Music performance

The University of Surrey is home to a successful and talented symphony orchestra formed from students, alumni, staff and members of the local community, and is led by our Director of Conducting, Russell Keable. The University Orchestra gives three major concerts each year, either on campus or in external venues such as Holy Trinity Church in the centre of Guildford. 

Members of the orchestra will have the opportunity to work on a wide range of classical music. Over past years this has include ballets by Tchaikovsky and Stravinsky; suites by Bizet, Rimsky-Korsakov and Britten; overtures by Beethoven and Berlioz; symphonies by Dvorak, Sibelius and Shostakovich; plus choral works with the University Choir and some fun seasonal numbers for our Christmas concert! 

The orchestra is a friendly and welcoming group that meets on Monday evenings from 7pm to 9pm in PATS Studio 1 during semester time. Auditions are held at the start of the academic year for students from all programmes. Joining the orchestra during the course of the year is also possible; to find out more please contact orchestra@surrey.ac.uk. Players are generally expected to have reached Grade 7 or above on their instrument. 

The University Choir, led by Amy Kearsley, is a lively and fun choir open to all University students and staff from all subjects, plus members of the local community. A basic level of sight-reading, an ability to hold a tune and general enthusiasm is all we ask for! No audition is required. 

We rehearse every Wednesday evening from 7:30pm to 9pm in PATS Studio 1, and perform several times a year at Holy Trinity Church and other venues both on and off campus. We have performed with the University Orchestra on a range of challenging works including Vivaldi’s Gloria (complete), choruses from Handel’s Messiah and selections from the musical My Fair Lady, as well as performing some choir only pieces. 

The University Chamber Choir, conducted by Amy Kearsley, is open to all students via a short, friendly audition. We rehearse on Wednesday evenings from 5:30pm to 7pm in PATS Studio 1 during semester, including January assessment period and the period following the Spring vacation. The expectation is that Chamber Choir singers will stay on to University Choir, which rehearses on the same evening. 

The Chamber Choir performs challenging repertoire, mainly unaccompanied and often contemporary, including works with soloists drawn from the choir. We perform at a wide range of events throughout the year, both on and off campus, including the highly regarded University Carol Service at Guildford Cathedral. 

At the University of Surrey, we often find that students who play classical music come together to form chamber ensembles, and students who play (or sing) popular music form bands. There are many opportunities for both types of groups to perform, both on campus in our regular concert series and at external venues. 

Concerts of classical chamber music given by our student ensembles this year have taken place in venues including G Live in Guildford town centre, Guildford Cathedral and local churches such as St Martha-on-the-Hill. Our bands have recently been given a platform for performance in our Band Night hosted in PATS Studio 1, featuring a stellar line-up of seven student groups. 

Larger groups also form on an ad hoc basis, for instance, the ‘Beyond Words’ Concert given at Guildford United Reformed Church last November featured a 46-piece student orchestra plus professional soloists, performing a range of both classical repertoire and popular arrangements. 

The University of Surrey Big Band is Surrey’s premier jazz ensemble. We are a 21-piece big band comprising saxes, trombones, trumpets, rhythm and two vocalists. The varied repertoire includes a diverse range of genres such as swing, Latin, samba and funk, making live shows hugely atmospheric and entertaining. 

We audition for members at the start of each academic year to form a first-class band of students from various programmes and schools which rehearses weekly on Tuesday evenings to prepare for functions taking place both within Surrey and externally. We participate in competitions, perform at sell-out headline gigs and hold an exciting annual tour. Members benefit from regular social events to which friends of the band are always welcome.

The University of Surrey String Orchestra is open to everyone who plays a string instrument, no matter what subject you study, and requires no audition. We pride ourselves on our social ethos and a broad repertoire, primarily performing in music department ensemble concerts, recording sessions and concerts in Guildford. 

In the past we have performed film and television score arrangements including Pirates of the Caribbean and Stranger Things and pop song arrangements by artists such as Abba and Billy Joel, in addition to standard classical repertoire like Holst’s St Paul Suite and Elgar’s Serenade for Strings. We work closely with student conductors and soloists. 

Rehearsals are on Thursday evenings between 6pm and 8pm in theTeaching Block

JazzO, the University of Surrey Jazz Orchestra, is an open and welcoming student-led group playing all types of jazz music in a relaxed setting from Sing! Sing! Sing! to Chameleon and Reptile. We are always open to song suggestions as well as student compositions and arrangements. 

Rehearsals are held on Thursday evenings from 7pm to 9pm, with a break halfway through so that you have plenty of time to mingle with the rest of the band. No audition is required; just come along!

The University of Surrey Wind Band is a great way for keen musicians to perform as part of a wind ensemble. We are open to anyone who plays a woodwind or brass instrument as well as percussionists who want to play a variety of pieces including film and musical medleys. Our aim is to perform in multiple concerts throughout the year. 

We do not hold auditions and our memberships are free, so please just come along and get involved. Our rehearsals are on Tuesdays from 7pm to 9pm in 10 TB 00. Feel free to give us a follow on Instagram: @uos_windband. 

The University of Surrey Musical Theatre Society offers a chance to express your love of performing no matter your experience level. We perform two showcases per year, one in the autumn and one in the summer, in addition to presenting a main show with costumes, lights and a live band in early March. This year, our main show was Grease. Our regular rehearsal times are Mondays and Thursdays from 6pm to 10pm with occasional Sunday rehearsals in the lead-up to showcases and the main show. 

We welcome performers of all abilities because at the end of the day, we’re all there to have a good time which is reflected in how well our members get along. By holding regular socials outside of rehearsal times, we nurture these friendships and create a space where people feel included no matter what. 

Please reach out to us on Instagram at @ussu_mtsoc or e-mail at ussu.musicaltheatre@surrey.ac.uk if you’re interested in joining! 

Instagram: @ussu_mtsoc

Email: ussu.musicaltheatre@surrey.ac.uk

No Wave is the University of Surrey's Alternative Music Society. We are the society for all things rock, indie, metal, electronic, folk and all subgenres and spin-offs (although this is not exhaustive). We are also the oldest continuously running society at the University!

Every Monday, we host Open Jams where anyone can turn up with their instrument and play with other people. Many bands have formed from these jams.

Every Tuesday, we have socials, where we have a drink and a chat with our group playlist in the background.

We are also the only society which regularly runs gigs. Most of these gigs are on-campus and all have cheap ticket prices. 

The Music and Images project gathered a group of first-year students, which all played instruments not traditionally be included in the same ensemble: electric guitar, electric bass, piano, lever harp, bassoon and voice. Through rehearsals we made a series of orchestrations for compositions of our choice, and practiced the concert and workshop delivery. We visited two schools in our area (Sandfield and Stoughton) and delivered a workshop and a concert for Year 2 children.  The students introduced their instruments to pupils, and announced the pieces they played. The pupils in both schools drew while the group played, and joined in the discussion about how music made them feel and why. The children reacted really positively and were interested in the music delivered. They happily talked about their feelings and how they hear the music. 

Have you ever wondered about how musical instruments make sounds? Or why some sounds are high and others are low?  Join Head of Music and Media Chris Wiley and physicist Alexia Beale – who both play lots of instruments – and find out! In this 45-minute interactive session for school pupils aged 7 to 11, we’ll explore a range of instruments with strings and instruments you blow down, as well as those you hit with a stick. The event is targeted at Key Stage 2 (ages 7-11), but may be suitable for others as well. Audience participation is more than welcome! More about The Science of Musical Instruments event

In this talk, Dr Christopher Wiley (University of Surrey) explores some of the many connections between music and space. First, he discusses famous examples of people who have been interested in both space and music, including several contemporaries as well as Gustav Holst (The Planets), William Herschel (discovered Uranus), and Johannes Kepler (the music of the spheres). Second, he looks at some of the music that has been sent to and from space, both recent broadcasts (live and recorded) as well as the contents of Voyager’s Golden Records. Finally, he investigates composers’ representations of space through some of the most recognisable musical themes in the history of film and television, including Star Wars, Star Trek, and Doctor Who. In the course of this talk, he will perform music by Herschel and demonstrate the theremin, an electronic musical instrument commonly associated with the creation of otherworldly sounds.

Hosted by the University of Surrey at Guildford United Reformed Church as part of the Being Human Festival 2025, this intergenerational concert featured a 46-piece orchestra comprising students, alumni, and special guests from the surrounding area, together with University of Surrey Brass Ensemble and the student-led vocal group Vox Hominum. It explored how music creates meaning and connections beyond words, and across generations, by presenting an event for the whole family framed around performances of five works by Surrey-based composer Dame Ethel Smyth, including two UK premieres. Completing the programme were arrangements of music from Jurassic Park, James Bond, and ABBA, as well as a new piece, Scenes from ‘Imoinda’, composed and conducted by our Honorary Visiting Professor Odaline de la Martinez, featuring professional soloists Donna Bateman (soprano) and Sandeep Gurrapadi (tenor). A series of short talks introduced the pieces presented and their relationship to the research and teaching undertaken at the University, as well as the instruments on which they were performed. Audience members also had the opportunity to try out selected instruments for themselves during the interval, facilitated by our Music Hub partner, Surrey Arts. Further information: Beyond Words: University of Surrey hosts packed concert blending music and research | University of Surrey

Twice a year, the University of Surrey hosts our community orchestra day, where we welcome local musicians to join students and staff to rehearse large-scale orchestral works across a single day (one Sunday during semester) and give an informal performance to the public. 

The impressive repertoire for past Orchestra Days has included Mussorgsky’s Pictures at an Exhibition, Tchaikovsky’s Symphony No. 4, Prokofiev’s Romeo and Juliet, Bernstein’s Symphonic Dances from West Side Story and Vaughan Williams’s ‘London’ Symphony.

If you would be interested in attending any future Orchestra Day events, or in further information in becoming a member of the orchestra, please contact orchestra@surrey.ac.uk. The orchestra is non-auditioning but players are generally expected to have reached Grade 7 or above on their instrument.

If you are a classical music performer, and hold a British passport, you can apply for The Humphrey Richardson Taylor Charitable Trust. HRTCT was established in 1997 for the 'Advancement of public education in, and appreciation of, the art and science of Music and allied performing arts.' The Trust's benefactor, Mr H R Taylor, who lived in Cheam, Surrey, and died in 1996, was devoted to music throughout his life and wished to encourage the growth of music-making and live performance by people of all ages. Since 1997, the Trust has provided financial support for a range of musical activities in the geographical and historical areas of Surrey.

Through partnership arrangements with the Royal College of Music, the University of Surrey and certain other national bodies it extends its support to musically gifted British residents beyond its core geographical area.

Typically, help may be given to the following:

• scholarship funding (both undergraduate and postgraduate)
• grants towards fees
• grants towards instruments purchase

Further to this, there is a number of University scholarships and bursaries available for both undergraduate and postgraduate students.

Adriano Bush Prize

An annual prize of £100 established in memory of second-year student Adriano Bush, awarded to the HE5 or HE6 level student with the best-assessed performance of a piece of Romantic piano music in the Department of Music and Media (the assessment to take place as part of a Performance module). The prize is awarded annually at the discretion of the Director of Performance.

Joyce Dixey Award

An award given by the Mechanical-Copyright Protection Society in memory of the late Miss Joyce Dixey who was the Society's Secretary and General Manager, open to all students in Music and Sound Recording except those registered for PhD by Composition. It is awarded to the composer of the most impressive musical composition as judged in performance.

Shoana M Mackay Dissertation Prize

A prize of not less than £50 given by Mr Ranald Mackay, whose daughter graduated from the Music Department in 1988, awarded to the student on the BMus (Music) programme who submits the best final-year dissertation.

Quattro mani: A piano duet competition

A first prize of £200, a second prize of £120 and a third prize of £80, donated by Maureen Galea, awarded to students on BMus programmes to encourage the study and performance of piano duet repertoire. This competition will be judged by an external adjudicator.

See information on prizes on the MySurrey website.

As part of the Tonmeister programme, students are expected to record a wide range of music in a wide range of styles. Hence they are always looking for bands and ensembles to record in our studios or on location. The Institute of Sound Recording has the facilities to record all styles of music to a professional standard, however the student engineers are still learning their craft and so whilst recordings are usually of a high quality we cannot guarantee a professional result. 

Please fill out the following form, and we will get back to you soon:

https://forms.office.com/pages/responsepage.aspx?id=kyaQa3QQqkCeIdiURqL…

The Dame Ethel Smyth Prize is awarded for an impactful and high-quality performance of a piece of classical music by a woman composer by a music student of the University of Surrey, at a public performance. The prize is made in acknowledgement of the strong and continuing links between the University of Surrey, the county of Surrey, and the composer Dame Ethel Smyth, but the performance for which the prize is awarded need not be of Smyth’s music necessarily.

The performance in question will likely be a public assessed recital, though other forms of performance, both on and off campus, will be considered provided the event is an official University of Surrey performance that features as part of its annual Events calendar. It will normally be awarded to a solo performer, or possibly a performer who takes a significant and soloistic role within an ensemble.

The International Guitar Research Centre (IGRC) is committed to the study and development of the guitar’s compositional, performance, analytical and technical activity across a range of geographical and stylistic domains. Now with a number of International partners across six continents (including the International Guitar Foundation, The Guitar Foundation of America, The Altamira Foundation in China, the 21st Century Guitar network in Canada), the IGRC has become a global hub of guitar research, co-hosting  conferences and festivals in the USA, Hong Kong, China, Canada, Portugal, Germany, UK and Australia, providing a fertile network for its scholars and practitioners, and disseminating its work (through scores, recordings, performances, broadcasts, academic writing and pedagogical materials) to broad public and cultural impact. Through this pluralistic activity, the IGRC advances and enriches the diverse practice, culture and public engagement with this universal instrument.

Early Recordings Association was founded by Dr Inja Stanović (University of Surrey) and Dr Eva Moreda Rodríguez (University of Glasgow), in order to provide an international platform for communication between researchers and early recordings enthusiasts. Membership is free and members can use the platform to promote their own research interests, discover the interests of others via a searchable directory, and form connections with others in the field. ERA is an open-access resource, aimed at general public, enthusiasts, and academics, ERA brings together the past, present, and future of early recordings research.

The Institute of Austrian and German Music Research provides a forum for innovative and transformative scholarly research in Austrian and German music from all periods of history and of all genres, including popular music, jazz, folk, sonic arts, and hybrid forms. The IAGMR is  interested as much in the social politics of music (diaspora, migration, colonisation, appropriation, identity) as it is in philosophies, aesthetics, and analyses of music, and the practices, events, performance contexts, institutions, reception histories, and critical frameworks through which it is mediated.

The Theatrical Voice Research Centre brings together researchers, performers, and cultural organisations involved in different genres and socio-cultural contexts. As a community, we aim to overcome the boundaries between singing and the spoken word in both live and mediated settings, classical and popular idioms, Western and non-Western practices.  We link comparative and historical investigations of the voice with contemporary voice training and performance, and are eager to share scholarly and performance-based understandings of the voice with the cultural industries and wider society. 

Dr Tom Armstrong, Director of Learning and Teaching. Tom is a composer who frequently works with performers collaboratively on long-term projects. His interests in composition cluster around the following topics: the composer/performer relationship, the revision process in composition, and reworking. Tom is also interested in the relationship between concert programming and composition; several projects in progress involve the curation of continuously running programmes in collaboration with ensembles and soloists. He has collaborated with colleagues at Surrey on performance-related research, organising the 2022 Performance Studies Network conference and co-editing a special issue of Performance Research. Tom studied at the University of York (with Roger Marsh), Dartington Summer School (with Vinko Globular) and the Britten-Pears School (with Oliver Knudsen, Colin Matthews and Magnus Lindberg). Tom’s music is recorded on Resonus Classics, Meridian and released by the Delta Saxophone Quartet (Late Music). Read more and listen to music at https://tomarmstrongcomposer.com/

Dr. Barbara Gentili, Surrey Future Senior Fellow. Barbara is an opera singer and music historian. She trained at the Milan Conservatoire and the Accademia di Voci Verdiane at the Fondazione Toscanini in Parma. Barbara has starred in many opera houses in Italy, including Teatro Dal Verme (Milan), Teatro Sociale (Como), Teatro Ponchielli (Cremona), Teatro Fraschini (Pavia) and Teatro Grande (Brescia), and in several concert halls throughout England. Leading operatic roles she played include Fiordiligi in Così fan tutte and the Second Lady in The Magic Flute by W.A. Mozart, Sailor in Purcell’s Dido and Aeneas, Santuzza in Mascagni’s Cavalleria Rusticana, Violetta in Verdi’s La traviata, the Portatore in Brecht’s L’eccezione e la regola, Micaëla in Bizet’s Carmen, Nedda in Leoncavallo’s I Pagliacci, Tosca and Sour Angelica in the eponymous operas by Puccini, and Mimì and Cio Cio San in respectively La Bohème and Madama Butterfly by again Puccini. As a scholar, Barbara has since published in the most prestigious academic journals and her first monograph, Italian Opera Singing at the Time of Verismo. The Invention of the Modern Voice has just been published by Boydell and Brewer. 

Professor Stephen Goss, Director of International Guitar Research Centre. Professor Steve Goss is Director of the International Guitar Research Centre at the University of Surrey and a Professor of Guitar at the Royal Academy of Music in London. He has supervised over 25 PhDs to completion in the areas of performance research and composition. He gives lectures internationally on guitar performance practice of the 20th and 21st Centuries. Steve's music has been recorded on over 100 CDs by more than a dozen record labels. He has been commissioned by many of the world’s most celebrated performers (John Williams, Ian Bostridge, Evelyn Glennie, Nicola Benedetti, Mikhail Pletnev) and leading orchestras (Royal Philharmonic Orchestra, Russian National Orchestra, China National Symphony Orchestra).

Dr Tom Hall, Programme Director (BMus in Creative Music Technology) is a UK-based Australian composer, performer and writer on music with a particular interest in combing live and fixed electronics with instrumental ‘acoustic’ music. Much of his music involves notions of flow and slowness and collaborative and practice-based work often shares some form of digital notation with audiences. Hall’s work usually combines composed, algorithmic and improvisatory elements often using multichannel or individually experienced mobile sound. As a performer he has for years sat behind a laptop, but has been spotted in the past with electric and acoustic guitars, as well as a violin. Hall has been an occasional member of ensembles including Arf Arf, [rout], and with Sam Hayden, butterflyCut.

Dr John McGrath, Programme Director (BMus). A professional guitarist from the age of 17, John has performed thousands of gigs including in ensembles with Dustin Wong, Sharon Gal, History of Harry, Black Snow Rodeo, Cavalier Song, Tequila Sunrise, Rhys Chatham, Howard Skempton and the aPAtT Orchestra. Recent session work includes two records with The Unattached (Gare du Nord, 2024). A musicologist with extensive experience in popular music performance, John holds degrees from UCD (BA, BMUS), Trinity (MPhil) and Liverpool (PhD Music). His monograph Samuel Beckett, Repetition and Modern Music (Routledge, 2018) explores the interactions and cross-pollination of music and literature including examinations of the Beckettian music of Morton Feldman and avantjazz guitarist Scott Fields (positive reviews in Music & Letters, Psychology of Music, Irish Studies Review, The Wire, Burning Ambulance); while other recent publications investigate the transmedial work of Laurie Anderson and David Lynch in addition to practice research on glitch aesthetics and avantfolk. He is Deputy Director of the International Guitar Research Centre (IGRC) and has co-edited the collection 21st Century Guitar for Bloomsbury (2023).  

Dr Milton Mermikides, Director of Research, performs and presents internationally as a guitarist, electronicist, academic and educator in a range of styles. He is a Professor of Jazz Guitar (RCM), an Ableton Certified Trainer, and has published peer-reviewed articles on performance practice (published by Routledge, Bloomsbury, Soundboard Scholar, Oxford University Press and Cambridge University Press), particularly in the realm of expressive micro rhythm (’time feel’), digital performance, improvisational and interpretive models (M-Space). He has contributed over 120 articles for a popular audience (from Guitar Techniques, MusicRadar, Future Music, Computer Music, Total Guitar) and gives masterclasses and residencies internationally. He has collaborated with John Williams, Steve Winwood, Pat Martino, South Bank Centre, Ableton, Evelyn Glennie, Design Museum, Science Museum, City of London and in his role as Gresham Professor of Music and Deputy Director of the International Guitar Research Centre gives multiple public lectures and keynote presentations related to performance to an international audience.

Dr Inja Stanović, Director of Performance. Inja is a pianist and researcher, focusing on early recordings and nineteenth century performance practices. She holds piano performance degrees from Moscow Conservatory Tchaikovsky, Boston Conservatory and Parisian Schola Cantorum.  Inja has performed throughout the world, including concerts in Croatia, Australia, France, Germany, Italy, Slovenia, Mexico, the United Kingdom, and the United States. Inja’s pianism focuses upon 19th Century performance practice, as she combines musicological research (with particular emphasis upon 19th Century reception, stylistic tendencies, and performance techniques), and practice-based research (involving historically-informed performance practice. Inja's research and practice are focused on historical performance research,  early sound recordings, and mechanical recording technologies. Her lates publications include Early Recordings: Research and Practice (Routledge, Feb 2023); research album with Dr. Milsom, Austro-German Revivals: (Re)constructing Acoustic Recordings (Huddersfield: University of Huddersfield Press, 2022) and ‘Reviving the Brave Belgians: Mechanical recording practices as a guide in historical performance’ (Music & Practice, 2023) Inja directs the Early Recordings Association (ERA), a digital platform for historical recording research and practice.

Dr. Bill Thompson, Teaching Fellow in Music and Creative Music Technology. Bill Thompson is a sound artist and composer. He performs regularly as a soloist as well as in a number of groups including The Seen, Three Plus One and Airfield (with Ian Spink), and duos with Richard Sanderson, Phil Durrant, and Yoni Silver. Past collaborations include performances with Keith Rowe, Faust, EXAUDI and others. Originally trained as a guitarist, Thompson has worked with live electronics for over 20 years. He now performs with a Moog guitar combined with electronics and miscellaneous tabletop devices, found objects, flashing lights, and the occasional vibrator. He has earned numerous awards and commissions including the Venice Biennale, Organ Reframed, the Sound Festival, the PRS for New Music ATOM award, the GAVAA Visual Arts Award, a PRS for New Music Three Festival commission, the Aberdeen Visual Arts Award, and was nominated for the Paul Hamlyn Award.

Dr Georgia Volioti is the MMus Programme Director, the Director of Music Careers and Employability and a Senior Lecturer in Music. She has interdisciplinary research interests in music performance which span across music performance studies, performance psychology and music education. Her research is published in leading peer-reviewed journals including The Musical Quarterly, Music and Letters, The Journal of Musicological Research, Music Performance Research, Musicae Scientiae and Research Studies in Music Education among others. Book chapters have been published in edited volumes by Routledge (Taylor & Francis). She is a frequent peer reviewer of performance scholarship for prestigious academic journals including: Frontiers in Psychology (Performance Science section); Empirical Musicology Review; Journal of New Music Research; Music and Letters; Acta Musicologica; Research Studies in Music Education; Psychology of Music; Nineteenth-Century Music Review; and Musicae Scientiae. Her recent book (as lead editor) Recorded Music in Creative Practices: Mediation, Performance, Education is published in the Routledge series SEMPRE Studies in the Psychology of Music. She is currently co-editing, with equal contribution to the project, a special issue of Performance Research titled ‘On Music’, which evaluates the current state of music performance studies and its relation to other disciplines. She is a frequent presenter at major national and international conferences on music performance, including the International Symposium on Performance Science and the Performance Studies Network International Conferences among others. She has organised and hosted various international conferences on music performance at the University of Surrey. Her forthcoming conference (26-27 June 2025) is Broadening Music Performance: New Approaches and Possibilities for Higher Music Education. She has given public pre-performance talks for Glyndebourne opera company and has written on contemporary issues in arts and culture for The Conversation. Her areas of teaching and supervision encompass a diverse range of topics on music performance at both undergraduate and postgraduate levels of the BMus and MMus programmes. 

Dr Christopher Wiley is Head of Department of Music and Media and Senior Lecturer in Music at the University of Surrey, and a National Teaching Fellow. Educated at the Universities of Oxford, Surrey and London, he also holds multiple music diplomas. Internationally acknowledged for his research in areas including musical biography and life-writing, Ethel Smyth, autoethnography, music in popular culture, gender studies, and higher education learning and teaching, he is also active in the field of music performance studies. Work in the latter includes articles on specific repertories such as the keyboard music of Ethel Smyth; supervising and examining multiple practice-led PhD and DMA dissertations; and publishing over 60 reviews of live performance for Musical Theatre Review. He has given pre-performance talks for internationally high-profile organisations including Glyndebourne and the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra, as well as for concerts in major Central London venues such as Southwark Cathedral and the National Musicians’ Church. He has written programme notes for the BBC Proms, BBC Symphony Orchestra and Chorus, and other organisations internationally, as well as liner notes for multiple commercially released recordings. He is a Director and Trustee of Retrospect Opera, which has commercially released 12 professional recordings over the past decade, and regularly organises recording sessions working with commercial labels such as Lorelt (Lontano Records); he is also Musical Executor and a Trustee of The Richard Stoker Trust. He is currently co-editing a special issue of the journal Performance Research and preparing a music edition for Breitkopf & Härtel, one of the world’s leading publishers. He remains active on oboe, organ and other instruments, and regularly performs with the University Orchestra, University Chamber Orchestra, University Choir, Surrey Students' Union String Orchestra and multiple student chamber ensembles, and as a soloist. His work at Surrey includes performance teaching, workshop facilitation and examining; he is also a freelance instrumental teacher. Recent performances (selected list): https://chris-wiley.com/performances/.

Russell Keable has established a reputation as one of Britain’s most exciting and versatile musicians. ‘Keable and his orchestra did magnificently’ wrote The Guardian, ‘one of the most memorable evenings at the South Bank' said The Musical Times. He performs with orchestras and choirs throughout the British Isles including the London Mozart Players, Manchester Camerata, Northern Ballet Orchestra, BBC Concert Orchestra, Viva and Royal Philharmonic Orchestra. He is a regular guest conductor for the Royal Oman Symphony Orchestra, has conducted in Prague and Paris (concerts filmed by French and British television) and recently made a highly-praised début with the George Enescu Philharmonic in Bucharest. His regular performing partners include many leading national and international soloists (including Steven Isserlis, Tasmin Little, Nikolai Demidenko, John Lill and Nicholas Daniel).

Amy Kearsley is a mezzo soprano from Wigan, currently in her final year of masters vocal studies at Trinity Laban Conservatoire of Music and Dance, under the tutelage of Neil Baker and coached by Panaretos Kyriatzidis. As a first class BMus graduate from the University of Surrey, Amy was awarded the ‘Robert Naylor Memorial Prize’ for the most meritorious final performance and the ‘Faculty Placement Student of Year Award’ for her placement with the English National Opera’s outreach and engagement team. Previous roles include the title role of Adela (Manchester Contemporary Youth Opera and Tête à Tête Festival), Jill in Merrie England (Brent Opera), Elém in Syllable, Olivia in Strozzi and Justine in Frankenstein or the Modern Prometheus (Trinity Laban Opera). Amy is also a founding member of new music collective, The Ruffians. Amy is a recipient of the Charles Jacobs award and her studies are supported by Help Musicians.

• Caroline Balding, violin
• David Burrows, cello
• Deborah Davis, flute
• Sarah Field, trumpet
• Paul Geary, bass guitar
• Caroline Harding, double bass
• Jenny Howe, voice
• Thomas Law, saxophone
• Joe Richards, percussion
• Margaret Roberts, piano
• Jennifer Snapes, voice
• Paul Thomas, guitar
• Darby Todd, drums
• David Whitson, trombone