols Ancient and Modern. (published by Hymns Ancient and Modern). He also composes instrumental works, and choral works with orchestra. His one act opera ‘George and the Dragon’ has become very popular as a community project. Similar in scope and conception to Britten’s Noye’s Fludde, it involves young singers alongside an amateur choir and adult professional singers and chamber orchestra. He was recently commissioned to compose ‘Vespers’ by The Farrant Singers, and his ‘Requiem’ is performed frequently both here and abroad, either with orchestra, or in its original form with organ. Malcolm Archer has worked extensively for the BBC, including directing choirs for TV and Radio broadcasts, and he has worked with the BBC Singers and the BBC Daily Service Singers. He has on several occasions been an adjudicator for BBC competitions including the Young Choristers of the Year, and Songs of Praise School Choirs’ competition, where his co-adjudicators included Katherine Jenkins and Pete Waterman. He has also been a judge for the liturgical section of the British Composer Awards. He studied as an RCO scholar at the Royal College of Music and was Organ Scholar at Jesus College Cambridge, where he read music. His organ teachers were Ralph Downes, Gillian Weir and Nicolas Kynaston, and he studied composition with Herbert Sumsion, Bernard Stevens and Alan Ridout. He holds Fellowships from the Royal College of Organists, the Royal School of Church Music and the Guild of Church Musicians, the latter two awarded for his many years of service to the church as a choir trainer and composer.

George Arthur Richford is a multi-award-winning composer and conductor, living and working in the South of England. He currently directs at Salisbury Cathedral having held previous posts at Newcastle Cathedral, St John’s College, Durham, Romsey Abbey and Southampton University. His compositions have been performed and broadcast around the world, and have received premiers on BBC 1, Radio 3 and 4, and at the 300th Anniversary of the Three Choirs’ Festival in Hereford. He has had commissions from Ralph Allwood and the ORNC in Greenwich, Canterbury Cathedral, Choir and Organ Magazine, Royal Holloway University amongst others. He currently holds a major contract with Universal Edition and is recording a number of his works with the acclaimed chapel choir of Royal Holloway, under Rupert Gough.

Antony Baldwin was a cathedral chorister and read Music at Oxford, where he was organ scholar of Trinity College. Subsequently, he undertook postgraduate work at Durham. A prizewinner of the Royal College of Organists, he holds the Fellowship and Choir-training diplomas. As a composer, he has written anthems, carols, carol arrangements, a book of descants, secular choral pieces, and organ music. He is currently Director of Music at the American Church of London, and organist to the Thomas Tallis Society and Chamber Choir.

Caz’s love of music began while singing in Gloucester Cathedral as a member of the choir at the King’s School, Gloucester. She began composing for the piano, her principal instrument, before branching into instrumental and choral music while at Cambridge University. She holds an MA from Cambridge and an ABRSM Diploma. As a composer, Caz’s work has been premiered by the Brunel Sinfonia and the Red Maids’ Chamber Choir. More recently she has branched into work for theatre productions and short films. As a viola player, Caz has played extensively with string ensembles, symphony orchestras and quartets. She has taught music for eight years in senior schools as well as working with students at the Bristol Pre-Conservatoire.

Simon is a Melbourne born professional tenor soloist equally at home in Grand Opera, Lieder and English Song, Early Music and contemporary performance art. Since moving to London in the mid 1990’s composition of choral works and editing of Renaissance Polyphony has flourished alongside opera and song, with appearances in the Aldeburgh Festival, Wigmore Hall and the Royal Opera House lunchtime recital series. The London Oratory Senior Choir regularly sings his editions of works by Nicolas Gombert on whose oeuvre his research into musica ficta and polyphony of the High Renaissance has centered. His choral works have been performed by The Tudor Choristers and The Canterbury Fellowship (Melbourne) the London Oratory School Schola (for whom he has written a number of commissions), the choirs of the London Oratory, St. John's, Hampstead and St. Bride's, Fleet Street.

Hilary Campbell is a freelance choral specialist, and is founder and Musical Director of professional chamber choir Blossom Street, and Musical Director of Bristol Choral Society, Chiswick Choir, and the Music Makers of London. Her project work includes guest conducting ensembles including the BBC Singers, Trinity Laban Chamber Choir, and the University of Greenwich Choir, and chorus mastering the BBC Symphony Chorus, and Royal Academy of Music Symphony Chorus. This year, Hilary is acting as Associate Conductor of Ex Cathedra. She often runs an annual project with Master of the Queen’s Music, Judith Weir, at the Royal Academy of Music, in conjunction with Blossom Street and the RAM composition department, and began working there in 2017 as a BMus Lecturer. Hilary gained a Distinction for an MMus in Choral Conducting at the Royal Academy of Music with Patrick Russill; she was also awarded the three choral conducting prizes. Her music has been performed around Europe and in the US, and on various radio stations, by professional and amateur ensembles alike, including: BBC Singers; Polish National Chamber Choir; Vilnius Municipal Choir; The Choir of Trinity College, Cambridge. Composition prizes include the Shipley Arts Festival Composer Award, the Leeds Philosophical and Literary Society Choral Composition Prize, the Philip Bates Prize for Young Composers, and the Musica Sacra International Competition for Composers (second place).

Alexander Campkin's music, described as 'fresh and attractive' by Gramophone, has attracted the attentions of some of the top ensembles. His work has been performed or broadcast in over forty countries. It features on over 20 CDs recorded by ensembles including the London Sinfonietta and the BBC Singers, and one of which was Christmas CD of the Year for Classic FM. His musical journey was changed forever after medical symptoms and the diagnosis of multiple sclerosis aged 17. This was shortly before he was due to perform with the Arad Philharmonic in Romania as a viola player. 'MS changed my life. It stopped me playing viola. But it certainly didn’t stop me composing.' Alexander (b. 1984) has received over one hundred commissions from organisations including The Royal Opera House, The Tallis Scholars, The Royal Ballet Sinfonia, The London Mozart Players, English Touring Opera, The BBC Performing Arts Fund, The Swedish Arts Council, New London Children's Choir, Episcopal School of Jacksonville Florida, The Joyful Company of Singers and The Theatinerkirche Vokalkapelle Munich. He has been appointed Composer in Residence of Ampersandance Contemporary Dance Company, The Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra Changemakers Ensemble, The Fulham Camerata, The Cantus Ensemble, The Fourth Choir, The Portsmouth Grammar School and Neresheim Abbey in Germany. Alexander's music has been performed in venues including the Berliner Philharmonie, Amsterdam Concertgebouw, Tokyo Opera City Concert Hall, Shakespeare's Globe Sam Wanamaker Playhouse, Grace Cathedral San Francisco, L'Oratoire de Louvre Paris, Tongyeong Concert Hall South Korea, Christ Cathedral California, LSO St Luke's, Muziekgebouw Amsterdam, Westminster Abbey, National Concert Hall Dublin, King's Place London, St Martin-in-the-Fields London, Cathedral of Saint John the Divine New York City, Southbank Centre and the Barbican Centre. Alexander is conductor of The Oxbridge Singers and the minimaLIST ENsemble. His growing passion for music education has led him to direct workshops for the Royal Opera House, the BBC Symphony Orchestra Learning, English Touring Opera, Royal College of Music Sparks and Streetwise Opera. Alexander studied at Oxford University where was choral and organ scholar, the Royal Academy of Music, and the University for Performing Arts in Vienna. He has received tuition from Sir Peter Maxwell Davies, Robert Saxton, Stephen Montague, Michael Jarrell and Simon Bainbridge. He has been elected an Associate of the Royal Academy of Music for services to music.

Michael Cayton is Director of Music at St John’s Wood Church. He has a truly varied and distinguished professional career, as an organist, trumpeter and conductor. In his early career he passed through the Royal Military School of Music at Kneller Hall before serving with the Grenadier Guards as a trumpeter, organist and pianist. On leaving the military, he studied piano at the Royal College of Music where he attained his BMus and ARCM and won the Hilda Anderson Deane prize for conducting and improvisation. After graduating, Michael Cayton worked as repetiteur (an accompanist and tutor of musicians and opera singers) in the Royal College of Music opera department and was appointed the first organ Scholar at the Royal Hospital, Chelsea. During that time, he worked as an accompanist and repetiteur for another large chorus in Hertfordshire. When he was unexpectedly asked to conduct them for a rehearsal, he enjoyed it immensely. From that moment on he was hooked on conducting. While focussing on developing his skills and experience in choral directing, he fulfilled extensive engagements as an organ and piano recitalist and accompanist in the Wigmore Hall, Westminster Abbey and other leading venues in London and Europe. He has broadcast on BBC Radio 2, BBC Radio 3, the BBC World Service and on television. Michael Cayton also holds the posts of Conductor to Watford Philharmonic, Organist at Belsize Square Synagogue and Conductor of the Chiltern Choir. As well as the classical repertoire, Michael has eclectic musical tastes and is an accomplished performer of many styles of music including jazz and fusion.

Carson Cooman (b. 1982) is an American composer with a catalog of hundreds of works in many forms—from solo instrumental pieces to operas, and from orchestral works to hymn tunes. His music has been performed on all six inhabited continents in venues that range from the stage of Carnegie Hall to the basket of a hot air balloon. Cooman’s music appears on over forty recordings, including more than twenty-five complete CDs on the Naxos, Albany, Artek, Gothic, Divine Art, Métier, Diversions, Convivium, Altarus, MSR Classics, Raven, and Zimbel labels. Cooman’s primary composition studies were with Bernard Rands, Judith Weir, Alan Fletcher, and James Willey. As an active concert organist, Cooman specializes in the performance of contemporary music. Over 300 new compositions by more than 100 international composers have been written for him, and his organ performances can be heard on a number of CD releases and more than 2,400 recordings available online. Cooman is also a writer on musical subjects, producing articles and reviews frequently for a number of international publications. He serves as an active consultant on music business matters to composers and performing organizations, specializing particularly in the area of composer estates and archives.

John was a chorister at Westminster Cathedral before reading music at Oxford University, where he also played drums in jazz and pop bands and developed an interest in electronic music. He has written for choirs including Commotio, Westminster Cathedral Choir and East Oxford Community Choir, and has written commissions for the Edington Music Festival, Crossover Intergenerational Dance Group, Oxford Youth Dance and The Oxford-Grenoble Association. In 2006 John co-founded Oxford-based choir Sospiri with Chris Watson. Sospiri specialises in liturgical singing of plainsong and sings Latin Vespers at Merton College each term, as well as performing regular concerts. Since 2007 John has written a series of settings of World War I poetry, a number of which were recorded by Commotio and included in their disk; Night (released by Herald, 2007). A more recent set was recorded by Sospiri for a disk titled Requiem (The Gift of Music, 2010).

Andrew Earis is Director of Music at St Martin-in-the-Fields where he oversees the music programme at this busy London church. He is a graduate of the Royal College of Music and Imperial College, London, and holds a PhD from the University of Manchester. In addition to his duties at St Martin’s, Andrew is a regular contributor to BBC Radio’s religious output as a producer of programmes including Radio 4 Sunday Worship and Radio 3 Choral Evensong.

Barry Ferguson studied at Peterhouse, Cambridge, where he was an organ scholar. After an appointment as Assistant at Peterborough Cathedral, he became Organist at Wimbourne Minster and Rochester Cathedral. He is now a freelance composer, lecturer, and recitalist. He lectures on "Thomas Hardy and Music" for the University of Bristol and on other musical subjects.

Gerald Finzi was born in London on July 14, 1901, and spent his early childhood in London. His father died when he was just seven and following the outbreak of the First World War Finzi moved with his mother to Harrogate, in Yorkshire. There Finzi was able to study composition with the composer Ernest Farrar and from 1917 with Edward Bairstow at York Minster. But attracted by the beauty of the English Countryside, Finzi moved to Painswick, Gloucestershire, in 1922 where he was able to compose in tranquility. His first published work was ‘By Footpath and Stile’ (1921-22), a song-cycle for baritones and string quartet to texts by Thomas Hardy, whose work Finzi greatly admired. But rural and musical isolation soon became oppressive and in 1926 he moved back to London and began to study with RO Morris, one of the outstanding British teachers of the inter-war years. He also became acquainted with Ralph Vaughan Williams, whose influence he was always to acknowledge and who in 1928 conducted Finzi’s Violin Concerto. Other acquaintances in London included Holst, Bliss, Rubbra and Ferguson – who was also to become a life-long friend. In 1930 Finzi gained a teaching appointment at the Royal Academy of Music, but in 1933 gave up the post after he married artist Joy Black and moved back to the country, to Aldbourne, Wiltshire. The same year saw a complete performance of the song-cycle ‘A Young Man’s Exhortation’ (1926-29), his first noted success in London. Combined with another early success, ‘Earth and Air and Rain’ (1928-32), it established him as a masterly and sensitive setter of poetry. His burgeoning career was soon thwarted by the outbreak of the Second World War, causing the cancellation of the song-cycle ‘Dies Natalis’ (1925-39) at the Three Choirs Festival. It was a performance that could have brought him to prominence sooner. In 1939 the Finzis moved to Ashmansworth Farm, Hampshire. During the war years Gerald Finzi was drafted into the Ministry of War Transport and opened his house to a number of German and Czech refugees. He founded the Newbury String Players, initially using local amateurs, reviving much neglected 18th Century string music as well as giving several premieres by his contemporaries. With the return of peace Finzi began to receive a series of important commissions, namely, ‘Lo, The Full, Final Sacrifice’ (1946-47), a festival anthem; a larger scale ode ‘For St Cecilia’ (1946-47); a Clarinet Concerto (1948-49) for Frederick Thurston, which was perhaps his best known work; and his masterpiece ‘Intimations of Immortality’ (1938-50), for tenor, chorus and orchestra. In 1951, however, Finzi learned that he was suffering from Hodgkin’s Disease, a form of leukaemia, and was told he had between five and ten years to live. The discovery in no way lessened his activities, particularly those undertaken for other composers. He had championed Ivor Gurney in the 1930s and those efforts continued. He also worked on the music of Hubert Parry and edited the overtures of William Boyce for Musica Britannica. An all-Finzi concert at the Royal Festival Hall in 1954 acknowledged his standing in Britain’s musical life. A commission from Sir John Barbirolli for the 1955 Cheltenham Festival brought forth the Cello Concerto (1951-52,54-55), Finzi’s most ambitious, purely instrumental work. Finzi finally lost the fight against his illness and he died on September 27, 1956. His Cello Concerto was first broadcast the night before he died. Today, his music continues to be much admired and celebrated. It embraces a rich variety of moods, from elegiac lyricism, through spiritual reflection, to radiant joy. In particular the deaths of his father, three brothers and his teacher introduced the theme of fragility and transient existence, which was explored in many later works. His oeuvre, extending to more than 100 songs for soloist or choir, firmly establishes him as one of the most popular 20th Century British composers.

As well as a composer and arranger, Peter Foggitt is a highly regarded pianist, organist and conductor who made his orchestral debut aged 14, and his first BBC Radio 3 broadcast aged 21 as soloist in Rachmaninov’s Third Piano Concerto. An award-winning accompanist, he also appears frequently with singers and instrumentalists, and was engaged by Aldeburgh Music for their Britten 100 production at the 2014 Edinburgh Festival Fringe. An alumnus of Chetham’s School and the Guildhall School of Music & Drama, and a former choral scholar at King’s College, Cambridge, he has worked in choral music and opera internationally. Last season he was guest chorus master at the Royal Opera, Copenhagen, and at the Polish National Opera. His vocal ensemble Cries of London won their category at the 2011 Royal Over-Seas League Annual Music Competition.

Louis Halsey studied music at Cambridge, where he sang as an alto Choral Scholar in the celebrated King’s College Choir. In this capacity he took part in four of the famous Festivals of Nine Lessons and Carols under the renowned choral trainer, and Director, Boris Ord. On leaving Cambridge he embarked on a music career which took him all over the world conducting, lecturing, examining, and adjudicating. He was the founder of The Elizabethan Singers and The Louis Halsey Singers, and with these chamber choirs he directed concert performances, broadcasts, and recordings of a wide variety of music, including many commissions and first performances. For nearly 20 years he was a Music Producer for BBC Radio, and has held posts at the University of Illinois and Regent’s University, London. In the latter part of his career, Louis has been increasingly active as a composer and arranger.

Rupert first started composing as a child and gained some success with his orchestral suites that he wrote aged 12. His music (mostly choral) is characterised by a particular intensity and immediacy which maps perfectly onto the occasion. In addition to organ music and music for ensembles, he has composed over 150 settings of the Psalms (used in worship) in a variety of translations and in a range of stylistic idioms. In 2000 at short notice (due to the incapacitation of the Master of the Queen’s Music), Rupert composed the key-note anthem for a National Service attended by HM the Queen, the Archbishop of Canterbury and the Prime Minister. This anthem Here is my servant has been recorded by the St Michael’s Singers on the Regent label. Also in 2000, Rupert composed his Third Service, a setting of the Magnificat and Nunc Dimittis (in Gb and F# respectively), which has been broadcast regularly and is in the repertoire of numerous Cathedral Choirs such as St Paul’s London, Truro, Chester as well as St Thomas’s Fifth Avenue, New York. He also composed a cantata The Prophet, which uses a translation by Ted Hughes from Pushkin based on Isaiah 6. Missa Jacet Granum was commissioned in 1998 and first performed by Canterbury Cathedral Choir. There are also many other pieces, such as carol arrangements and original pieces that are all characterised by both profundity and wit, with his Advent Calendar (to words of Archbishop Rowan Williams) being particularly effective. His jazzy arrangement of a Caribbean blessing Now Go in Peace is published by the RSCM in the Silver Collection. For the Consecration of Brisbane Cathedral in October 2009 he composed a short anthem God be with us in our Lives, as well as an orchestral piece The Disciples Awakening for 12 string players. His setting of Laudate Dominum (for two-part trebles, two pianos and organ) was premiered at the International Church Music Festival in Coventry in 2000, and he continues to compose much occasional music for ceremonies, worship, events and occasions.

Klatzow's earliest musical training (at about age five years) was at the Roman Catholic convent of Saint Imelda in Brakpan. After completing his schooling at St. Martin's School, Rosettenville, Johannesburg he briefly taught music and Afrikaans at the Waterford Kamhlaba School in Swaziland. Klatzow moved to London in 1964 to study for a year at the Royal College of Music after being awarded a composition scholarship from the South African Music Rights Organisation composition scholarship which allowed him to go to the (RCM) in London to study. His professors included Gordon Jacob (orchestration), Kathleen Long (piano), and Bernard Stevens (composition). He won several prizes for composition while at the school. He later studied in Italy and then with Nadia Boulanger in Paris. Klatzow returned to South Africa in 1966, where he worked for the SABC in Johannesburg as a music producer. In 1973 was appointed to the South African College of Music in Cape Town where he later became professor in composition and director.

Catherine was born in Luxembourg but now lives and works in London. She studied composition with Roger Redgate, the piano with John Tilbury and Michele Ries and the cello with Ivan Andrews. In 2008, she was awarded a PhD in Composition by Goldsmiths College, University of London. Catherine is an experimental composer who uses a mix of traditional and graphic scoring methods and works in a variety of genres including contemporary opera and performance art. She has composed works for voice, toy pianos, massed harps, orchestra and the glass harmonica. She is an active performer and one half of critically acclaimed experimental pop duo French For Cartridge. Catherine has been commissioned for new works by Huddersfield Contemporary Music Festival, Rational Rec/London, Chetham’s School of Music, Centre National de L’Audiovisuel/Luxembourg and Banque Centrale de Luxembourg. Her work has been performed extensively throughout Europe.

One of Canada’s foremost organists and church musicians, Matthew Larkin has forged a successful career in many musical forums, including as choral and orchestral conductor, composer and arranger, accompanist and recording artist. He is the Founding Artistic Director of Caelis Academy Ensemble, Ottawa, Music Director of the Anglican Chorale of Ottawa, Principal Family Conductor of the Ottawa Pops Orchestra, and maintains a busy calendar of recital, conducting, and collaborative projects. Performances this season include conducting Israel in Egypt with Caelis Academy Ensemble, Carmina Burana with Ottawa Choral Society (piano), a solo recital of Messaien’s organ works with Toronto’s Confluence Concerts, as well as Bach’s St. John Passion (organ) with Ottawa Choral Society, and Charpentier’s Messe des morts (organ) with Ottawa Bach Choir. For the past two decades, Matthew has made his home in Ottawa, where he has served as Director of Music of both St. Matthew’s Church and Christ Church Cathedral. Matthew lead the Choir of Men and Boys of Christ Church Cathedral on several cathedral residencies in the UK, including Ely, Salisbury, and St. Paul's Cathedrals, and Westminster Abbey. His extensive liturgical music experience has included appointments at the Church of St. John the Divine, Victoria, St. James' Cathedral, Toronto, and St. Thomas's Church, Toronto. While Music Director of the Ottawa Choral Society (2005–12), Matthew introduced many new works into the choir's repertoire, collaborating frequently with the National Arts Centre. As a choral and orchestral conductor, he has led performances of a wide range of oratorio and symphonic works. A published composer, Matthew Larkin’s music has been performed and recorded worldwide, and he is frequently in demand as an instrumental and choral arranger. He has worked extensively with instrumental ensembles as soloist and guest conductor, and has appeared as organist with the Gabrieli Consort, the National Arts Centre Orchestra, the Ottawa Symphony, the Victoria Symphony, the Theatre of Early Music, and the Toronto Symphony Orchestra. Matthew Larkin has been featured as solo guest artist and collaborator with many of Canada's summer music festivals, including Ottawa's Chamberfest, the Elora Festival, and the Music and Beyond Festival. A Fellow of the Royal Canadian College of Organists, he has concertized throughout Canada, the United States, the United Kingdom, France, Italy, and China. A native of Oxford, UK, Matthew spent his childhood in Kingston, Ontario, where he received his early musical instruction in singing, piano and organ playing, as well as liturgical composition. He later attended the University of Toronto (as Organ Scholar of Trinity College) where he studied with John Tuttle, and the Royal College of Music, London, where he studied with Nicholas Danby.

Simon Lindley is Organist of Leeds Parish Church and of Leeds Town Hall.

At the City's historic and famous Parish Church his duties included the direction of its world-renowned Choir. He is also Music Director of St Peter's Singers, one of England's leading Chamber Choirs, and has served in that capacity since the foundation of the group in 1977.

Other current conductorships include Sheffield Bach Society, Halifax-based Overgate Hospice Choir and Leeds College of Music Community Choral Society. During the coming season (2010–11) Simon is Chief Guest Conductor of Doncaster Choral Society. He is pianist to St Peter's (Leeds Parish Church) Church of England Primary School, Burmantofts.

Senior Lecturer in Music at Leeds Polytechnic from 1976 to 1987, Simon was in 1988 appointed to the new post of Senior Assistant Music Officer for Leeds City Council's [then] Learning and Leisure Department, working on a kaleidoscopic diversity of productions in the office of the award-winning Leeds International Concert Season – notably weekly Town Hall Lunchtime Recitals, programmes for the Saturday symphony and choral concerts and as Artistic Advisor to the Leeds Summer Heritage Festivals from 1989.

Before moving to Yorkshire thirty-five years ago, Simon was organist to several famous London Churches [notably St Anne & St Agnes and St Olave, Hart Street, in the City], Organ Tutor at the Royal School of Church Music's College of St Nicolas – then at Addington Palace, Croydon – and held posts at Westminster and St Albans Cathedrals and as Director of Music to St Albans School.

At St Albans, he was the first full-time assistant to the legendary Dr Peter Hurford OBE.

A notable 1969 début recital at Westminster Cathedral, and his acclaimed live broadcast from the 1975 Proms of the Elgar Sonata at the Royal Albert Hall established his reputation as a player of distinctive style. This reputation has been enhanced by an extensive discography including two best-selling Naxos CDs [French Organ Music from Leeds Parish Church and Handel Concertos with Northern Sinfonia] and an award-winning performance of the fiendish solo part in Khachaturian's Organ Symphony with the BBC Philharmonic on Chandos conducted by Feyodor Gluschenko and recorded live at a concert in Leeds Town Hall.

Also for Chandos he has made a number of critically praised CDs as accompanist to cornet virtuoso Phillip McCann in the series The World's Most Beautiful Melodies. Simon's playing is also to be heard on many recordings by the Orchestra of Opera North - most recently with Paul Daniel in a Walton CD including Belshazzar's Feast and the 1937 and 1953 Coronation Marches, and in Bartók's Duke Bluebeard's Castle under Richard Farnes.

As an orchestral organist, he has worked – and continues to work – with all the leading British orchestras, and very regularly as organist for concerts by Huddersfield Choral Society. He remains one of very few players regularly playing full oratorio organ accompaniments without orchestra. Recent solo work has included the Poulenc concerto with the Orchestra of Opera North and the Royal Liverpool Philharmonic. There have been recent performances of the Saint-Saëns Organ Symphony with the RLPO and, on a UK Tour, with the Warsaw Philharmonic. He undertook a similar tour in 2007 with Maestro Paul Freeman and the Czech Philharmonic.

In the 70s' and 80's, Simon worked as Chorus Master to two of the West Riding's most famous adult choruses – Halifax Choral Society under Dr Donald Hunt OBE and Leeds Philharmonic Society with Meredith Davies.  He still conducts Leeds Philharmonic on a regular basis for the annual Lord Mayor's Carol Concerts at Leeds Town Hall and is a life Vice-President of both choirs.

President of the Royal College of Organists from 2000 to 2003 and of the Incorporated Association of Organists from 2003 to 2005, Simon is Secretary of the Church Music Society – a position he has held since 1991.

As a choral conductor, his work is to be heard on many recordings and broadcasts with the famous Choir of Leeds Parish Church whose director he has been since early 1975. Two trail-blazing Amphion CD's of the two monodramas by doyen of British composers and former Minster Organist at York, Dr Francis Jackson OBE - Daniel in Babylon and A Time of Fire [Scenes from Tyndale's Dream] - have attracted widespread critical acclaim; these historic performances, recorded in Leeds Parish Church, feature the composer at the organ, actor-dramatist John Stuart Anderson and St Peter's Singers under Simon Lindley's direction.

Personalia, awards and achievements: Born in London, the son of an Anglican priest and a writer and the grandson of Belgian poet and art historian Professor Emile Cammaerts, Simon was educated at Magdalen College School, Oxford and in London at the Royal College of Music, studying organ, piano and voice. He is an Associate of the Royal College and a Graduate of the Royal Schools of Music [London].

He comes from a musical family. Simon's sister Ruth was for years a leading member of the Choir of the London Oratory. His son Nicolas proved a notable Parish Church Head Chorister and soloist at Leeds and great-grandmother, Marie Brema, colleague and friend of Elgar, sang the role of the angel in the première of  Elgar's The Dream of Gerontius at the 1900 Birmingham Festival.

Work in many capacities for the Royal School of Church Music has included directing RSCM courses on four continents. He is a member of the Royal School's Advisory Board and holds the honorary diplomas of ARSCM [1987], and FRSCM – the latter presented in 2002.

In 2003, Simon succeeded the late Dr Lionel Dakers CBE [RSCM Director from 1973 to 1989] as Chairman of the Friends of the Musicians' Chapel at Church of St Sepulchre-without-Newgate in the City of London - the National Musicians' Church. He is also a Churchwarden of St Sepulchre's.

Additionally on the national musical canvas, he is Chairman of the Ecclesiastical Music Trust [the charitable arm of the English Hymnal Company, a Trust founded by Ralph Vaughan Williams], a founder-trustee of the Sir George Thalben-Ball Memorial Trust and the longest-serving trustee of the John Pilling Trust. Simon is also a member of the Royal Society of Musicians and a Liveryman of the Worshipful Company of Musicians.

Dr Lindley is a Director of the English Hymnal Company and worked extensively on New English Praise, the recently published supplement to The New English Hymnal issued by the Canterbury Press in 2006.

Simon is a Fellow of the Royal College of Organists and holds the College's coveted Choirmaster's Diploma [CHM]. He is also a Fellow of Trinity College of Music and a Licentiate of the Royal Academy of Music.

In Autumn of 2001 an honorary doctorate of Leeds Metropolitan University was conferred upon him in recognition of his services to the musical and civic life of his adopted city. He is the recipient of Honorary Fellowships from Leeds College of Music, the Guild of Church Musicians, the Guild of Musicians and Singers and, most recently, the Royal School of Church Music.  In Summer 2005 he received the Freedom of the City of London, where he began his career as an organist over forty years ago and in the Spring of 2006 he was the recipient of the coveted Spirit of Leeds award from Leeds Civic Trust.

A number of Simon's small-scale compositions and carol settings for worship services have achieved widespread provenance. A very popular setting of Ave Maria is sung and recorded very widely in and by quires and places where they sing and his carol-arrangements include Now the green blade riseth – used very widely in churches, cathedrals and chapels of all denominations at Eastertide. Katherine Jenkins' acclaimed CD Sacred Arias includes a performance of Simon's Ave Maria.

His interests include writing, printing and typography, cooking, travel - especially rail travel - and local history.

Simon lives at the Moravian Settlement in Fulneck near Pudsey at the confluence of the West Riding rural and industrial heartlands. He is currently Grand Organist to the United Grand Lodge of England and to the Masonic Province of Yorkshire, West Riding.

He has four children and two grandchildren: Nicolas, the eldest son – with two children of his own – lives and works in Florida, USA; Dominic is Senior Economic Policy Advisor to the Consumers' Association. Benedict – a stalwart of LPC Choir Tours – holds at BSc in computer science from Leeds Metropolitan University and works in IT. Rebecca is currently recently returned to Leeds, having recently graduated from the University of Northumbria.

Teena Lyle is a professional percussionist and keyboard player and has toured worldwide with some of the greatest names in rock, pop and blues.

Chris Manners was Director of Music at All Saints, Weston-Super-Mare, Chairman of the Bath & Wells Diocesan Choral Association, and past Chairman of the Somerset Organists' & Choirmasters' Association.

Matthew Martin is Precentor and Director of College Music at Gonville & Caius College, Cambridge. He read Music at Magdalen College, Oxford before studying at the Royal Academy of Music and with Marie-Claire Alain in Paris. From 2015-2020 he was Director of Music at Keble College, Oxford and Artistic Director of the Keble Early Music Festival. 

Matthew spent much of his early life immersed in cathedral music and in 2010, after six years as Assistant Master of Music at Westminster Cathedral, he decided to focus more on composition. Since then he has been commissioned to write music for the The Tallis Scholars, the choirs of Westminster Abbey, St Paul’s Cathedral, The Gabrieli Consort and The Sixteen. Matthew won the Liturgical category in the 2013 British Composer Awards, and the first disc of his choral music (Jubilate Deo) was recorded by Daniel Hyde and The Choir of Magdalen College, Oxford (Opus Arte/2014).

More recently, he has written for the Cheltenham Music Festival (Trumpet Sonata) and The Tallis Scholars (Lamentations of Jeremiah). His Rose Magnificat for Paul McCreesh and The Gabrieli Consort won the Choral category in the 2019 BBC Music Magazine Awards. Earlier in 2019, he was asked to write a festival anthem (In the midst of thy Temple) for the choir of Westminster Abbey, marking the 750th anniversary of its refounding, and a test piece for organ (Triptych) for the 2019 St Albans International Organ Competition. 

Philip studied at the Royal College of Music in London where he won the Walford Davies Prize for Organ Playing and the Limpus, Turpin, and Read Prizes in the Royal College of Organists’ exams. He holds a Bachelor in Music degree from the University of Durham and, more recently, he was awarded Honorary Fellowships by the Royal School of Church Music, the Guild of Church Musicians, and the Academy of St Cecilia for his services to Church Music. After graduation, he taught at Eton College, moving to Canterbury Cathedral in 1968 as Assistant Organist, and in 1974 to Guildford as Organist and Master of the Choristers. In 1983 he became Organist and Master of the Music at York Minster, succeeding Dr Francis Jackson. When he retired from the Minster in 2008 he was appointed Organist Emeritus, and the Archbishop of York awarded him the Order of St William, an honour entirely within his gift. As a composer, he has written extensively, primarily music for choir and organ, but also music for chamber ensembles.

Anthony was born in France and has sung in various choirs since attending school in East Anglia. He has written music in a broad range of classical forms including symphonies, canticles, piano pieces and chamber music, but choral works dominate his output. He has a particular interest in Latin motets and Gregorian chant, with French neoclassicism and Bruckner foremost among his influences. Anthony's works have been performed in Norwich and Ripon cathedrals, Paisley Abbey and in Edinburgh, where he now lives.

James O’Donnell is the Abbey’s Director of Music and principal conductor of the Abbey Choir. He is the head of the Abbey music department and is responsible for all musical aspects of the Abbey’s work. Internationally recognised as a conductor and organ recitalist, James has performed all over the world, including the United States, Japan, Australia, New Zealand, and throughout Europe, and appeared in the BBC Proms and at many other festivals. Recent engagements have included Poulenc’s Organ Concerto with the London Philharmonic Orchestra under Yannick Nézet-Séguin at the Royal Festival Hall, broadcast live on BBC Radio 3 and released on CD on the LPO Live label, and solo recitals in the United States, Germany, Norway, and the Netherlands. Before taking up his appointment at Westminster Abbey in January 2000, James was a junior exhibitioner at the Royal College of Music and then Organ Scholar of Jesus College, Cambridge.  He was appointed Assistant Master of Music at Westminster Cathedral, where he became Master of Music in 1988.  Under his direction the Choir of Westminster Cathedral won the Gramophone ‘Record of the Year’ award (for its Hyperion disc of masses by Frank Martin and Pizzetti in 1998), and a Royal Philharmonic Society award (1999), both unprecedented for a cathedral choir. As soloist and director James has worked with many of Britain’s leading ensembles. He is Music Director of St James’ Baroque and appears regularly with the BBC Singers. He is Visiting Professor of Organ and of Choral Conducting at the Royal Academy of Music and was President of the Royal College of Organists from 2011–13. He is an Honorary Fellow of Jesus College, Cambridge and Doctor of Music honoris causa of the University of Aberdeen.

Jonathan Rathbone was a chorister at Coventry Cathedral and later, a choral scholar at Christ’s College Cambridge, where he read mathematics. He gained a second degree at the Royal Academy of Music where he studied composition with John Gardner. Whilst there, he wrote a children’s musical called The Selfish Giant, and the music for a production of Dog Beneath The Skin at the Half Moon Theatre with director Julian Sands. He was signed as a song-writer with Noel Gay Music.

He sang with St Bride’s Choir, Fleet Street and the BBC Singers before joining the Swingle Singers in 1984. He was musical director of the group for eight of the twelve years he sang with them, during which time he created the majority of their arrangements, both a cappella and with orchestra. He has worked with many of the world’s leading musicians including Pierre Boulez, Luciano Berio. John Dankworth, Stephan Grapelli, Beatles producer, George Martin and French pop star, Etienne Daho.

He left the group in 1996 to spend more of his time writing. He has orchestrated for Sir Cliff Richard and Michael Ball and more recently for Katherine Jenkins, Lesley Garrett and Wynne Evans (“Go Compare!”). He still travels all over Europe to vocal courses, to work with various vocal ensembles and to adjudicate choral competitions. In recent years he has lectured and run workshops on close harmony, improvisation, choral conducting, vocal arranging and choral techniques.

He is now an in-house composer with Peters Edition. He conducts three choirs in north London, for whom has written numerous pieces, including Night of Wonder, Swithun’s Watery Tale, a festive Christmas cantata entitled Mr Fezziwig’s Christmas Party and a serious piece Christmas Truce telling of the truce of 1914. Most recently he has written two larger works for choir and piano - Patricius! which tells dramatically, the life story of St Patrick, and A Day at the Fair which tells of all the goings-on at a typical English Fair about 100 years ago.

His largest scale work (about 100 minutes) has just been recorded by the Vasari Singers (who also commissioned it). Under the Shadow of His Wing is a reworking of the Vespers Service

In addition to his choral writing, Jonathan’s string quartet, More Fools than Wise, written for the Fitzwilliam Quartet, has been performed all over the world.

Most recently, he was commissioned by the King of Qatar to re-orchestrate The Crown of India Suite by Elgar for a small ensemble and also for an ensemble of 12 harps!

Born at West Wickham, Greater London, England, Alan Ridout studied briefly at the Guildhall School of Music before commencing four years of study at the Royal College of Music, London with Herbert Howells and Gordon Jacob. He was later taught by Michael Tippett, Peter Fricker and (under a Dutch government scholarship) Henk Badings. He went on to teach at the Royal College of Music, the University of Birmingham, the University of Cambridge, the University of London, and at The King's School, Canterbury. He also broadcast musical talks on the radio. His works include church, orchestral and chamber music, much of it for children. His style is mostly tonal, though in younger life he wrote some microtonal works. Alan Ridout worked regularly with the Leicestershire Schools Symphony Orchestra (LSSO). Ridout's Three Pictures of Picasso, originally written for the National Youth Orchestra, was performed by the LSSO at a De Montfort Hall concert conducted by Rudolf Schwarz in 1964 in the presence of the composer. Ridout then composed his second symphony for the LSSO and dedicated it to Michael Tippett to mark his 60th birthday (though Ridout did not hold Tippett in high regard). The symphony was first performed in 1965 and also featured in the television programme Overture with Beginners (see video link below). The 1967 Leicestershire Schools Music Festival included a number of LSSO commissions and in May that year Ridout’s dance drama Funeral Games for a Greek Warrior made its debut at De Montfort Hall. In July 1967 the LSSO made its first commercial disc for the Pye Golden Guinea label and Ridout responded to a request for a short work for inclusion on the disc by composing a lively Concertante Music. The work’s debut took place on a record rather than at a public concert. Concertante Music was then taken on the LSSO tour of Denmark and Germany in September 1967. Alan Ridout lived for much of his life in Canterbury. He died in Caen, France. This entry is from Wikipedia, the user-contributed encyclopedia. It may not have been reviewed by professional editors and is licensed under an Attribution-ShareAlike Creative Commons License. If you find the biography content factually incorrect or highly offensive you can edit this article at Wikipedia.

Marcus Sealy attended the Royal College of Music where he  studied organ with Richard Popplewell and  harpsichord with  Dr  C Thornton Lofthouse. He taught music and, subsequently, French at Kingswood School in Bath. He was assistant organist of Bath Abbey from 1974 to 2017 where, in addition to supporting the work of the church, he gave well-attended recitals and was heard on many recordings. As regular accompanist/organist to Bath Bach Choir, he has played for concerts and recordings in many cathedrals and other venues, at home and abroad.

Paul is best known as a choral conductor, partly through the many CDs he made with the Finzi Singers for Chandos records. He conducted Bach Choirs in Chester and Leicester before moving to conduct the Bach Choir in Birmingham in 1992. He conducted the Whitehall Choir in London between 2000 and 2017 and is Conductor of the Petersfield Musical Festival. He is a regular guest conductor with the BBC Singers. He taught at the Royal College of Music in London between 1995 and 2008. He now teaches choral conducting at the Royal Birmingham Conservatoire, where he also directs both chamber choirs, and at Oxford and Durham Universities. The Royal Birmingham Conservatoire’s principal chamber choir has an increasing recording presence. It’s first disc To Music was outstandingly reviewed by MusicWeb International who described it as ‘one of the finest discs to have come my way in a long time’. Their recording of music by James MacMillan and Kenneth Leighton was attended by MacMillan and was released in April 2011 and has received five star reviews. Part songs by Ireland and Delius were recorded for Somm Records followed in 2012. A first ever recording of Stanford part songs was released July 2013 including a number of world premiere recordings. Their disc of rare Howells was Editor's Choice in The Gramophone in December 2014. The complete choral works of Samuel Barber was released in 2015 with the English Visionaries disc of music by Vaughan Williams, Holst and Howells following in 2016. John Joubert's 90th birthday in 2017 was celebrated in their next disc with many premier recordings. The music of Richard Rodney Bennett with many more first recordings is their most recent release. Until July 2001 Paul Spicer was Artistic Director of the Lichfield International Arts Festival and the Abbotsholme Arts Society, posts he relinquished in order to pursue a freelance musical career. He was Senior Producer for BBC Radio 3 in the Midlands until 1990 and today is in considerable demand as a composer. He has also been a much sought-after recording producer and, in particular, has produced over forty recordings with the organist Christopher Herrick. The first complete recording of Paul Spicer’s large-scale Easter Oratorio, originally commissioned as part of the Lichfield Festival Millennium celebrations, was released in 2005 and has received considerable critical acclaim, the work being recognised by Gramophone Magazine as 'the best of its kind to have appeared... since Howells's Hymnus Paradisi'. It was also chosen as Editor’s Choice in the same magazine. The Deciduous Cross, a work for choir and winds based on five poems by RS Thomas and premiered in June 2003, was commissioned for Paul's tenth anniversary as conductor of the Birmingham Bach Choir and was recently recorded by the Whitehall Choir. It was described as ‘a deeply-felt composition, almost intoxicatingly melodic throughout to create a chaste kind of spiritual ecstasy in which elements of reviving nature figure strongly’. A recording of his complete works for organ, played by Robert Sharpe, was released in 2006 from Truro Cathedral, and a recording of his shorter choral works performed by the choir of Selwyn College, Cambridge, was made in 2008. Individual works appear on discs by various artists and his Kiwi Fireworks for organ has been recorded five times. Paul’s new large-scale choral and orchestral work, Advent Oratorio, to another libretto by renowned New Testament scholar, Bishop Tom Wright, who wrote the text for the Easter Oratorio, was premiered in Lichfield Cathedral on 5 December 2009 and received the first performance in its newly revised version in 2016. His most recent major commission is a choral symphony, Unfinished Remembering, commemorating the centenary of the first World War in 2014. The poet Euan Tait wrote the libretto. The work was premiered in Symphony Hall, Birmingham to great acclaim in September 2014. 2015 onwards saw the publication of a whole series of Paul's choral works by Boosey & Hawkes. 2017 saw the publication of all his organ music by Trumph publications in Sweden. Paul Spicer's highly acclaimed biography of his composition teacher, Herbert Howells, was published in August 1998 was reprinted twice and republished in 2014 and again in 2016. His full-scale biography of the composer Sir George Dyson was published by Boydell Press in 2014. He was awarded a major grant by the British Academy to take a sabbatical period to further the research for this work. He is now working on a biography of Sir Arthur Bliss for the Crowood Press and has been awarded another British Academy grant to further research for this project. His English Pastoral Partsongs volume for OUP is widely used. As a writer he has written countless articles for many periodicals and is a contributor to the Dictionary of National Biography. He has twice written an overview of all James MacMillan’s choral music commissioned by Boosey & Hawkes, his publishers. Boosey and Hawkes commissioned a practical guide to the choral music of Benjamin Britten for his centenary in 2013 and Paul has given many lectures and workshops of Britten's music during the centenary year. Besides these major projects Paul Spicer is in great demand for his choral workshops which take him all over the world. In July 2011 he gave a the first Proms Extra choral workshop on Havergal Brian’s giant Gothic Symphony for the Proms. He runs a series of annual choral courses under the banner of his Foundation, the English Choral Experience. These take place at Dore Abbey in the Golden Valley of Herefordshire, in Europe at Easter, and a variety of locations around the UK for the Camerata weekends for expert ameatur singers. These include Orford, Suffolk, St. Cross Hospital, Winchester and Durham Castle. (www.englishchoralexperience.co.uk). He is a broadcaster, lecturer and popular speaker. He visits the USA most years as a visiting lecturer and conductor at the University of South Carolina and Trinity Cathedral, Columbia. Paul Spicer is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts, an Honorary Research Fellow of Birmingham University, an Honorary Fellow of University College, Durham, an Honorary Fellow of Birmingham Conservatoire, Honorary Fellow of Victoria College of Music and Drama (London), Lay Member of Lichfield Cathedral Chapter, Trustee of the Gerald Finzi Trust, Chairman of the Sir George Dyson Trust, Vice-President of the Herbert Howells Society, and Visiting Fellow to the Loughborough Endowed Schools.

Having begun his musical education as Head Chorister of his parish church choir in Kent Matthew went on to read Music and English at Lancaster University where he studied singing with Mary Hitch and directed the University Chamber Choir.

While training as a teacher in Canterbury Matthew became director of the Kent Youth Barbershop and his college chamber choir.

Specialising in oratorio and English song, Matthew has performed as a soloist in St John’s Smith Square, St Martin in the Fields and on choral tours of France and Italy. As well as deputising with several London choirs and Canterbury Cathedral Choir he sings with the Vasari Singers, one of Britain’s leading chamber choirs, and has sung solo baritone with them in numerous performances and for several recordings.

Matthew is also a composer and arranger mainly of liturgical choral music. His two sets of Versicles and Responses are published by Shorter House and have been performed by the Vasari Singers in Bath Abbey and Chester Cathedral.

Until August 2017, Matthew was Director of Music at St Dunstan’s College, Lewisham. He has recently been ordained and is Assistant Curate at St John the Evangelist, Ranmoor, in the Diocese of Sheffield.