James McVinnie

He began playing the organ while he was a music scholar at Sevenoaks School. In 2001 he took up the post of Organ Scholar at St Albans Cathedral, and in 2003 became Organ Scholar at Clare College, Cambridge, where he studied for a degree in music, graduating in 2006. As organist to the Choir of Clare College, he performed in venues and music festivals throughout Great Britain, Europe, the United States, and the Far East. He also acted as chorus-master in collaboration with Timothy Brown on projects with the Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment, and the Freiburger Barockorchester, with conductors Richard Egarr and René Jacobs. He appeared regularly with the choir on live broadcasts on BBC Radio 2 and Radio 3, and features on recordings of Tarik O’Regan’s choral music (Collegium), John Rutter’s Mass of the Children (Naxos 8.557922), and S. S. Wesley’s choral music (Naxos 8.570318). He is also organist on recordings made by the St Albans Abbey Girls Choir (Lammas), and an album of Richard Allain’s choral music with the National Youth Choir of Great Britain and Laudibus (Delphian). He is active as an organ soloist and continuo player, and works regularly with groups in London including English Voices and the Steinitz Bach Players. In 2005 he toured to Australia with the baroque violinist David Irving, with whom he performed in Brisbane and Sydney. He studies the organ with Thomas Trotter.