Adrian Thompson - Patron

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Adrian is one of Britain’s leading operatic character tenors, long established on the stages of Covent Garden, Glyndebourne, English National Opera, Welsh National Opera and Garsington Festival. He trained at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama where he is now a professor of vocal studies. Internationally, his guest appearances have included Snout A Midsummer Night’s Dream for Teatro alla Scala, Albert Gregor The Makropoulos Case for Opera Zuid and Cologne Opera, title role Peter Grimes, Skuratov From The House Of The Dead and Canio Il Pagliacci for Oper Frankfurt, The Diary of one who Disappeared for La Monnaie and the Aix-en-Provence Festival, and Emperor Turandot for Canadian Opera Company.

Adrian received extraordinary critical acclaim for his February 2020 performance as Mime Siegfried in the London Philharmonic Orchestra’s Ring Cycle conducted by Vladimir Jurowski. Highlights of the 2023-24 season include returns to Grange Park Opera as Tichon Katja Kabanova and Trinculo in the world premiere of Antony Bolton’s Island of Dreams directed by David Pountney. Future plans include a return to the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden. 

A former organ scholar at Sidney Sussex College, Cambridge, where he read music, Sam now juggles dual careers as a musician and barrister. For over 20 years he has been the Director of the Elysian Singers, with whom he has made several acclaimed recordings, performed in the major London venues, and appeared numerous time on BBC Radio 3 and television. 

Sam s also in demand as a guest conductor, working with such orchestras as the Oxford Sinfonia, Kensington Chamber Orchestra, Kew Sinfonia, Orchestra of the City, Crendon Chamber Orchestra and Trinity Camerata. As a keyboard player he has also worked with the groups as varied as Oxford Philomusica, the Joyful Company of Singers, English National Opera and Garsington Opera. 

Antonida trained at the Royal Birmingham Conservatoire, achieving a distinction in her Masters in Vocal Performance.  A dramatic soprano, she is currently working on projects with Guildford Opera, Peterborough Opera, Clyde Opera Group, and Opera in a Box. 

As well as performing, Antonida has spent eight years as a producer with Oxford Opera Society. She has been instrumental in growing the group through introducing performances of opera scenes, developing a popular Opera at the Pub series, as well as overseeing productions at the Sheldonian Theatre.

She has undertaken many production roles for Oxford Opera Society, including assisting directing the company’s filmed pandemic production of Cui’s A Feast in the Time of Plague which attracted an international cast and creative team, and directing scenes from Rigoletto, Les Mamelles de Tirésias, La Bohème and La Traviata. 

As well as performing and directing opera, Antonida is a practising barrister, specialising in family law, property law and Court of Protection.

 Harriet studied the piano, harpsichord and voice at the Royal College of Music and as a post graduate répétiteur at the RCM Opera School. Her career was based in Italy, working as a répétiteur at the Teatro Verdi in Trieste, the Teatro Massimo in Palermo and Teatro Piccolo in Milan. She collaborated with Giorgio Strehler on his last production, Cosí fan tutte, touring in China, Germany, Italy, Japan, Russia and Spain. She worked for six years at the Rossini Opera Festival in Pesaro as Maestro di sala e al cembalo, collaborated with Théâtre de l’Opéra de Bordeaux, L’Orchestra Verdi Milano, Glyndebourne Festival, with Radio France and with Radio Suisse. 

Harriet’s concert work as an accompanist has taken her all over Europe – Salle Gaveau in Paris, opera houses in France, Germany, Italy Portugal, Spain and Switzerland, and numerous festivals. She has collaborated with the Britten Pears School in Aldeburgh and the Solti Peretti Masterclasses in Italy and was, for ten years, a teacher and pianist in the Walton Foundation masterclasses and concerts in Ischia. Since 1988 she has been teaching at the Accademia di Lirica di Osimo.

In 2015, after 35 years in Italy, Harriet returned to the UK, taking up bee keeping, building a vegetable garden and planting an orchard at her home in Beaconsfield. In her spare time, she has collaborated with the London Bel Canto Festival, occasionally with Arcadian Opera and Aylesbury Opera, and twice been Music Director of the Chiltern Shakespeare Festival. In 2021 she joined the Wooburn Singers, a great auditioned local choir. 

Originally from the north of England, Judith has become a well-known figure in the local musical community. After a career in Opera in Germany, and teaching voice at Exeter University, Queen’s University Belfast and the Royal Welsh College of Music and Drama, she settled in Slapton, Buckinghamshire.

Judith continues to sing with the Ridgeway Ensemble, performing for music societies across the country, and her special interest in the music of Jewish composers banned by the Nazis led to performances and lectures in the UK and USA, and a CD entitled “Forbidden Voices”, available on the Divine Art label.

Judith teaches locally and in Gloucester and conducts the Beacon Community Choir, Sing Wilstone!, the choir at St Mary the Virgin and RAF Halton Military Wives Choir. She is also a regular MD for Berkhamsted Youth Theatre productions.