About Me

I do quite a few different things:

  • I currently run two open access community choirs in Oxford, Man Choir and Best Sing Since Sliced Bread. They’re open to EVERYONE - including you!

  • I run an annual blokes’ singing weekend called Singing in the Shed

  • I perform regularly with the amazing Spooky Men’s Chorale and their fun-sized UK version, A Fistful of Spookies

  • I recently started a free wellbeing choir for NHS staff at Oxford University Hospitals

  • In 2019 I obtained a diploma in Choir Conducting from the Royal Academy of Music in Aalborg, Denmark

  • I’m a regular gig promoter

  • I’m an occasional arranger of vocal music (with aspirations to do more of this!)

  • … and then there’s all the other stuff, like graphic designer, video editor, dad, husband, etc.

But I used to do something else.

If you’re interested in how I got to this point, and/or have a couple of minutes to kill ;) - read on!

I used to do all manner of weird and wonderful things. I directed the BBC’s widescreen test transmission. I worked for a couple of consultancies. I ran a BAFTA award-winning digital design agency. I also started up an internet, um, startup, and then very nearly moved to San Francisco.

Instead - and this was a way better decision! - in 2006 my awesome wife Tash and I decided to move to Spain and live in a tiny village in the mountains. But making a permanent family home in a remote rural location is a serious commitment - and so, in 2007 we decided to return to the UK and move to Oxford, somewhere that was completely unknown for both of us.

When I first got here, using my previously acquired digital skills I started working with a wonderful not-for-profit tech social enterprise in the city (which I’m very pleased to say is still going strong).

Until one day in about 2006,

when Tash persuaded me to go with her to a singing workshop. The last time I had done anything like that, I was a child.

And it turned out that I liked singing workshops. I had my eyes opened to the amazing world of (what I learned subsequently is often called) ‘natural voice’ singing - the belief that singing is a birthright, that everyone can do it, and that simple harmony songs can be taught and enjoyed quickly, by ear, ‘listen and repeat’.

And that was the reason why, when we moved to Oxford, in 2007, I joined a choir. Followed, a couple of years later, by another one.

Then one day in 2011, a rather extraordinary chap called Stephen decided that he’d like me to sing in his… thing, which went by the name of The Spooky Men’s Chorale. And I really liked that.

(With ‘The Spookies’, I’ve gone on to sing at dozens of festivals including Womad, Camp Bestival, Tonder (Denmark), Rudolstadt Word Music (Germany) and the world famous Cambridge Folk Festival. I’ve also performed live on BBC Radio 2 with Mark Radcliffe, BBC Radio 3, BBC’s flagship Radio 4 arts show ‘Front Row’… and many, many more marvellous things!)

Let’s do this thing.

So in 2013, it seemed like it was probably time for me to have a whirl at this choir-leading game myself, and thus Man Choir was born. Still going strong ten years later, Man Choir now has around 40 members and hopes to perform abroad for the first time in 2023. That was followed by Singing Saturdays, a singing project in some of Oxford’s incredible spaces, and then ‘Garsingington’, a choir in… Garsington.

It was all ace fun but, well, there was perhaps just a little bit more ‘winging it’ going on on my part than I felt entirely comfortable with. And so, after a somewhat daunting but entirely thrilling trip into the unknown in Summer 2016, I spent three exceedingly happy years studying part time for a diploma in Modern Choir Conducting at the Royal Academy in Aalborg, Denmark. During my time there, I also set up and ran The Rivers, a 16-piece acapella groove ensemble.

Then, of course, 2020 and 2021 happened…. and I got very good at Premiere Pro.

As soon as the rules allowed, in Spring 2022 I started the Best Sing Since Sliced Bread. It’s my first mixed community choir in Oxford and is currently barrelling towards 100 members. Most recently, only a few weeks ago (at the time of writing) I started ‘OUH One Voice’ - a completely free workplace choir at Oxford University Hospitals, designed specifically to bring some joy and relief to those real-life heroes - NHS staff.

Look out 2023!

“I think he’s done this before.”

— Best Sing Since Sliced Bread member

Want to do some singing with me?

Try one of these!