Musical Director - Ben Palmer

Ben Palmer graduated in 2003 with first class honours in music from the University of Birmingham, where he also completed an MPhil in composition with Vic Hoyland. In September 2005 he undertook a year's study with Head of Composition Simon Bainbridge at the Royal Academy of Music. He has received bursaries and scholarships to study conducting with Diego Masson on his Advanced Conducting Course at Dartington International Summer School. He has conducted Birmingham Contemporary Music Group and Britten Sinfonia, and acted as assistant to Richard Hickox, Edward Higginbottom, Peter Wiegold and David Angus.

He is also Musical Director of the Bartholdy Chamber Orchestra, the Orchestra of St Paul's (Covent Garden) and Manor Light Opera, and Guest Conductor of SE10 Brass. He has been invited by Dartington Festival to conduct a Walton double bill of Façade and The Bear in August, directed by Richard Williams and narrated by William Sitwell and Pippa Longworth. Forthcoming engagements include concerts with Vox Cordis (Haydn's Harmoniemesse with OSP), Cheltenham Symphony Orchestra (Tchaikovsky Symphony no. 6 and Dvo_ák 'Cello Concerto in Tewkesbury Abbey), and Suffolk Sinfonia (in St Edmundsbury Cathedral). He has recently worked with Sinfonia of Cambridge (Mahler Symphony No. 1 and Saint-Saëns Violin Concerto No. 3 with Matthew Trusler), Camden Chamber Orchestra, Abingdon and District Musical Society and Brandon Hill Chamber Orchestra. Other ensembles he has conducted include MoEns (a professional Czech contemporary music group), Seychelles International Festival Orchestra, the Royal Academy of Music Chamber Orchestra, Worcestershire Symphony Orchestra, Churchgate Sinfonia, Birmingham Symphonic Brass, Surrey Sinfonietta and all the ensembles and choirs of Birmingham University.

His opera experience includes three fully-staged performances of Le nozze di Figaro for Birmingham University Summer Festival Opera, and The Rake's Progress and Die Zauberflöte for Dartington Festival Opera. He has conducted orchestral concerts throughout the UK, and in Hungary, Germany, Poland, and the Seychelles.

In 2004 his chamber work Volatile Substances was premiered by BCMG under Diego Masson. (“It was a display of music's sheer vitality and variety of colour” The Times). He has received commissions and performances from the National Saxophone Choir of Great Britain, Bury St Edmunds Festival, The Kenneth Page Foundation, Nero String Quartet, Bella Tromba, Churchgate Sinfonia, and His Majestys Sagbutts and Cornetts. In March 2006 his orchestrations were performed by ensemble The Fibonacci Sequence in the Royal Albert Hall. His studies at Dartington have been generously supported by the Howard Hartog, DISS and Leche Trust Bursaries.

Ben was appointed as Musical Director of South West Essex Choir in 2006.