Musical Director

The Wessex Chamber Choir is a registered charity comprising a friendly group of about 20 singers from various musical backgrounds. Membership has dropped since the COVID lockdown and the choir is looking to increase this back to around 24.

The choir was originally formed some 30 years ago since when it has built a reputation as a capable and reliable choir performing diverse choral music for entertainment and cultural enrichment.

The Wessex Chamber Choir regularly visits cathedrals around the country to lead services and offices in the absence of the resident choir. In recent years we have sung at St Paul’s Cathedral London, St George’s Chapel Windsor, Worcester, Norwich and Chichester Cathedrals, Christchurch Priory and Tewkesbury Abbey, all of which have invited us back. Looking forward, we are already booked to sing at Winchester, Bury St Edmunds and Portsmouth in 2024, Norwich Cathedral in 2025 and Worcester Cathedral in 2026.

The choir also raises funds through concerts in collaboration with local churches and communities as well as it’s own concerts and events, and has a wide repertoire; secular and religious, from Tudor to modern, popular to obscure. The choir has an extensive library of music from which to draw.

The ‘Wessex’ is based around the South-West Surrey and North Hampshire area and rehearses at St John’s Church Hook on a Thursday evening from 8 pm until 9:45 pm. A typical year for the choir encompasses three cathedral visits in February, August and October, plus three or four concerts or fundraising events. Thursday rehearsals take place throughout the year with breaks only being taken immediately after a cathedral visit and over the Christmas season.

The successful applicant will need to have a similar broad musical background, both ecclesiastical and secular and will need to commit to the following:

• Up to three cathedral visits a year, comprising weekends or up to five days (Wednesday to Sunday in August). These cathedral visits will often require hotel accommodation, the costs for which will be paid by the choir.
• Up to four concerts or events local to SW Surrey/North Hampshire. These could be afternoon and/or evening events.
• Weekly rehearsals – to be agreed but currently we rehearse about 45 weeks of the year.
• Creating music lists for cathedral visits in collaboration with the cathedral authorities. While the music selected will be at the prerogative of the Musical Director, this should be in close liaison with the choir committee.
• Creating music programmes for concerts and events, again at the Musical Directors prerogative but in liaison with the choir committee.
• While the choir has a large library of music from which we would expect most of the cathedral and concert programmes to be selected we would recognise the need for and welcome the occasional addition of new music at the suggestion of the Musical Director, for which funds would, within reason, be provided by the choir.
• The position is paid monthly.