ADRIAN LUCAS
Musical Director

Adrian Lucas is currently Master of the Choristers at Worcester Cathedral, Musical Director of the Worcester Festival Choral Society and the City of Birmingham Choir, Artistic Director of the Worcester Three Choirs Festival and a freelance conductor, organist and lecturer.

Focused principally around the daily liturgy of the Cathedral, Adrian has developed the work of the Cathedral Choir and directed a series of successful recordings over the last eight years. In addition to a range of choral music spanning the 16th and 20th centuries, the choir has also performed in a disk of music by John Harle and a light-hearted promotional recording of Christmas music Deep and Crisp and Even in support of the Worcester Appeal for Music and Light.

The Cathedral Choir is also busy with a schedule, which includes concerts and broadcasts in a wide variety of contexts. Regular appearances on national radio and television keep the choir's profile high and have included a live broadcast of Bernstein's Mass with the BBC National Orchestra of Wales in 2000 and two ambitious Songs of Praise special broadcasts for BBC television in 2001, as well as a 52 minute documentary on the history of the European boys' choir tradition entitled "L’Or des Anges". The choir also makes regular international tours, including most European countries, Scandinavia, South Africa and six times to the United States.

Adrian Lucas is widely respected as an orchestral conductor and works regularly with such groups as the Philharmonia, the Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra and the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra. In recent years he has been involved in a large number of major concerts in the Midlands and across the country, conducting programmes which range in scale from the baroque glories of Bach and Handel, through to the challenges of Stravinsky, Elgar and Walton. In 2002 he succeeded Christopher Robinson as conductor of the City of Birmingham Choir and has worked with them on a series of highly acclaimed concerts in Symphony Hall. A live broadcast of the centenary performance of Elgar's The Apostles was the first of a series of collaborative projects with the City of Birmingham Symphony Chorus and its chorus master, Simon Halsey. He has recently returned from directing a choral festival in Houston, Texas and will be guest conductor for an oratorio course in Richlieu, France in 2006.

Adrian has also become known as a composer, largely writing music for the liturgy during his many years experience in four major cathedrals. In March 2004, he was commissioned to write Creation Canticles, a 41-minute work for chorus and orchestra, which was premiered by the Society to great acclaim. The work received its second performance at the 2005 Three Choirs Festival and further performances are scheduled in the near future.

As director of the Worcester Three Choirs Festival since 1999 he has enjoyed the challenge of taking this celebrated and historic event firmly forwards with a ground-breaking performance of Duke Ellington with the Stan Tracey Orchestra, a world premiere of Francis Pott's A Song on the End of the World, received to great acclaim by national and international media, and Andrew Gant's jazz oratorio The Vision of Piers Plowman. The planning and execution of the 2005 festival was received with great excitement in local, regional and national press and the programme for 2008 is now available.

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CHRISTOPHER ALLSOP
Accompanist

Christopher Allsop was born and educated in London. In his final year at school he held the Organ Scholarship at St. Martin-in-the-Fields, Trafalgar Square, before spending a gap-year as Organ Scholar at St. George's Chapel, Windsor Castle. He graduated from Trinity College, Cambridge in June 1996, where he spent three years as Organ Scholar, reading music. He studied the organ with Richard Dunster-Sigtermans, lain Simcock and David Sanger.

After a year teaching for the University Music Faculty and Assistant Organist at Great St. Mary's, Cambridge, Christopher moved to Birmingham in 1997. As Assistant Organist of the Cathedral and Organist of the Blue Coat School, Edgbaston, he accompanied the Cathedral Choir on many broadcasts, tours and recordings and taught organ, piano and class music at school. He also founded and directed the New Birmingham Scholars Chamber Choir, taught at Birmingham Conservatoire, and regularly played for various local choirs including Ex Cathedra and Birmingham Bach Choir.

In 2004 Christopher took up his present post of Assistant Organist at Worcester Cathedral and Music Teacher at The King's School. His work involves accompanying the Cathedral Choir, directing the boys and men of the Voluntary Choir and teaching curricular music to all ages, as well as giving individual piano and organ lessons. In Summer 2005 Christopher was Festival Organist for the Worcester Three Choirs Festival, and he is also accompanist to the Worcester Festival Choral Society. In his spare time, Christopher is particularly enjoying exploring the local countryside with his wife Amanda and daughter Lucy.