Roderick Williams
The British baritone Roderick Williams was born in 1965 in London to a Welsh father and a Jamaican mother. He studied at London’s Guildhall School of Music and – while still completing opera classes there – made his debut as Tarquinius in Britten’s The Rape of Lucretia. He soon became known in particular for his interpretations of Mozart’s major baritone roles, performing at the English National Opera, Opera North, Scottish Opera, and the Royal Opera House in London. Another focus of his artistic work is contemporary music, with credits in stage works by David Sawer, Sally Beamish, Robert Saxton, and Alexander Knaifel. In this area he recently appeared, in March 2015, in Michel van der Aa’s Sunken Garden at the Opéra de Lyon. Williams is a sought-after concert singer who has worked with the Philharmonia Orchestra, the Royal Liverpool Philharmonic, the DSO Berlin, the Russian National Orchestra, the Orchestra dell’Accademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia, and the Bach Collegium Japan. He has sung the role of Christus in Peter Sellars’s staging of Bach’s St. John Passion in performances with Sir Simon Rattle and the Berlin Philharmonic in Berlin and Baden-Baden. In September 2014 Williams was the star guest for the Last Night of the Proms, at which he sang Strauss’s Taillefer and Rule, Britannia at the end. Williams also presented some of his own song arrangements there, for he himself is a successful composer whose works have been heard in London at Wigmore Hall, the Barbican, and the Purcell Room, as well as on radio broadcasts. As a lieder singer he has performed at the Oxford Lieder Festival, the London Song Festival, and the Musikverein in Vienna, and he has recorded an anthology of English song settings. Starting in 2016 he will take on artistic directorship of the Leeds Lieder series.

Sophie Bevan
Recognised as one of the leading lyric sopranos of her generation Sophie Bevan studied at the Royal College of Music where she was awarded the Queen Mother Rose bowl for excellence in performance. She was the recipient of the 2010 Critics’ Circle award for Exceptional Young Talent, The Times Breakthrough Award at the 2012 South Bank Sky Arts Awards, Young Singer award at the 2013 inaugural International Opera Awards and was made an MBE for services to music in the Queen’s Birthday Honours in 2019.

She works regularly with leading orchestras worldwide and with conductors including Sir Antonio Pappano, Daniel Harding, Andris Nelsons, Edward Gardner, Laurence Cummings, Sir Mark Elder, Ivor Bolton and Mirga Gražinytė-Tyla. Recent and future highlights include Ah! Perfido, The Seasons, Knussen Whitman settings and Ryan Wigglesworth’s Augenlieder all with the London Philharmonic Orchestra, Strauss’ Four Last Songs with the Philharmonia, Les Illuminations with the BBC Philharmonic Orchestra, the Aurora Orchestra and the Finnish Radio Symphony Orchestra, Faure Requiem and Haydn Nelson Mass with the Netherlands Radio Philharmonic, Schubert Mass no 6 at the Concertgebouw, St Matthew Passion at the Royal Festival Hall, Messiah with the Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment, Gluck Orfeo ed Euridice at the Edinburgh Festival, an evening of Viennese repertoire with the BBC Concert Orchestra at the 2020 BBC Proms Festival and Knussen’s Songs and a Sea-Interlude with the Swedish Radio Orchestra. An acclaimed recitalist she has appeared with pianists including Julius Drake, Malcom Martineau, Ryan Wigglesworth, Christopher Glynn and Graham Johnson at the Concertgebouw, Amsterdam and the Wigmore Hall in London.

Sought after for her work in opera Sophie’s recent and future engagements include Ilia Idomeneo, Sophie Der Rosenkavalier, Susanna Le nozze di Figaro Dalinda Ariodante and Pamina Die Zauberflöte at the Royal Opera House, title role The Cunning Little Vixen for Welsh National Opera, Hermione in Ryan Wigglesworth’s The Winter’s Tale and Télaïre Castor and Pollux for ENO, Ginevra Ariodante for the Bolshoi Moscow, Melisande Pelleas et Melisande for Dresden Semperoper, Asteria Tamerlano for The Grange Festival, Freia Das Rheingold at Teatro Real, Madrid and Governess The Turn of the Screw in the acclaimed production for Garsington Opera. She made her debut at Glyndebourne Festival Opera as Michal Saul and at the Salzburg Festival and Metropolitan Opera as Beatriz in Thomas Adès’ The Exterminating Angel.

James Gilchrist
began his working life as a doctor, turning to a full-time career in music in 1996. His musical interest was fired at a young age, singing first as a chorister in the choir of New College, Oxford, and later as a choral scholar at King’s College, Cambridge.

James’ extensive concert repertoire has seen him perform in major concert halls throughout the world with conductors including Sir John Eliot Gardiner, Sir Roger Norrington, Bernard Labadie, Harry Christophers, Harry Bicket and the late Richard Hickox. Recent highlights have included Britten’s Church Parables with performances in St Petersburg, London and at the Aldeburgh Festival, Handel’s L’Allegro il Penseroso ed il Moderato with the Mark Morris Dance Group at the Teatro Real, Madrid, Solomon with Les Violons du Roy, Schumann’s Das Paradies und die Peri and Die Schöpfung

at the Leipzig Gewandhaus, Britten’s Nocturne with the NHK Symphony Orchestra in Tokyo and War Requiem with the San Francisco Symphony Orchestra. In J.S. Bach’s great Passions of St John and St Matthew, James works consistently at the highest level and is recognised as the finest Evangelist of his generation; as one recent BBC Proms reviewer noted, ‘he hasn’t become a one-man Evangelist industry by chance’.

A prolific and versatile recitalist, James enjoys imaginative and varied programming in collaborations with pianists Anna Tilbrook and Julius Drake, and harpist Alison Nicholls. Recent appearances include a Schubertiade weekend at St John Smith Square and Schwanengesang coupled with Beethoven An die Ferne Geliebte at the Wigmore Hall. James recently returned to the Wigmore Hall to begin his project with Anna Tilbrook, Schumann and the English Romantics, pairing Schumann song cycles with new commissions from leading composers, Sally Beamish, Julian Philips and Jonathan Dove, setting English poetry of the Romantic period.

James’ impressive discography includes the title role in Albert Herring and Vaughan Williams’ A Poisoned Kiss for Chandos, St John Passion with the Academy of Ancient Music, the Finzi song cycle Oh Fair To See, Elizabethan Lute Songs When Laura Smiles with Matthew Wadsworth, Leighton Earth Sweet Earth, Vaughan Williams On Wenlock Edge, Finzi songs and Britten’s Winter Words for Linn Records and the critically-acclaimed recordings of Schubert’s song cycles for Orchid Classics. James and Anna Tilbrook have recently released a new disc of Schumann song cycles for Linn Records.

Recent engagements include performances with The King’s Consort at the Enescu Festival in Bucharest; concert performances of Semele with Concerto Köln, and Hercules with the English Concert; Handel’s Messiah with Boston Handel and Haydn Society; Bach’s Christmas Oratorio with Tafelmusik Baroque Orchestra in Toronto, with the BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra and with the Academy of Ancient Music; a recital with Julius Drake at the Concertgebouw and Haydn’s Creation with Orquesta Sinfonica de Galicia and in a new staged production for Garsington Opera and Ballet Rambert, as well as appearing as the Evangelist in St Matthew Passion across Europe with the Monteverdi Choir.

This season, highlights include Handel L’Allegro with Stuttgart Bachakademie; Haydn Creation at Sadler’s Wells (Garsington Opera / Ballet Rambert) and in Denmark (Aarhus Symphony Orchestra); Christmas Oratorio across Europe with Windsbacher Knabenchor; and appearances at the Lammermuir, Roman River, Hatfield House and Oxford Lieder festivals. James will also curate a concert series of Bach and Purcell for the Academy of Ancient Music, and appears in the role of Reverend Horace Adams in Britten’s Peter Grimes for Bergen National Opera and the Edinburgh International Festival.