Thomas was born in Gorseinon near Swansea, Wales, the daughter of M. Wynn Thomas OBE, a Professor of Literature at Swansea University, and Karen Thomas. She was educated at the Welsh-speaking Ysgol Gyfun Gŵyr in Gowerton near Swansea, and by the time she was 15 was singing in the Swansea Bach Choir. She won a choral scholarship to Clare College, Cambridge University, where she gained a starred first in Anglo-Saxon, Norse and Celtic, and completed an MPhil.
After auditioning for Sir John Eliot Gardiner she joined the Monteverdi Choir, singing in many of the concerts of the Bach Cantata Pilgrimage which the choir completed in the year 2000. In 2001 she moved to pursue postgraduate vocal studies at the Royal College of Music in London.
She went on to sing with The Sixteen, Polyphony, Cambridge Singers and the Gabrieli Consort, as well as pursuing a solo career. She is the first singer to record Bach's Alles mit Gott, a birthday ode written in 1713 and discovered in 2005. She first received great acclaim for her 'Pie Jesu' on Naxos' award-winning recording of Rutter's Requiem.
In 2016, Manahan Thomas was the soprano soloist in the première of Karl Jenkins' choral work, Cantata Memoria: For the children, at the Wales Millennium Centre.[6] She also features on the première recording of the work.
On 19 May 2018 she sang Eternal source of light divine at the wedding of Prince Harry and Meghan Markle, accompanied by the event's orchestra and with David Blackadder playing the trumpet obbligato.[7]
A Christmas Festival (2008), recorded with the Cambridge Singers, Farnham Youth Choir and the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra, conducted by John Rutter[9]
Song of Songs (2009), composed by Patrick Hawes, featuring Hawes's choir Conventus and the English Chamber Orchestra. [10]
William Boyce was an English composer and organist. Like Beethoven later on, he became deaf but continued to compose. He knew Handel, Arne, Gluck, Bach, Abel, and a very young Mozart all of whom respected his work.
The English mezzo-soprano Carolyn Watkinson is a well-known singer of baroque music. Her voice is alternately characterized as mezzo-soprano and contralto.
Ode for the Birthday of Queen Anne is a secular cantata composed by George Frideric Handel to a libretto by Ambrose Philips, of which the first line, "Eternal source of light divine", provides an alternative title for the work. It was probably composed during January 1713 for a performance on 6 February 1713, although there is no record of the performance having actually taken place. Other catalogues of Handel's music have referred to the work as HG xlvi A; and HHA i/6.
Sir Stephen John Cleobury was an English organist and music director. He worked with the Choir of King's College, Cambridge, where he served as music director from 1982 to 2019, and with the BBC Singers.
Patrick Hawes is a British composer, conductor, organist and pianist.
Reading Festival Chorus is a chorus which was formed in 1945 to give performances of larger scale choral works. It is based in the town of Reading in the English county of Berkshire. Rehearsals are held on Monday evenings in central Reading and new members are always welcomed.
Boston Baroque is the oldest period instrument orchestra in North America. It was founded in 1973 by the American harpsichordist and conductor, Martin Pearlman, to present concerts of the Baroque and Classical repertoire on period instruments, drawing on the insights of the historical performance movement.
Saint Peter's Singers (SPS) is a chamber choir associated with Leeds Minster, Leeds, West Yorkshire, England that celebrated during the Season 2017/2018 the fortieth anniversary of the choir's formation by Harry Fearnley in 1977. An anniversary concert took place at Leeds Minster on Sunday 25 June 2017 with the National Festival Orchestra and soloists Kristina James, Joanna Gamble, Paul Dutton and Quentin Brown. Further anniversary year events included Bach Cantatas and Music for Christmas at Fulneck Church in August and December respectively, Handel Coronation Anthems at Holy Trinity, Boar Lane as part of the Leeds Handel Festival in September and a tour of East Anglia in October. In November at Leeds Town Hall, the Singers participated in Herbert Howells's masterpiece Hymnus Paradisi with Leeds Philharmonic Chorus and Leeds College of Music Chorale under the direction of Dr David Hill with the Orchestra of Opera North. 2018 began with a concert of Sacred Choral Masterworks at Leeds Town Hall in February and Bach's Mass in B minor at Leeds Minster on Good Friday 2018 in memory of long-serving member Jan Holdstock. The final concert of the current season takes place at Leeds Minster on Sunday 24 June at Leeds Minster at 5.30. At this event will be presented the first performance of a new work from composer Philip Moore commissioned for the Singers' 40th anniversary – the motet Tu es Petrus – along with music by E W Naylor, Arvo Part, Sir Hubert Parry, Judith Bingham and Maurice Durufle.
London Concert Choir (LCC) is one of London's leading amateur choirs. The choir was formed in 1960, and the full-time membership consists of ca 150 singers of a wide range of ages.
Fair Albion - Visions of England, is a 2009 album on the Signum Classics label featuring compositions by Patrick Hawes. The music ‘celebrates the heart and soul of the British Landscape’. The CD includes performances by Elin Manahan Thomas (soprano), the cellist Julian Lloyd Webber and the Royal Harpist Claire Jones.
Miriam Allan is an Australian soprano.
Joanne Lunn is an English classical soprano in opera and concert.
Howard Arman is an English choral conductor and opera director. He won the Handel Prize of the Handel Festival, Halle, in 1996, shaped the festival's orchestra and conducted operas of George Frideric Handel. He is a conductor of the Theater and Philharmonie Thüringen, also the Luzerner Theater. Since 2017 he is the Director of the Bayerische Rundfunk Chor.
The wedding of Prince Harry and Meghan Markle was held on 19 May 2018 in St George's Chapel at Windsor Castle in the United Kingdom. The groom is a member of the British royal family; the bride is American and previously worked as an actress, blogger, and charity ambassador and advocate. On the morning of the wedding, Prince Harry's grandmother, Queen Elizabeth II, conferred upon him the titles of Duke of Sussex, Earl of Dumbarton and Baron Kilkeel.
Aksel Johannes Skramstad Rykkvin is a Norwegian singer. He rose to fame as a boy soprano singing baroque arias, and recorded two albums on Signum Records with orchestral accompaniment. Critics have noted his fine vocal tone and instinctive musicality.
Thomas Wayne Markle is an American retired television lighting director and director of photography. He received a Chicago/Midwest Emmy Award for work on the television program Made in Chicago in 1975 and was a co-recipient of two Daytime Emmy Awards for work on the television soap opera General Hospital in 1982 and 2011. His youngest child is Meghan, Duchess of Sussex.
Members of the Markle and Ragland families have been related by marriage to the British royal family since the wedding of Meghan Markle and Prince Harry in May 2018, when she became the Duchess of Sussex. The couple has two children, Archie and Lilibet Mountbatten-Windsor. The Markle family is of German descent and originates in Alsace on the modern French–German border, and Meghan's paternal ancestors moved to the United States in the 17th century; among her father's other ancestors are American settlers of English, Dutch, and Irish descent. The Ragland family is of African American descent.
St Albans Bach Choir is an amateur choir based in the English cathedral city of St Albans. Since its founding in 1924 it has performed a wide range of choral music including but by no means limited to the great Bach masterpieces. It strives for the highest possible standards of music making, employing soloists of the highest calibre and professional orchestras. Performances are normally held in St Albans Cathedral. Currently, the Musical Director is Andrew Lucas, Master of the Music at the Cathedral.
Grace Davidson is an English soprano from London who specialises in the performance of historically informed music from the Renaissance and Baroque periods. She has also recorded for prominent contemporary composers such as Max Richter, Eric Whitacre, Michael Price, and Paul Mealor, and has performed on over 140 soundtracks to date. Highlights include solos on The Hobbit: Desolation of Smaug, Over The Moon, Gunpowder Milkshake and The Last Duel.
Luke Bond is a British organist and is currently Assistant Organist at St George's Chapel, Windsor Castle, where he played prominently for the wedding of Prince Harry and Meghan Markle and the funeral of Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh. He has appeared internationally, and has made recordings of organ music and choral music.
This page is based on this Wikipedia article Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply. Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.
