Category: Presenter Biography

Aside from his award-winning work with I Fagiolini, Robert is a conductor, broadcaster, educator, editor, Monteverdi specialist and festival director. Robert founded “musical shapeshifters” I Fagiolini in 1986 to share his love of vocal music – the group will celebrate its 40^th anniversary in 2026 and has performed its signature projects around the world on stage, online, on radio and tv “following [his] giddy, eclectic imagination wherever it leads” (The Spectator). Robert has spent much of his life considering how audiences receive music, instead of just how performers want to deliver it.

Upcoming conducting highlights include multiple world premiere album releases of large-scale, multi-choir Benevoli Masses with I Fagiolini, and directing territory premieres of the same with choirs and orchestras including RIAS Kammerchor. Robert was musical director of Shobana Jeyasingh Dance’s Monteverdi/Roustom production Clorinda Agonistes, with tenor Ed Lyon. He has conducted orchestras including the English Concert, Academy of Ancient Music, BBC Concert Orchestra, Irish Baroque Orchestra and directed some of the world’s finest chamber choirs including Accentus, NDR Chor, RIAS Kammerchor (Berlin), Netherlands Chamber Choir, National Chamber Choir of Ireland, BBC Singers, Danish National Vocal Ensemble and Capella Cracoviensis.

Robert is Artistic Director for Stour Music Festival and Reader in Music at the University of York where he directs two choirs and the UK’s only MA in Solo-Voice Ensemble Singing. Aside from recording wor with I Fagiolini, Robert is co-director for De Profundis’ Morales Project in collaboration with Eamonn Dougan. The project is an ambitious 12-album series of Morales’ complete Masses and Magnificats for Hyperion, the first of which won a Diapason d’Or – Gramophone notes “We can feel confident that the future of this bold project is in the best possible hands”.

Robert has written and presented programmes on BBC Radio 3 and more recently created over 30 episodes of the YouTube choral series SingTheScore as well as founding and co-presenting the UK’s top choral podcast series, Choral Chihuahua, with Eamonn Dougan and Nicholas Mulroy, now in its sixth season. Robert Hollingworth is managed worldwide by Percius. www.percius.co.uk

Rebecca is an Associate Professor in Music Education at the University of Reading, and Co-director of Postgraduate Taught Programmes. She teaches music education on undergraduate and postgraduate programmes at Reading, specialising in classroom musicianship, choral education, and leadership. She is the founder of Universal Voices, a free, children’s community choir at the University. Universal Voices offers high quality choral education for children and opportunities for student conductors to learn to conduct by working with the choir. Rebecca also works with the British Kodály Academy and Sing for Pleasure as a musicianship tutor, and is the Musical Director of Mosaic Chamber Choir.

Peter is one of Britain’s leading choral conductors, known for his consistent commitment to contemporary music. In 1988, he formed the Joyful Company of Singers, which rapidly established itself as one of Europe’s leading chamber choirs, winning an impressive list of National and International Competitions. Performances have included many of the major UK festivals, including the BBC Proms, and they have given concerts and broadcasts throughout Europe and in the USA. The JCS repertoire includes over 40 first performances, and its discography extends to over 25 CDs, with recording continuing to be an important part of its activity.

He works as a guest conductor throughout Europe, including concerts and broadcasts with the BBC Singers, the National Chamber Choir in Dublin, and has conducted the Kodály Philharmonic Orchestra and the Kodály Chorus in Debrecen. He gives masterclasses and adjudicates at international competitions. In 2016 he was awarded the Knight’s Cross of the Hungarian Order of Merit for promoting and strengthening British-Hungarian cultural relations.  

Peter was one of the team who first established the abcd extended conducting courses, later becoming its first Director of Training, and on standing down from this role in 2017 he was presented with the Chair’s Award for Choral Leadership. In 2022 he was awarded the MBE for his services to music.