Artist Spotlight – Katherine Gregory

We are delighted to be welcoming Katherine Gregory to give a recital on 1 September at 7pm in Boxgrove Priory.

Early booking is advised to hear this exceptional young talent! Tickets are available here.

Born in 2002, Katherine Gregory began singing as a chorister at Truro Cathedral at the age of 13. She has recently graduated with a BA in Theology and Philosophy from Newnham College, Cambridge.

During her time in Cambridge she was a member of Trinity College Choir with whom she did many recordings and tours, including a recording for Hyperion and video release of Duruflé’s Requiem in Saint Eustache, Paris, for which she performed the Pie Jesu. 

Katherine was awarded first prize in the prestigious Clare College Song Competition during her final year in Cambridge, having been awarded second prize in the same competition two years earlier. She has sung roles in many Cambridge opera productions including Countess in Mozart’s Le Nozze Di Figaro (Trinity College Music Society), Rosalinde in Strauss’ Die Fledermaus (Cambridge University Opera Society), The Queen of the Night in Mozart’s The Magic Flute (CUOS) and Juno in Handel’s Semele (CUOS). 

Katherine was also on the Pembroke Lieder Scheme 2022-2023 where she received regular sessions with acclaimed piano accompanist Joseph Middleton. She has participated in masterclasses with Sir Thomas Allen and Ailish Tynan as part of the scheme. 

Katherine’s recent engagements include Durufle’s Requiem (The Bach Choir and David Hill), Brahms’ Requiem (Trinity College Choir with Stephen Layton and Three Spires Singers with Christopher Gray), Handel’s Messiah (Truro Choral Society), Mendelssohn’s Hear My Prayer (Three Spires Singers with Christopher Gray), Mendelssohn’s Elijah and Mozart’s Requiem (The Knightsbridge Festival Choir with Nicholas Danks). 

Katherine currently studies with Ann De Renais, previously studying with Margaret Kingsley.

Here she is with duo partner Madeleine Brown:

Autumn Concerts – Announcing New Dates!

We are excited to announce three new concert dates in the autumn in London, Cambridge & Stockbridge. All three feature a new programme called ‘A Quiet Night’ which takes as its inspiration the service of Compline.

Beginning with the music of John Tavener, whose death 10 years ago is being marked this year, The Beaufort Singers journey through music from across the centuries, using the texts of Compline to dwell on themes of light and darkness, life and death, prayer and praise. We hope to see you there!

London

St James’ Church, Islington 15 September, 7.30pm

Part of the Islington Proms

Cambridge

Church of Our Lady and the English Martyrs, Hills Road 16 September, 7.30pm

Self-promoted concert

Stockbridge

St Peter’s Church, Stockbridge 20 October, 7.30pm

Stockbridge Music

Artist Spotlight – Jess Dandy

We are thrilled that Jess Dandy is singing with us for our performance of Rachmaninov’s All-Night Vigil at the Boxgrove Choral Festival.

Jess will be singing the beautiful solo in the second movement of Rachmaninov’s masterpiece. Come along on Saturday 2 September at 7.30pm in Boxgrove Priory!

Grab your tickets for the concert here.

Cumbrian born Jess Dandy is the foremost British contralto of her generation and has been praised for her instrument of velvety plangent timbre, and her artistic remarkable immediacy.

This 2022/23 season highlights have included performances of the Messiah with the Welsh National Opera and Academy of Ancient Music, Bach’s Weinachtsoratorium with Salzburg Kulturvereinigung, Bach’s St Matthew Passion with Concertgebouw Amsterdam and Dunedin Consort and premiered a new opera All Seas by Josephine Stephenson at Opéra Grand Avignon. Other performance highlights yet to come this season will include Handel’s Samson at the BBC Proms with The Academy of Ancient Music, C.P.E Bach’s Heilig with the Dunedin Consort at the BBC Proms, Elgar’s Music Makers with the English Symphony Orchestra and a new commission with the BBC Philharmonic.

Jess has appeared on the concert platform with the BBC Philharmonic Orchestra, The English Concert, The Academy of Ancient Music, Orchestre révolutionnaire et romantique, Minnesota Symphony Orchestra, Kitchener-Waterloo Symphony Orchestra, BBC National Orchestra & Chorus of Wales, BBC Welsh National Opera, BBC Symphony Orchestra, The Dunedin Consort, Les Arts Florissant, Opera Settecento, Hallé Orchestra, Britten Sinfonia and the Royal Liverpool Philharmonic; collaborating with conductors including Sir John Eliot Gardiner, Harry Bicket, Laurence Cummings, Osmo Vänskä, Trevor Pinnock, Gemma New, John Butt William Christie, Kristian Bezuidenhout and Stephen Layton.

In 2021, Jess was shortlisted for a Royal Philharmonic Society Award in the category of Young Artist. She is a multi-faceted artist with a keen interest in ecology, body psychology and spirituality. She is the co-founder of SongPath, a mental health initiative creating musical walking trails in nature for better mental health. With composer Alex Mills, she developed the Music & Being Collective, an open laboratory space exploring music and our sense of self through interdisciplinary dialogue.

New Video posted! Gloria – Frank Martin: Mass for Double Choir

We’re pleased to reveal a video from our concert in London last November. The Gloria from the Mass for Double Choir by Frank Martin is a real jewel in the repertoire, and we had such a good time performing it in St James’ Sussex Gardens. We love performing this work as part of our O Magnum Mysterium programme. If you would like to book the group to sing a concert at Christmas, do get in touch.

If you haven’t already, please subscribe to our YouTube channel and turn on notifications – that way, you won’t miss an upload!

Booking Now Open! Boxgrove Choral Festival 2023

We are looking forward to welcoming you back to the Boxgrove Choral Festival!

There is lots to enjoy, including our own performance of Rachmaninov’s All-Night Vigil.

We also welcome The Gesualdo Six and their English Motets programme, and we can’t wait to hear Strauss’ Four Last Songs performed by talented duo Katherine Gregory & Madeleine Brown.

The dates for your diary are 31 August–3 September 2023. Mass on the Sunday morning will be the climax, featuring the setting of the Mass in G by Poulenc.

We have set up a dedicated page on our website which shows you all the events, dates and ticket links.

If you would like to support this year’s festival, then you can join our Friends’ Scheme. We are also delighted to hear from you with any further queries – contact us here.

O Magnum Mysterium – London success

We had an amazing time last weekend performing our brand new O Magnum Mysterium programme. Thank you to those who braved the weather and the Football World Cup temptations (!) to come and hear us.

We look forward to more exciting adventures in the New Year! You can find out more in the What’s On section of our website.

Rehearsal photo November 2022

London Debut date announced

We are making our London debut at the beautiful church of St James, Sussex Gardens!

The concert is at 8pm on Tuesday 29 November and we have a wonderful programme of moving works from the twentieth century. We will be performing Howells’ Requiem and Martin’s Mass for Double Choir alongside modern settings of O Magnum Mysterium. Tickets are on sale now and can be purchased here.

Artist Spotlight #3 – Michael Craddock

For our third and final solo showcase, we’re delighted to present Michael Craddock who will be singing Isolation Songbook – a project he has jointly brought to fruition with his fiancé Helen Charlston.

Tickets for the concert are available here, and you can buy the CD of Isolation Songbook here.

Michael Craddock started his formal musical education with the choir of Trinity College Cambridge, with whom he sang for four years, whilst studying Mathematics, and now combines his time as a regular member of The Gesualdo Six with a busy schedule of freelance oratorio, operatic and song perfomances in the UK and further afield.

Operatic performances include Walton The Bear (Smirnov) for Opera Anywhere, Britten’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream (Bottom) in Aldeburgh, sharing the role with Matthew Rose, Donizetti Don Pasquale (Dr. Malatesta) for Opera Minima and Verdi’s La Traviata (Marchese) for Regent’s Opera at the Bermuda Festival. He sang the dual roles of Alfio/Tonio in Hampstead Garden Opera’s performances of Cavalleria Rusticana/Pagliacci and gave the role of Dandini in the Bedford Park Festival production of La Cenerentola. Most recently he performed the part of the Usher in Sullivan’s Trial by Jury, with the OAE and John Wilson.

He has a particular affinity for the music of JS Bach, and has given many performances with the group Amici Voices, who specialise in one-voice-per-part performances of Bach’s vocal works. In their performance of the St Matthew Passion ‘Michael Craddock … deserve(d) special mention’ (Early Music Review). He was singled out by Opera News magazine for ‘beautifully shaped’ solo singing, with ‘comforting tone’ in Amici Voices CD release of BWV 106 and 182 (Hyperion). Oratorio solos include bass arias in the St Matthew Passion with the Auckland Philharmonia, Pilate/Arias in the St John Passion with the Adelaide Symphony Orchestra and Tasmanian Symphony Orchestra and Messiah with Hereford Choral Society.

Other freelance consort work includes engagements with The Tallis Scholars, The Marian Consort, Vox Luminis, The Gabrieli Consort, Polyphony, Contrapunctus, Le Concert D’astree, The Cardinall’s Musick, and the Choir of the Enlightenment.

Artist Spotlight #2 – Helen Charlston

We are extremely excited to be welcoming Helen Charlston to the Boxgrove Choral Festival!


Tickets for her concert are available here.


It’s on Saturday 4th September at 2.30pm, and it will be the first time that Isolation Songbook has been performed to an in-person audience.


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Acclaimed for her musical interpretation and “warmly distinctive tone” (The Telegraph), Helen Charlston won first prize in the 2018 London Handel Singing Competition and was a finalist in the 2019 Grange Festival International Singing Competition. She was a founder participant of the Rising Star of the Enlightenment programme, working alongside the Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment; and is a member of Les Arts Florissants Young Artist Programme (Jardin des Voix) for 2021/22. Helen is a 2018 City Music Foundation Artist and a BBC New Generation Artist.


Recent concert highlights include Handel Messiah: Reimagined (London Handel Orchestra/Laurence Cummings); Bach Matthew Passion (Gabrieli Consort and Players/Paul McCreesh); Dussek Mass in C (Academy of Ancient Music/Richard Egarr); Bach B Minor Mass (Slovenia Philharmonic Orchestra/Stephen Layton). Solo recital performances have taken Helen to Wigmore Hall, Barbican Sound Unbound Festival, Oxford Lieder Festival, York Early Music Festival, Händel-festspiele Halle, Korčula Baroque Festival, and Leicester International Music Festival.


The hiatus caused by the COVID-19 pandemic saw Helen’s music making return closer to home. Her Isolation Songbook, a collection of songs by 15 different composers, was commissioned during the first UK lockdown. Recorded by Delphian Records, the set was released on CD in early 2021.


Helen began singing as chorister and head chorister of the St Albans Abbey Girls Choir. She then studied music at Trinity College, Cambridge where she held a choral scholarship for four years and was a scholar on the Pembroke College Lieder Scheme, led by pianist Joseph Middleton.