Rufus Frowde
Rufus Frowde read music at Oxford University (where he was Conductor of the Oxford University Philharmonia, Organ Scholar of Merton College and a tenor in Schola Cantorum, performing his Finals Recital as a violinist). He subsequently became Organ Scholar of Worcester Cathedral. In 2003, Rufus took up his former post as Organist and Assistant Director of Music at the Chapel Royal, Hampton Court Palace. He combined this with postgraduate study in Choral Direction and Church Music at the Royal Academy of Music, being awarded prizes in both disciplines.Rufus appears as a conductor and organist on the Divine Art and Diversions labels and has participated in workshops with the BBC Singers, the National Youth Choir of Great Britain and the Royal Academy of Music Chamber Choir, as well as conducting in the London Master Classes under Benjamin Zander. He was Musical Director of Surrey Youth Choir from 2005 – 2019.
Current conducting appointments include North Herts Youth Orchestra, Vivamus (Chamber Choir), The Dacorum Community Choir (founder), with whom he has recently conducted Jonathan Dove’s community opera Tobias and the Angel. He has also formed his own professional group, Paean.
Rufus is a passionate educator and is heavily involved in the work of Hertfordshire Music Service as an orchestral conductor and animateur (most notably as Artistic and Musical Director of the 2014, 2016 and 2018 Hertfordshire Galas at the Royal Albert Hall). He has also worked as a choral director for Goldsmiths, University of London, collaborated with the Yehudi Menuhin School on a number of choral projects and was a part-time member of the academic and peripatetic staff at the closed Princess Helena College, Hitchin. He has recently taken up the post of Accompanist of Hertfordshire Chorus.
Rufus has given recent performances in numerous churches and cathedrals, St Martin in the Fields, St John’s Smith Square (with Emma Johnson), the Spitalfields Festival, New Chamber Opera, La Madeleine (Paris), Kaunas Cathedral (Lithuania), St. Thomas’s (Leipzig), St. Paul’s Basilica (Rome), Cologne Cathedral and Neresheim Abbey (Germany). He has also performed Dave Brubeck’s Cantata The Gates of Justice (European Premiere). He accompanied Rossini’s Petite Messe Solennelle in Rome under the direction of the late Sir David Willcocks. He has also accompanied a number of prominent musicians including the trumpeter Crispian Steele Perkins, Kiri Te Kanawa and José Carreras and played continuo on a UK tour with the acclaimed violinist Lara St John and the London Baroque Ensemble.
Contemporary music also features highly in Rufus’s diary and he has conducted and played for numerous premieres including works by Judith Weir, Richard Allain, Ben Parry, Graham Ross, Sasha Johnson Manning, Richard Sisson and Will Todd. 2014 included his first organ recital at Westminster Abbey and the premiere of his carol Adam lay ybounden at the Annual Carol Service for the Royal Academy of Arts.
On the lighter side, Rufus is a regular deputy pianist in the Palm Court Quintet at the Ritz Hotel, London and has played the organ for a number of celebrity weddings, including that of Geri Halliwell (Spice Girls) and F1 boss, Christian Horner, as well as for Royalty. He has been a regular contributor to Classical Recordings Quarterly and in 2012 he was awarded Her Majesty’s Diamond Jubilee Medal.
Rufus was Music Director of the Hardynge Choir since 2011. He directed his last concert The Dawning of the Day on Saturday 29 June 2024; that concert was followed by a farewell party, We heartily congratulate Rufus on his appointment as the Artistic Director of The English Chamber Choir. We wish him every success.
