Graham Caldbeck, director of Nonsuch Singers since 1996, is one of Britain’s leading conductors of amateur choirs, known for his wide-ranging musical skills, innovative programming and stylish performances.  

He studied music at Trinity College, Cambridge, where he was a Choral Scholar under Richard Marlow, and has sung with the Cathedral Choirs of Guildford and Winchester. He holds both the Fellowship and Choir Training diplomas of the Royal College of Organists, is a former Assistant Organist at St. Martin-in-the-Fields and is currently Director of Music at St Mary The Boltons, SW10. For fifteen years, Graham held senior positions at the Royal College of Music and he now pursues a freelance career as conductor, organist, vocal coach and teacher. 

Between 1984 and 1999, Graham was conductor of Southern Voices, the Winchester-based chamber choir that he co-founded and rapidly established as one of the leading choirs in the area, regularly giving performances in Winchester Cathedral, Turner Sims Concert Hall at Southampton University, and Romsey Abbey. In 1993 he was chorus master for a recording of works by Delius with Southern Voices, the Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra and Chorus and soloists Bryn Terfel and Amanda Roocroft, conducted by the late Richard Hickox. This recording won the “Grammy” choral award that year. 

Since 1990 he has conducted the Somerset Chamber Choir in performances in Wells Cathedral and King’s College Chapel, Taunton, working with many of the UK’s finest vocal soloists and period and modern instrument ensembles. Last July he conducted a sell-out concert of works by Handel, Vivaldi, Charpentier and Jonathan Harvey with Somerset Chamber Choir, Dame Emma Kirkby, Sophie Bevan, Tim Mead, Thomas Hobbs, Derek Welton and Canzona in Wells Cathedral.  

From 2005 Graham has also directed the Mayfield Festival Choir in E. Sussex, where he recently directed a performance of Bach’s Magnificat and Handel’s Dixit Dominus, also with Canzona and a Composers’ Anniversaries programme of works by Purcell, Handel, Haydn, Mendelssohn and Jonathan Dove with the choir and London Primavera and soloists from the RAM. Apart from concerts with Nonsuch Singers (detailed elsewhere), future projects this year include Orff’s Carmina Burana and Jonathan Dove’s The Passing of the Year with the Somerset Chamber Choir in Taunton on 14 February and works by S. S. Wesley, Parry, Elgar, Vaughan Williams and Judith Bingham with Southern Sinfonia and SCC in Wells Cathedral on 31 July. In the 2010 Mayfield Festival, he shares the rostrum with Sir David Willcocks in a programme of choral works by Fauré and Gounod.