'A highly talented local ensemble of classically trained opera singers and pianists'
ABOUT US
About Us
Peter Crockford, Musical Director and Pianist
Peter studied at the Birmingham School of Music (now Conservatoire) and the Royal Northern College of Music.
His early career was spent travelling widely as accompanist and vocal coach. He worked with Glyndebourne Festival and Touring Operas, New Sadlers Wells Opera, Wexford Festival Opera and Welsh National Opera. He conducted the very successful European Tour of Bernstein’s West Side Story and this led to an invitation to join the music staff at the Stadt Theater Freiburg, Germany as assistant to the General Music Director.Freiburg he toured all over the Middle and Far East conducting many operas and concerts. In the UK he has conducted the Royal Liverpool Philharmonic Orchestra, The National Symphony Orchestra, The Wren Orchestra, London City Opera, Crystal Clear Opera, European Chamber Opera amongst many others. He has always had a great interest in working with young and amateur musicians and is equally at home in conducting Madame Butterfly as a Broadway Musical. His last big job before ‘lockdown’ was to conduct the Sri Lanka Symphony Orchestra in Colombo in their celebration of Beethoven’s 250th anniversary.
Michaela Clarence, Set & Costume Design
Michaela Clarence is a design historian and writer based in London whose work is rooted in the performance and costume.
Her interest in dress began in the context of performance and staging, where garments act as both aesthetic devices and carriers of emotional resonance - her architectural interest is prompted by the idea that 'there’s nothing in skirts you can’t see in doorways.' This performative foundation informs her research into the haptic and emotional afterlives of dress, tracing how clothing is remembered, misremembered and reanimated through bodies, archives and glass.
She is a Postgraduate Researcher at the Victoria and Albert Museum and the Royal College of Art. Supported by multiple scholarships, her current research examines the aesthetic and social implications of ribbon use in eighteenth-century England.
Michaela’s practice moves between material research and critical writing, between performance, textiles and theory. She has published with Harper’s Bazaar (US) and Simulacrum Magazine, and is a frequent speaker on the intersections of dress, memory and representation.
Simon Wilson, Baritone
Simon has studied with Margaret Hyde, Ellis Keeler, Mark Wildman and Phillip Guy Bromley and won a scholarship to study on the Opera Course at the Royal Academy of Music. He has performed in many Concerts, Oratorios and Operas both in the UK and in Europe. His repertoire includes: Requiems by Verdi, Brahms, Mozart, Duruflé and Fauré, St John and St Matthew Passions,The Creation, Messiah, Elijah, Beethoven’s Ninth, La Traviata, Le Nozze di Figaro, Così fan tutte, The Magic Flute, Cavalleria Rusticana, Carmen, Zampa, Hansel and Gretel, Verbum Nobile, Don Pasquale, Si j'étais roi, Samson and Delilah, Faust, Carmen, Un ballo in maschera, Pagliacci, the title roles in Henry VIII, Nabucco, Rigoletto and Don Giovanni and many Gilbert and Sullivan Operas.
Liezel Ruthven-Brink, Mezzo Soprano
Liezel qualified with a Bachelor of Music in Voice and Education at the University of Stellenbosch, South Africa. She won prizes for recitals, song, oratorio and opera. Liezel toured internationally with the Philharmonia of Cape Town who performed with Luciano Pavarotti. She is the Director of Music at a local Private School and she also teaches Singing and Piano. Liezel regularly performs with a number of opera companies and she is the founder and Artistic Director of Opera Bel Canto London. Roles include: The High Priestess Aida for Riverside Opera, Olga The Merry Widow for West London Opera, Stephanie Tempest (cover) and Emilia Otello for Guildford Opera, Flora La Traviata for West London Opera, Hata Bartered Bride for Opera at Barewood.
Rachel Jones, Mezzo Soprano
The founder member of KT Tenuto, Rachel came to singing later in life when she took lessons to help her with a surprise birthday performance as Shirley Bassey! Already a keen musician, it sparked a great joy for singing and she began her classical voice training journey, having since performed in opera choruses and solo roles as a mezzo-soprano with a number of companies including Riverside Opera, Guildford Opera, Opera Foundry and New London Opera Players. As a great supporter of the arts and as a singer, Rachel is dedicated to sharing her love for music with others.
Matthew Connolly, Tenor
Matthew came to singing in his 20s, having previously studied double bass and piano. He initially studied with Roger Durstewitz at the Mainz Konservatorium, which sounds a lot grander than it is. Back in England he made a name for himself singing tenor leads in the amateur and semi-pro opera circuit in London, though history does not record exactly what that name was, and he isn’t letting on.
Over the years he has taken on a sizeable variety of major roles ranging from Bel Canto through French Lyric to Verismo, and even dipped a toe in the Heldentenor repertoire. He has a particular fondness for Puccini.
Elaine Way, Soprano
Classically trained in London and the USA, Elaine studied bel canto technique with soprano Anne Heath-Welch, with intensive periods of study in Graz, Austria, AIMS International School of Music and the National Opera Studio in London. An award-winning soprano who has won accolades for opera, Lieder and oratorio performances, she has performed internationally with a number of opera and ensemble companies. Repertoire includes principal and soloist roles in Mozart's Coronation Mass, Mass In C Minor and Vesperae Solennes; Faure Requiem; Le Nozze Di Figaro; La Boheme; Otello; Tosca; Falstaff; Turandot; Die Walkure; Rheingold and Aida, amongst others. Elaine has been a resident of Surrey for over a decade and is delighted to be finally singing in her own neighbourhood.
Elaine Way Hypnotherapy and Therapy Farnham, Surrey, Berkshire, Hampshire. Hypnotherapist at Solution Focused Studio www.solutionfocusedstudio.com
Richard Milnes, Tenor
Richard spent many years singing in chamber choirs, especially the award winning Joyful Company of Singers. Richard made the move into the operatic repertoire as a founder member of KT Tenuto and now focuses on opera and oratorio as a soloist, studying with Cathy Pope. In recent months Richard has appeared as Don Ottavio (Don Giovanni) at the Weimar Lyric Opera Studio, Don Bazilio/Curzio (Marriage of Figaro) and Rinuccio (Gianni Schicchi) for Aquarian Opera, Nemorino (L’Elisir D’Amore) for Brent Opera, Red Whiskers (Billy Budd) for New Palace Opera, Beppe (Pagliacci) for both Guildford Opera and Rose Opera, and Pong (Turandot) for Instant Opera.
Victoria Lord, Mezzo Soprano
A founding member of KT Tenuto, Victoria has a broad musical experience predominantly in Jazz music, playing and singing semi-professionally from later teens through her 20s and 30s, continuing for leisure since then. Qualifying as a Music Therapist from the Guildhall School of Music and Drama, she has worked mainly in neuro-rehabilitation and cancer care with children and adults, but has maintained her love for singing with performances with opera choruses and contemporary solos with Riverside Opera and KT Tenuto.
Andrea Kirkwood, Soprano
Andrea holds a BMus (Hons) from City University, where she also studied advanced performance at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama. She went on to complete a PGCE and an MA in Music Education at the Institute of Education. With over 13 years of experience teaching music and drama, Andrea spent the last six years of her classroom career as Head of Performing Arts. Following the birth of her daughter in 2022, she retrained as a Forest School Leader and founded Evergreen Explorers CIC, a not-for-profit forest school that inspires children and their parents/carers to connect with nature through outdoor learning. In her Forest School sessions, Andrea weaves together her passions for the outdoors, education, and music. As a performer, she has embraced a range of operatic roles, including Monica (The Medium), Liù (Turandot), Lucia (Lucia di Lammermoor), Rusalka (Rusalka), and Aida (Aida).
Anna Slavina, Soprano
Anna Slavina has studied voice and piano from a young age in addition to obtaining a degree in mathematics from Moscow State University. Previously studying with Brian Galloway and Helen Cannell, Anna joined Opera Integra in 2005. She had her debut with Opera Integra as Tatiana (Eugene Onegin).Since then rolles include Adina, Fiordiligi, Pamina, Gilda, Micaëla, Alice (Falstaff), Amelia (Un ballo in maschera), Lady M, Giulietta and Antonia (The Tales of Hoffmann). Anna is very happy to be joining the Tenuto project this year. Anna is also a Chairman of Hampstead Music Club, one of the oldest surviving music clubs in London.
Annette Dumville, Mezzo-Contralto
Annette Dumville read music at Nottingham University specialising in the late orchestral works of Mahler. As a mezzo-contralto her appearances on the operatic stage have mostly been witches and strong feisty women of a certain age, including Frugola, Principessa and Zita (Il Trittico), Witch (Hansel and Gretel), Filipyvena (Eugene Onegin), Florence Pike and Mrs Herring (Albert Herring), Mistress Quickly (Falstaff), Ulrica (Masked Ball), Sorceress (Dido and Aeneas) and Jezibaba (Rusalka). She performed the title role in Michael Hurd’s Widow of Ephesus under the direction of the composer and Hannah (Kinneret) in her Purcell Room debut. This was followed by Mrs Trapes in John Gay’s Polly which was credited in the Independent as being “nicely sleazy”. Recently she created the role of the Sergeant of Police, aka Cressida Dick, in a tour of the Pirates of Penzance and Buttercup in a trans-gender production of HMS Pinafore. She is an experienced oratorio soloist while recent appearances on the concert platform have included “Reflections” in memory of those lost during the pandemic, concerts for German twinning associations based around the Rhinemaidens’ scenes from Das Rheingold and Götterdämmerung, and opera galas including one staged on the deck of a yacht sailing out of Poole Harbour.