Samuel

Having studied at the Royal College of Music, the Royal Birmingham Conservatoire and the Wales International Academy of Voice, I have enjoyed a varied and successful career as a professional baritone since leaving full-time study in 2016. Throughout, I have invested myself significantly in cultivating an extensive teaching portfolio. I have been a piano and singing teacher in a variety of settings for the last nine years, with my total hours of teaching experience now numbering over 2000.

As an operatic singer, I hav been acclaimed for singing “with fire and gusto” (Seen and Heard International) and for my "masterful breadth of line” (BBC). I commenced my studies at the Royal Birmingham Conservatoire (RBC) where I gained a BMus (Hons) 1:1 and was awarded the RBC Singing Prize, The Doris Newton Club Prize, The Edward Brooks English Song Prize and the Mario Lanza Opera Competition. For my work as a concert artist, I am the prize-winner of the Royal Forest of Dean Herbert Howells` Prize, and was a finalist in the London Song Competition.

Among my operatic roles are Balstrode (Peter Grimes), Demetrius (A Midsummer Night’s Dream), Belcore (L’elisir d’amore), Il Conte (Le nozze di Figaro), Nardo (La finta giardinera), Thoas (Iphigéine en Tauride), Ein Steuermann (Tristan und Isolde), Marquis de la Force (Dialogue des Carmélites), Title role, Simone and Marco (Gianni Schicchi), Figaro (Il barbiere di Siviglia)¸ Dandini (La Cenerentola), Silvano (Un ballo in maschera), Ein Lakai (Ariadne auf Naxos), Capelio (I Capuleti e i Montecchi), James Henry (Street Scene), and Strephon (Iolanthe).

In the contemporary field I have performed The Angel Off the Beaten Track (James Oldham), The Commentator The Colour Blue (Simone Spagnolo), Oberon P.U.C.K. (Mahlon Berv and Benjamien Lycke) and John the Manservant Jane Eyre (John Joubert) with the English Symphony Orchestra, recorded by SOMM.

I have a busy concert career both in oratorio and on the recital platform. My repertoire is extensive and includes the Bach B Minor Mass and The Passions, Christmas Oratorio, Brahms Ein Deutsches Requiem, Fauré Requiem, Britten War Requiem, Rejoice in the Lamb, Handel Messiah, Haydn Creation, Die Schöpfung, Mozart C Minor Mass, Orff Carmina Burana, Rossini Stabat Mater, Messa di Gloria, all Schubert Masses, Stainer Crucifixion, Vaughan Williams Serenade to Music and Dona Nobis Pacem. My recital repertoire includes Finzi’s Earth and Air and Rain, By Footpath and Stile, Let us Garlands Bring, Mahler Lieder eines fahrenden Gesellen, Vaughan Williams Five Mystical Songs, Five Tudor Portraits and a rare performance of Bloch’s Advodath Hakodesh.

Availability: I can available during reasonable working hours during the week - if I have space I can guarantee you a slot.

Willing to travel: 8 miles

Experience: As a performer my voice has granted me unique and rewarding opportunities, and I have always felt that passing that craft onto the next generation has been a real source of professional and personal pride. As a performer, singer, conductor and accompanist around the UK I have cultivated a rewarding career as a musical animateur that has enabled me to provide a holistic yet specialist musical education to many. As a songwriter, I have had SATB choral arrangements performed live on Channel 4, and can therefore provide a breadth of compositional musical literacy, and excellent musicianship, in my teaching that complements my vocal pedagogy. This is supported through extensive experience teaching composition privately at both GCSE and A Level. I have worked as an operatic soloist all over the UK and Europe and therefore continue to provide my students with current, on-the-ground industry knowledge and contacts where appropriate.

My goal as a singing teacher is to ensure that my students hold themselves to account through taking responsibility for their own work ethic, to show integrity in their personal development, and to respect their colleagues around them. I also coach students to take the courage to navigate performance nerves which has real-life impacts in their whole education and later lives. Most importantly I expect my students to be unwaveringly kind to one another, and to use this kindness to cultivate a culture of errors within which student knowledge can develop healthily in a positive atmosphere.

Along with working as a private singing teacher from my studio at home, I have had the pleasure of working with many fantastic schools and educational trusts within my teaching career. As a singing, piano and music theory teacher with the Royal College of Music’s Teaching Service, I was able to learn how to build a dynamic educational business from the ground-up, alongside learning how to inspire students to achieve the top tier of marks in their discipline. As a singing teacher at The Cotswold School and the Oasis Academy Silvertown, I learned how to enthuse students from a wide variety of different backgrounds to ensure that they received top marks in the performance elements of their GCSE, A-Level and ABRSM examinations along with leading many of their ensembles (orchestral and vocal). As the Choirmaster at All Saints C of E School, Fulham, I discovered how to succinctly communicate ideas such as polyphony, harmony and canon to KS2 students while we worked toward performances throughout the school year; my work with Christ Church C of E School, Chelsea, allowed me to see music-making through the sphere of a small community and, while teaching the students to highest possible standards at all times, I learned how the student’s music-making could give back to their local community through local fundraising performances and school-wide, extracurricular involvement. Through my work as a singing teacher in the music faculty at More House Girls School, Kensington, I gained a wealth of experience with teaching girls’ voices in a girls school setting. I also had the pleasure of working with many young musicians who were considering continuing their musical education at the Conservatoire and/or Oxbridge level, and I was able to help them carefully navigate the audition requirements for these institutions.

Throughout my whole experience working in renowned private schools around the UK, I have honed the ability to be adaptable and flexible within schools’ working patterns and processes and have learned how, and when, to maintain discreet confidentiality whilst working with school. As a reflective practitioner I am committed to regular CPD to ensure that my work stays up to date with modern teaching practices and have undertaken courses such as the NSPCC Child Protection in Music along with EduCare’s Safeguarding and Prevent courses to make sure that I understand how to incorporate robust and committed safeguarding into my practice. Moving forward in my career I am interested in undertaking a teaching qualification which will consolidate my teaching practises and will prove that I meet all of the DofE’s Teaching Standards.