Our Team

President

Will Todd

Will Todd taught himself the piano from an early age and grew up in County Durham, North East England where his grandfather was a coal miner and his parents were teachers. His love of improvising has been the central force in a wide ranging career of composing and playing.

His love of choral music is reflected in a large output including masses, anthems and larger sacred concert works including Mass in Blue, which has been performed hundreds of times around the world since its 2003 premiere. His carol My Lord Has Come has become a worldwide favorite since it was included in Oxford University Press’s Carols for Choirs Five in 2012.

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Musical Director

 Michael Summers

Michael is a highly respected figure in the music within the North East of England, where he has made significant contributions to music education and choral conducting. Currently serving as the Manager of Music Education for Durham Music Service, a lead partner in the Durham and Darlington Music Hub, and a Schools Improvement Advisor across the north of England, Michael has helped to shape the music education landscape in the region.

Assistant conductor 

C. Elizabeth Woods

Elizabeth studied Music at Royal Holloway, University of London, where she was a Choral Scholar under the direction of Professor Lionel Pike, and specialised in vocal performance with Elaine Pearce. In 2000 she was awarded the prestigious J. W. Pearce prize for the Young Musician of the Year in her home town of Huddersfield.

Elizabeth sings with the acclaimed, Yorkshire-based vocal group The Mastersingers, with whom she has taken part in numerous television and   radio broadcasts, tours and recordings. The     Mastersingers recorded the first album of Choral works by Malcolm Williamson, Master of the Queen’s Music (1975-2003), featuring a solo written for Elizabeth when she was just 17.

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Accompanist 

Alison Frances Gill

Alison Gill is a graduate of the Royal Academy of Music, specialising as an accompanist and répétiteur. Whilst at the RAM she made her Wigmore Hall debut, filmed for Channel 4, and was chosen as one of ten pianists to perform alongside Michael Nyman and Gavin Bryars in Satie's 19 hour work Vexations, taking place in the Turbine Hall at the Tate Modern.