Biographies
Below are the biographies of current and past performers with CUMC and CUCO.
- Peter Stark - CUCO Principal Conductor.
- Stehpen Cleobury - CUCO Conductor.
- Nicholas Daniel - CUCO Conductor.
- Tim Brown - CUCO Conductor.
- Guy Woolfenden - CUCO Conductor.
- Baldur Brönnimann - CUCO Conductor.
- Priya Mitchell - CUCO Soloist.
- Morwenna Del Mar - CUCO Soloist.
- Luis Pares - CUCO Soloist.
Peter Stark
CUCO Principal Conductor
Hon DMus, Hon FTCL, Hon ARAM, GRSM, ARCM
Peter Stark’s work has taken him all over the world, but in particular to Europe where he has been hailed “genius… exemplary…one of the leading figures of a new generation of British conductors”. He appears regularly at the Royal Festival Hall and the Barbican Centre, has recorded many times for BBC Radio 3 and has been the subject of a television documentary. He has performed at the Cheltenham International, Thaxted and St Albans Organ Festivals and CD recordings of his work include music by Britten, Elgar, Messiaen, Rachmaninov, Roxburgh, Shostakovich and Richard Strauss.
He trained in London at the Royal College of Music with Norman Del Mar and in Vienna with Sir Charles Mackerras. He was a finalist in the Vittorio Gui International Competition, a prize-winner in the Leeds Conductors’ Competition and was awarded the Tagore Gold Medal by the Royal College.
He has worked with many of the finest orchestras, including the London Symphony Orchestra, English Chamber Orchestra, Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment, BBC National Orchestra of Wales and BBC Concert Orchestra. He has worked jointly with Pierre Boulez, Sir Colin Davis, Lord Menuhin, Sir Roger Norrington, Mstislav Rostropovich and Klaus Tennstedt, and has performed with soloists such as Peter Donohoe, Lynn Harrell, Stephen Isserlis, John Lill, Tasmin Little, Pascal Rogé and Raphael Wallfisch.
As an experienced trainer he is noted for inspiring young musicians; he is Leverhulme Professor of Conducting to the National Youth Orchestra and has conducted young orchestras ranging from the Hertfordshire County Youth Orchestra (Principal Conductor since 1994) to the New South Wales Public Schools’ Symphony Orchestra, Australia. In 1997 he was appointed Senior Fellow of Conducting and Orchestral Studies by Trinity College of Music, London.
He is Artistic Director to both the West of England Philharmonic Orchestra and Parnassus (a fifteen piece instrumental ensemble specialising in festival based work performing anything from recitals to fully staged opera productions). In 2002 he was appointed Principal Conductor to the Cambridge University Chamber Orchestra.
A recording of Edwin Roxburgh’s “Saturn” is to be released in 2006 on the NMC label, and future plans include tours to the USA and the Far East.
Numerous awards include the degree of Honorary Doctor of Music, awarded to him by the University of the West of England in 2000 for his “outstanding contribution to music in the West Country”.
Stephen Cleobury
CUCO Conductor
Stephen Cleobury is associated with two of Britain’s most famous choirs. As Director of Music at King’s College, Cambridge and Chief Conductor of the BBC Singers, he also works with leading symphony orchestras and period instrument ensembles. He works across a broad repertoire, ranging from Gregorian chant to newly composed works. He has particularly championed contemporary music. At King’s he has commissioned a carol annually for the Festival of Nine Lessons and Carols, thereby refreshing this great tradition of Christmas music with compositions from the foremost composers of our own day. In March this year, he instigated the first Easter Festival of Music at King’s, at which he conducted concerts with the Chapel Choir and the Academy of Ancient Music, which were broadcast by the BBC. He has premièred many works with the BBC Singers, notably Giles Swayne Havoc at the Royal Albert Hall at the Proms, and Edward Cowie Gaia, both with the Endymion Ensemble. Last summer, also at the Proms, he gave the British première of Harrison Birtwistle Ring Dance of the Nazarene with the same forces.
King’s Choir currently records exclusively for EMI records and their recent recordings, including an album for the trebles and altos of the Choir, ‘Heavenly Voices’, continue to be received with acclaim. The Choir received a Classical Brit Award for its recording of the Rachmaninoff Vespers and this year has been nominated for a Grammy Award for the recent recording of Rachmaninoff Liturgy of St John Chrysostom, the critic in The Gramaphone magazine greeting the latter as “without a shadow of doubt, a triumph”, adding that “there is no comparable rival to this disc. If I had only this recording on my desert island, I’d consider it a foretaste of Paradise.”
As Conductor of the orchestra and chorus of the Cambridge University Music Society, Stephen has directed the major works for chorus and orchestra as well as symphonic repertoire and has also premièred new works, among them pieces by Alexander Goehr, Robin Holloway and Robert Saxton. Last season he directed the Cambridge University Music Society in performances of Mahler Resurrection Symphony in Boston, Berlioz Requiem in Ely Cathedral and Dvořák Stabat Mater in King’s Chapel. Most recently, in January, he conducted Vaughan Williams A Sea Symphony with the Cambridge University Music Society in the Sheldonian Theatre in Oxford and Tippett A Child of Our Time in King's Chapel.
He frequently appears in this country and abroad as a conductor, solo organist and leader of conducting workshops. 2004 saw him performing in Hong Kong, and touring Estonia with the BBC Singers who were joined by the Estonian Philharmonic Chamber Choir in a live broadcast featuring music by Richard Strauss. In April he conducted the BBC Concert Orchestra and BBC Singers in a broadcast performance of Mozart’s orchestration of Handel Messiah, the Academy of Ancient Music joined King’s Choir for Bach’s St Matthew Passion under his direction, and, in Belfast, he gave the world première of a new work by Deirdre Gribben with the Irish Chamber Orchestra. In the summer he took the King’s Choir to Hong Kong, later conducting a BBC Prom featuring works by Birtwistle and Dallapiccola. He also conducted the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra in a recording of works by John Rutter with King’s Choir. Recent performances as an organ recitalist have taken him to venues as diverse as Haderslev Cathedral in Denmark, St Edmundsbury Cathedral in Suffolk, England and Salt Lake's huge LDS Conference Center, where several thousand people came to hear him play earlier this year. He regularly gives recitals at King's, where he has made a number of organ recordings, including 'Organ Favourites from King's College, Cambridge', available on the EMI 'Classics for Pleasure' label.
Just before Christmas 2004 he led King’s College Choir on a six-concert tour of the USA, taking in Dallas, St Louis, the Twin Cities, New York City, Norfolk, Virginia and Washington D.C. 2005 has seen him directing the Mormon Tabernacle Choir in Salt Lake City, recording with the BBC Singers a CD of Tippett’s choral music to mark the composer’s centenary, and conducting the Israel Camerata in a series of concerts in Tel-Aviv and Jerusalem. In April he gave a series of conducting master-classes in Mexico and he conducted the National Chamber Choir of Ireland during their summer series in Dublin, and took King's Choir to Italy and Belgium and the BBC Singers to Japan, where he also gave a lecture on the music of Benjamin Britten at the International Choral Symposium in Kyoto.
Nicholas Daniel
CUCO Conductor
At his debut at the BBC Proms in 1992, the Sunday Times described Nicholas Daniel as one of the greatest exponents of the oboe in the world. Today one of the UK's most distinguished soloists as well as an increasingly successful conductor, he has become an important ambassador for music and musicians in many different fields.
Educated at Salisbury Cathedral School, the Purcell School for gifted young musicians and at the Royal Academy of Music, Nicholas Daniel studied with Irene Pragnell, George Caird, Janet Craxton and Celia Nicklin. At the age of 18, he won the BBC Young Musician of the Year Competition, going on to win major prizes at several other competitions, including the International Double Reed Society competition in Graz, and the Munich International Oboe Competition.
Nicholas Daniel has been heard in recital on every continent, and has been a concerto soloist with orchestras such as the Royal Philharmonic, the City of Birmingham Symphony, the Academy of St Martin in the Fields, the Seoul Philharmonic, the Britten Sinfonia, the English Chamber Orchestra, the Scottish Chamber Orchestra, the Ulster Orchestra, the Israel Sinfonietta, the Netherlands and Bavarian Radio Orchestras, the Orquestro Sinfonico di Rio, the European Union Chamber Orchestra, the Budapest Strings and all the BBC orchestras, under such conductors as Sir Roger Norrington, Oliver Knussen, Richard Hickox, Sakary Oramo, Tadaaki Otaka and Sir Peter Maxwell Davies. He has appeared regularly at the BBC Promenade Concerts, where his concerts have included the world premiere of John Woolrich's oboe concertoand Thea Musgrave's Helios, a work written especially for him. He made his conducting debut at the Proms in 2004 in the chamber series with the Britten Sinfonia.
An active chamber musician, Nicholas Daniel is a founder member of the Haffner Wind Ensemble and has enjoyed long and fruitful collaboration with pianist Julius Drake and the Maggini and Lindsay string quartets.
Nicholas Daniel has been an important force in the creation and performance of new repertoire for oboe. He has premiered works by composers including Henri Dutilleux, Sir Harrison Birtwistle, Sir Michael Tippett, Nigel Osborne and John Woolrich. Composers such as Sir Peter Maxwell Davies, John Tavener, Oliver Knussen, Michael Berkeley and David Matthews have written pieces especially for him. With the English Chamber Orchestra, he gave the world premiere of the orchestral version of Britten's Temporal Suite at the 1994 Aldeburgh Festival; and with the Scottish Chamber Orchestra the world premiere of Thea Musgrave's Helios at the St. Magnus Festival. Currently, John Tavener is composing a major work for oboe and strings for Nicholas Daniel as well as a song cycle for oboe, tenor and piano, Jonathan Harvey is writing a concerto and Thea Musgrave is writing a double concerto for oboe, percussion and orchestra for the BBC Proms that will feature Mr. Daniel and Evelyn Glennie.
Conducting is now absorbing an increasing amount of Nicholas Daniels time and he has conducted and directed a number of leading orchestras including the English Chamber Orchestra, Bournemouth Sinfonietta, City of London Sinfonia, Britten Sinfonia, Budapest Strings (Hungary), Camerata Roman (Sweden) and Kristiansand Chamber Orchestra (Norway).
As oboist and as conductor, Nicholas Daniel has performed in Melbourne, at the Aldeburgh Festival, with the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra under Sakary Oramo, with the BBC Symphony Orchestra, with the Leicester Symphony Orchestra in Leicester and Paris (Bruckner's 4th Symphony), in concerts with the Haffner Wind Ensemble including at the Wigmore Hall, with the Britten Sinfonia with pianist Rolf Hind, in master courses in Italy. He has conducted at the Philharmonie in Berlin and played and directed the Britten Sinfonia in six concerts to celebrate the Michael Tippett centenary.
Nicholas Daniel was Artistic Director of the Osnabrck Chamber Music Days from 2001-2004. In 2002 he was appointed Associate Artistic Director of the Britten Sinfonia, and is Artistic Director of the lsle of Man International Oboe Competition and of the Leicester International Music Festival. He is a member of the UK Arts Council in the East of England where he makes his home.
A committed teacher, Nicholas Daniel was appointed Professor of Oboe and Chamber Music at London's Guildhall School of Music and Drama at age 23. He served as Professor of Oboe at the Indiana University School of Music from 1997-99, and is now a Fellow of both the Guildhall School and the Royal Academy of Music. He was appointed Prince Consort Professor at the Royal College of Music, London from 1999-2002 and in 2004 took up the post of Professor at the Trossingen Musikhochschule in Germany.
Mr. Daniel can be heard on more than 30 recordings for such labels as Virgin Classics, Chandos, BMG Conifer and Leman Classics, most recently in Bliss's Oboe Quintet on Naxos with the award winning Maggini Quartet, in the music of John Tavener with Fretwork on Harmonia Mundi USA, and with the BBC National Orchestra of Wales under Richard Hickox in concertos by Michael and Lennox Berkeley, which recording was BBC Record Review's Disc of the Week.
Mr Daniel plays Loree instruments supplied by Crowthers of Canterbury in association with Loree, Paris.
Tim Brown
CUCO Conductor
Timothy Brown, Director of Music at Clare College, Cambridge, succeeded John Rutter as director of Clare College Choir in 1979. With the choir he has made many recordings and broadcasts, and undertaken numerous overseas tours. He also directs Cambridge University Chamber Choir and the London-based professional chamber choir English Voices. Described recently in a leading newspaper as one of Britain's most effective choir conductors and a prime custodian of the tradition that makes Oxbridge chapels famous from Seattle to St Petersburg, he undertakes many freelance conducting engagements and is a popular tutor at international singing courses. He has edited a number of choral volumes for Faber Music and is a contributing editor to the complete edition of music by William Walton, published by Oxford University Press.
Guy Woolfenden
CUCO Conductor
With more than 150 scores for the Royal Shakespeare Company and an impressive list of credits with major European theatre companies, including the Comédie-Française, Paris and the Burgtheater, Vienna, Guy Woolfenden’s theatre music is highly regarded throughout the world. During his thirty-seven years as Head of Music to the RSC, he collaborated with some of the world’s finest directors, designers and choreographers in many award-winning productions.
In collaboration with choreographer André Prokovsky, he has arranged the music for four full length ballets, which he has subsequently conducted in productions with The Australian Ballet, The Royal Ballet of Flanders, Hong Kong Ballet Company, Asami Maki Ballet, Tokyo, and Scottish Ballet. Guy conducted the acclaimed Russian première of his Anna Karenina with the Kirov Ballet at the Mariinsky Theatre in St Petersburg.
Last year Guy completed a commission for Saint James’s Singers and Orchestra, entitled Sounds and Sweet Airs - A Shakespeare Journey, which received its first performance at Holy Trinity Church, Stratford-upon-Avon in October during the 2006 Stratford on Avon Festival. He is currently working on a new piece for wind orchestra which will receive its first performance at the World Association of Symphonic Bands and Ensembles Conference in Killarney in July 2007.
Guy’s compositions for wind orchestra are performed all over the world and much has been recorded on CD. He has received several commissions from the USA and conducts concerts and workshops of his music both there and in Europe. Guy is conductor of the Birmingham Conservatoire Wind Orchestra.
Guy read music at Christ’s College, Cambridge, conducted the University Opera Group, wrote music for the ADC, and played horn in many orchestras and ensembles. More recently, he was Artistic Director of the Cambridge Festival from 1986-1991, and enjoys conducting concerts with the Sinfonia of Cambridge.
Guy was President of the Incorporated Society of Musicians 2002-2003 and is a past Chairman of the British Association of Symphonic Bands and Wind Ensembles. He was awarded a Fellowship of the Birmingham Schools of Music for his services to music in the Midlands in 1990, is an Honorary Member of the London College of Music, and an Honorary Associate Artist of the Royal Shakespeare Company.
August 2006
Baldur Brönnimann
CUCO Conductor
Brönnimann is becoming particularly well known for his innovative programming and his mastery of contemporary scores. He regularly conducts the major orchestras and new music ensembles in the UK and Europe and in 06-7 will make his debut in Australia and New Zealand.
In a wide and eclectic range of repertoire, Brönnimann has conducted in several of Europe's contemporary music festivals and series, including Helsinki's Music Nova Festival, Stockholm's New Music Festival, Cologne's MusikTriennale, Belfast's Sonorities Festival and the Philharmonia's Music of Today series. He is a regular conductor for BBC Radio 3 for whom he has recorded many lesser known works by contemporary composers for programmes such as Hear and Now and in recent seasons has worked with many of Europe's new music ensembles including Ensemble Modern, Ensemble Intercontemporain and Portugal's Remix Ensemble to whom he returns in 2007.
Highlights for the 2006-7 season include several debuts including with the Scottish Chamber Orchestra, as part of their flagship "Masterworks" education project, Finland's Tampere Philharmonic, the orchestra of Musikkollegium Winterthur in Switzerland, the Adelaide Symphony, with Hakan Hardenberger as soloist, and Auckland Philharmonia where he will conduct two programmes, one including Brett Dean's Viola Concerto with the composer as soloist.
Brönnimann trained at the Basel Music Academy, before holding a fellowship at the UK's Royal Northern College of Music, where he worked with Kent Nagano and Sir Edward Downes amongst others. He now regularly returns to the College in his capacity as Visiting Tutor in Conducting.
Pryia Mitchell
CUCO Soloist
Priya Mitchell has been described as ‘of the foremost violinists of her generation’ (The Strad). She was brought up in Oxford and went to the Yehudi Menuhin School where she studied under David Takeno. Two years at the Conservatoire in Vienna were followed by a period of study with Zachar Bron in Germany. In 1994 the Young Concert Artists Trust in London selected her for representation.
She was chosen as the British representative in the European Concert Halls Organisation Rising Stars Series and her year as ECHO Rising Star included recitals at Symphony Hall Birmingham, Cit de la Musique (Paris), Konzerthaus (Vienna), Alte Oper (Frankfurt), Concertgebouw (Amsterdam), Palais des Beaux-Arts (Brussels) and her critically acclaimed New York debut at Carnegie Hall.
She has given highly acclaimed performances with, amongst others, the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra and Yuri Temirkanov at the Royal Albert Hall, the BBC Symphony Orchestra conducted by Richard Hickox, and the Walton Concerto with Sir Andrew Davis at Symphony Hall, Birmingham; the BBC Philharmonic Orchestra and Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra; the English Chamber Orchestra, Royal Liverpool Philharmonic and the Philharmonia. She has recently toured Scotland with the Scottish Chamber Orchestra and played with the Academy of St Martin in the Fields at the Barbican under Emmanuel Krivine.
Priya Mitchell is a regular concerto soloist with many major European orchestras. She has appeared with the Belgian Radio and Television Philharmonic Orchestra, Sinfonia Varsovia and the Polish Chamber Orchestra. In August 2000 she made her debut in Australia with a very successful nationwide tour with the Australian Chamber Orchestra. In 2003 she toured the UK with the Moscow Philharmonic Orchestra performing the Sibelius and Stravinsky violin concertos. Her most recent successes include concerts with the Deutsche Sinfonie-Orchester at the Berlin Philharmonie, the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra at the Royal Festival Hall, and also a tour of the UK with the Polish National Radio Symphony Orchestra.
As a recitalist and chamber musician Priya Mitchell has performed extensively at many international music festivals including Schleswig-Holstein, Lockenhaus, Stavanger, Heimbach, Rheingau and Mecklenburg-Vorpommern Festivals in Germany. In November 2000 she gave a highly praised recital tour of Northern Ireland and Eire and was subsequently invited to play in the 2003 Sligo Festival. Additionally she has performed at the Schwarzenburg Festival, Bath International Festival and the Perth Arts Festival, Australia; Cheltenham, Bath Mozartfest and recitals at the Philharmonie, Berlin; Chatelet, Paris and concerto performances with the BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra.
In July 2000 Priya Mitchell launched her own festival the Oxford Chamber Music Festival of which she is Artistic Director. The Independent acclaimed this is a festival that should really put Oxford on the map of the classical music world and the majority of the concerts have been broadcast on BBC.
Recent performances have included, among others, appearances at the Osnabrck, Risr, and Khmo Festivals, and her future dates include a series of concerts throughout the UK with the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra.
Priya Mitchell plays a Balestieri violin (1760).
Morwenna Del Mar
CUCO Soloist
Having graduated from Cambridge University in 2005, Morwenna Del Mar is now in her second year on the postgraduate diploma in performance course at the Royal Academy of Music, studying the cello with Josephine Knight.
As a soloist Morwenna has performed at a number of leading concert halls throughout the country, including the Wigmore Hall, Leeds Town Hall, the Purcell Room, Kettles Yard and West Road Concert Hall in Cambridge. She recently performed the Schumann Cello Concerto in Kent, and the coming year includes performances of the Elgar Cello Concerto in Exeter, and the original version of Tchaikovskys Rococo Variations for Solo Cello and Orchestra with the Cambridge University Chamber Orchestra. She has had success in numerous solo and ensemble competitions at the Royal Academy of Music, reaching the finals of the Wilfrid Parry Brahms Prize with her duo partner, Susie Summers, being very highly commended in the May Mukle and Douglas Cameron prizes, and most recently winning the Harry Isaacs Prize with her piano trio. She is currently the recipient of the Royal Academys Winifred Disney bursary.
Morwenna is also a keen orchestral player and has recently been awarded the title of Leverhulme Orchestral Fellow at the Royal Academy of Music. She been the principal cello of many orchestras including the National Youth Orchestra of Great Britain, the Cambridge University Chamber Orchestra, the Dartington Festival Orchestra, the St Endellion Festival Orchestra, and both the Symphony and Concert Orchestras of the Royal Academy. Morwenna was a Cambridge University Award holder for chamber music.
Luis Parés
CUCO Soloist
Born in 1980, Venezuelan/Italian pianist Luis Parés is in much demand as a soloist and chamber musician having performed in many countries such as the USA, UK, Spain, Venezuela and Italy. He has appeared with some of the most distinguished orchestras in Venezuela including the Caracas Symphony Orchestra and Maracaibo Symphony Orchestra. In the UK he recently performed at the Queen Elizabeth Hall, Wigmore Hall and St John's Smith Square in London and the Bridgewater Hall in Manchester as well as giving numerous recitals over the past years at venues such as St James's Piccadilly, St Martin-in-the-Fields and the Bolivar Hall.
Luis has won First Prize at the XI Ricard Viñes International Piano Competition (Lerida, Spain, 2005), First Prize at the Silvia Eisenstein National Piano Competition (Venezuela, 2001) a Special Mention at the Stefano Marizza Piano Competition (Italy, 1998), many RCM prizes and was one of the winners of the 2006 Making Music Young Concert Artists Awards. After winning the RCM Concerto Competition he was invited to perform Beethoven First Piano Concerto with the RCM Sinfonietta conducted by Neil Thomson and he was a finalist at the 2007 YCAT Final Auditions held at Wigmore Hall. He has also received important chamber music prizes such as Third Prize at the Maria Canals International Music Competition, Duo Sonatas Category (Barcelona, 2004), the Beethoven Piano Society of Europe Gwyneth George Prize (London, 2003) and First Prize at the XIV Paper de Musica Competition (Catalonia, 2003).
He started his musical studies with Juan Antúnez and also studied with Sergio Cimarosti, the Trio di Trieste and Igor Lavrov. He obtained a First Class BMus Degree and an MMus Degree in Advanced Performance with Distinction from the Royal College of Music and studied with Gordon Fergus-Thompson and Andrew Ball. He held RCM awards supported by an Elsa and Leonard Cross Memorial Award, Charles Napper and Lucy Ann Jones Awards and the Leverhulme Trust, a Sir Richard Stapley Educational Trust Award and a Myra Hess Award administered by the Musicians Benevolent Fund. Luis currently holds the Mills Williams Junior Fellowship at the Royal College of Music for 2007/08.
Forthcoming engagements include Beethoven Fourth Concerto with Cambridge University Chamber Orchestra and Neil Thomson, numerous solo and chamber music recitals in the UK including a Bridgewater Hall recital in Manchester in March, and performances in Italy and Spain.