STEPHEN
CLEOBURY
Biography
Stephen Cleobury is associated with two of Britain’s most famous choirs. Renowned equally as a conductor and organist, he has, since 1982, been Organist and Director of Music at King’s College, Cambridge. At the end of 2006 became Conductor Laureate of the BBC Singers, Britain’s only full-time professional choir, whose Chief Conductor he was for 11 years before that. He is also Conductor of the Cambridge University Music Society, one of the oldest such organisations in the world and works with leading symphony orchestras and period instrument ensembles. He ranges across a broad repertoire, from Gregorian chant to newly composed works. He has particularly championed contemporary music and at King’s has commissioned a carol annually for A Festival of Nine Lessons and Carols, thereby refreshing this great tradition of Christmas music with compositions from the foremost composers of our own day, including the Minnesotan composer, Stephen Paulus.
Of late, performances as an
organ recitalist have taken him to venues as diverse as Houston, Texas, Leeds
Town Hall, the Performing Arts Centre in Hong Kong, Haderslev Cathedral in
Denmark, and Salt Lake City’s huge LDS Conference Center, where he played to an
audience of several thousand people. Other engagements have 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; giving a
series of conducting master-classes in Mexico; conducting the National Chamber
Choir of Ireland and touring with the CUMS in Switzerland. In the midst of a tour of the BBC Singers in
As a conductor he has worked with many ensembles, including the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra, the BBC Concert Orchestra, the Philharmonia, the London Philharmonic, Southbank Sinfonia, the Academy of Ancient Music, the Irish Chamber Orchestra, the Estonian Philharmonic Chamber Choir, Endymion and His Majesty's Sagbutts and Cornetts.
He has directed the orchestra and chorus of the Cambridge University Music Society in the major works for chorus and orchestra as well as in symphonic repertoire, and has also premièred new works, among them pieces by Alexander Goehr, Robin Holloway and Robert Saxton. Recent performances with this ensemble have included Mahler Resurrection Symphony in Boston, Berlioz Requiem in Ely Cathedral, Dvořák Stabat Mater in King’s Chapel, Vaughan Williams A Sea Symphony in the Sheldonian Theatre in Oxford, and Tippett A Child of Our Time and Verdi Requiem, also in King's Chapel. 2007 saw a number of Elgar performances to mark the composer’s 150th anniversary year.
In March 2004, he instigated the
first annual Easter Festival at King’s, at which he conducts concerts with the
Chapel Choir and the Academy of Ancient Music, many of which are broadcast by
the BBC. He has frequently premièred
works with the BBC Singers, notably Francis Grier Passion of our Lord Jesus
Christ at the Easter Festival in 2006, Giles Swayne Havoc and
Harrison Birtwistle Ring Dance of the Nazarene at the Royal Albert Hall
at the Proms, and Edward Cowie Gaia, all with the leading chamber
ensemble, Endymion. More
recently he premièred Errollyn Wallen Our English Heart in
His CD output is prolific. King’s College has an exclusive contract with EMI and the latest release is I heard A Voice featuring music by Gibbons, Tomkins and Weelkes with the viol consort Fretwork. The Choir can also be seen and heard on DVD. Cleobury has also recorded with the BBC Singers, and there are solo organ recordings, too; Priory Records has recently re-released his much acclaimed account of the Elgar Sonatas.
Stephen thrives on this varied
professional life.
Current as of December 2007