Trevor Jones

Music is the product of the inner Sacred Spirit acting as inspiration for each composition. The spiritual is what lies at the heart of my compositions.

Trevor Jones was born in Poole, and gained early musical experiences in a high Anglican church choir, youth choirs, and as a violinist in orchestras. He sang various solo tenor and baritone roles during those early days in Britten's 'The Little Sweep' with Poole College Saturday morning music centre (now Wessex centre for young musicians), a Bach cantata with Bournemouth Bach Society and in various works with Bournemouth based Gli Amici della Musica. He then attended Dartington College of Arts where he was a first study singer, and also studied composition, organ and percussion as well as music education and conducting. Composition was influenced at the time by the avant gard and new music movements of the 1960s and 70s. He completed his course in Exmouth where he undertook teaching practice at Truro School, rehearsed the college orchestra in Carl Orff's 'Carmina Burana' and organised and conducted a choral and orchestral concert in music by Renaissance, Baroque and 20th century English composers.                                                                    

Trevor then taught music in schools around the country for around twelve years, facilitating much creative composition, teaching music theory and history, classroom singing, conducting productions of 'Joseph and the Amazing Technicolour Dreamcoat' and 'Oliver', entering and accompanying students in music festivals, conducting concerts and carol services in local churches and organising trips to London concert halls and Aldeburgh.                     

  He then became a freelance singing teacher, choral conductor and singer soloist in the West Country, continuing some limited composing that had started during his teaching period. Trevor has conducted stage musicals such as the previously mentioned 'Joseph and the Amazing Technicolour Dreamcoat' and 'Oliver' as well as 'Gigi' in an amateur production in Cornwall. He has founded a number of choral groups, including a light music choir in Plymouth. He has worked with a small ladies close harmony choir, a home-based small choral group and a chamber choir.     

 Trevor holds a Certificate in Education, Batchelor of Education degree, Licentiate diploma in orchestration and choral composition from the Guildhall School of Music and Drama, and a Diploma of Music in Education from Dartington.

Having started a small vocal ensemble called Choro Baroque in Plymouth, he directed performances of his part-songs and a Requiem as well as European Sacred Music from the Renaissance to the 20th century, Bach and Handel's Messiah with Devon Baroque orchestra and a quartet of soloists. He also sang in St Andrew's Church choir in Plymouth and Plymouth RC Cathedral Choir as a regular tenor cantor and soloist, having sung in Peterborough Cathedral Choir some thirty years before that with whom he undertook BBC broadcast Evensong services and a tour to France. Trevor has sung with chamber choirs in London, Peterborough, Bristol and Plymouth with whom he sang services in Canterbury, Bristol and Exeter Cathedrals, as well as singing to visitors at Windsor Abbey. He is keen to see more progress made with choirs committing to regular performances of contemporary music by their regional composers alongside the older music. He is also concerned that churches should appoint music teachers and experienced performance musicians to lead liturgical singing.

Trevor has attended performances of his orchestral compositions played by Stroud Symphony Orchestra, Capriol Chamber Orchestra, Thornbury Orchestra and Cheltenham Philharmonic Orchestra. His string quartets have been performed and recorded to CD by Voller Quartet with mezzo-soprano Zarah Hible. Song cycles have been performed by sopranos Sarah Leonard and Charlotte Newstead variously in Bristol and Stroud, and have been recorded to CD by soprano Louise Wayman accompanied by Sarah Gard. At Ganina Yama for violin and piano has been performed by internationally acclaimed violinist Madeleine Mitchell accompanied by Geoffrey Poole in Stroud in two separate concerts. Some Christmas carols were included in a special event in 2007 called A Cavalcade of Contemporary Christmas Carols in St Mary's Church, Thornbury, South Gloucestershire. Trevor has also conducted his Variations on Mr Isaac's Maggot for strings with Severnside Sinfonia and his opera Maria Marten with Phoenix Community Touring Opera, the latter alongide Purcell's 'Dido and Aeneas' in the Church of the Immaculate Conception in Stroud with a chamber orchestra and team of young soloists from music conservatoires in London and Glasgow in July 2010. He organised and directed an ad hoc choir and Baroque chamber ensemble, together with soloists from London conservatoires in a Christmas fund raising concert for St Roses special school in Stroud at Church of The Immaculate Conception in December 2009. There was a further Christmas concert in December 2010 in the same church with soprano and mezzo-soprano soloists from London conservatoires and Baroque ensemble (strings and harpsichord).

Outside of musical composition, Trevor has an interest in various other topics such as Russia, UAE, Qatar, Iran, Syria, Lebanon and Jordan as well as Islam on which he has researched and written, and also makes links between music and theology in a discipline called theomusicology. He publishes this work under his Expression publishing imprint.                                                                                 

Trevor has had a book of poetry [Towards a Real Education] published by Olympia Publishers in 2023 and a novel [Lysette - A story of childhood wartime endurance] published by Austin Macauley Publishers, also in 2023. He also had a book 'Lifelines - Ten topics to introduce the Christian Faith' published by Kevin Mayhew in 2005.                            

Trevor has given talks connected to his writing, including a lecture entitled 'Music as Beauty, Inspiration, Hope and Promise' at Regents Park College, University of Oxford, and has also given a talk on Iran. He is an oblate of Prinknash Abbey in Gloucestershire. Both CDs of the string quartets and song cycles have been uploaded to his website at;

https://www.trevorjonesstroudcomposer.wordpress.com

The first movement of Sinfonietta can be heard on YouTube at;

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uS-hFaVKENc 

 



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