[Please do not reproduce all or part this biography without permission. For an up-to-date version or a CV, please contact Edmund]

Biography

(09 February 2012)

Edmund Connolly, MA (Cantab), MMus, PGDip (GSMD)

Edmund Connolly was born in London, UK. He studied music at Robinson College, Cambridge, where he was organ scholar and in his senior year he led the choir on their most ambitious tour to date, to Hong Kong. On graduating in 2000 he joined the choir of St John's College, Cambridge as a lay clerk for a year, during which time the choir made two commercial recordings and toured to Japan and Sweden, as well as performing at the Wigmore Hall in London. Edmund then won a place at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama in the City of London where he spent two years studying voice under Professor David Pollard. A year after graduating, Edmund was appointed a Professor of Music Studies at the GSMD.

Since completing his studies, Edmund has forged a career as an opera and concert singer, organist, piano accompanist and conductor, as well as developing a reputation as a private teacher and vocal coach to young professional singers.

A lyric baritone, Edmund has been described as “an intelligent young singer” (Musical Pointers) and as singing “with authority and clarity” (Birmingham Post). He has worked extensively in major operatic roles in the UK and abroad. These have included Don Giovanni (Pavilion Opera), Eugene Onegin (Birmingham Chamber Orchestra), Count Almaviva Le nozze di Figaro (Surrey Opera, understudy at Garsington Opera), Guglielmo Cosí fan tutte (Skipton Camerata, Opera UK, English Chamber Opera) and Dandini La Cenerentola (understudy at Garsington Opera). He was also a member of Glyndebourne Festival Opera’s world renowned chorus and understudied the role of Curio Giulio Cesare at the 2006 Glyndebourne Festival.

Edmund's experience also embraces opera education work. He has led opera and singing workshops in primary and secondary schools for both English Touring Opera and English Pocket Opera, as well as performing in two new operas, specially commissioned by ETO, which toured around England to rural, suburban and inner-city schools.

Winner of the Thames Valley Young Musicians Platform 2003, Edmund is in demand as an oratorio and concert soloist in a wide range of music. He has performed with choirs and orchestras around England and his extensive oratorio repertoire includes Bach's Passions, Handel's Messiah and Brahms' Requiem. He recently made his US concert début at the Cathedral of St. John in Albuquerque, New Mexico, as the baritone soloist in Henry Mollicone's Beatitude Mass. Edmund has given song recitals in numerous UK venues including an evening concert at the National Portrait Gallery, London, and a recital for the Oxford Lieder Festival in the chapel of Queen's College, Oxford.  His song repertoire includes cycles by Schubert, Schumann, Finzi and Vaughan-Williams as well as songs by Fauré and Duparc. He also works as a professional chorister for groups including the BBC Singers, English Voices, the Choir of London and the Gabrieli Consort.

Edmund is an experienced accompanist and is currently Assistant Organist-Choir director at the Cathedral of St. John, Albuquerque, New Mexico. From 2004-2012 he held the post of Organist at Rosslyn Hill Unitarian Chapel in London. He has worked as pianist and organist with choirs, solo singers, instrumentalists and classical crossover artists in concerts and recitals around the UK. In addition, Edmund has worked as musical director with London fringe company Imperial Productions on concerts and on musicals including Showboat, Pickwick, Nine, Elegies and the UK première of Colette Collage.

A respected choral conductor, Edmund has conducted and trained groups ranging from children’s choirs such as the New London Children’s Choir's Barbershop Group, through adult amateur groups such as the North London Chorus to the professional Antiphon Chamber Choir. In March 2011, with the Antiphon Choir and Orchestra he made his conducting début at the prestigious London venue, St John’s, Smith Square, where he directed perfomances of works by Purcell, Mozart's Piano concerto in A K488, and the world première of James Drew-Edwards' Requiem for Claire.