Peter is Director of Music at St Paul’s School, London. He is also rapidly becoming known as a leading figure in choral publications: Encores for Choirs 2 (OUP) won Best Classical Publication at the Music Industries Awards in 2005. In the educational field his contributions are Folksongs from around the World (Faber). Also from Faber is his piano series Simply Classics – the aim being to introduce young pianists to the milestones of Western music through arrangements of great symphonic and choral masterpieces. However, he is probably best known for Follow that Star, Christmas song arrangements for choir published by Chester Music. He is a choral workshop leader both in Britain and on the continent. His first musical, Mary Seacole, has been showcased at the Greenwich Theatre, while he hopes that his second, Jones, will allow him to retire to his own island! He conducted the BBC Concert Orchestra, BBC Singers and 1000 London state-school pupils in a performance of his own football cantata Pitch Perfect at the Wembley Conference Centre in 2005. Peter is occasionally spotted performing as countertenor with vocal ensembles I Fagiolini, Tenebrae and with barbershop group Flash Harry and the City Slickers. In his time, he has also accompanied singers such as Ian Partridge and Henry Herford.
Peter Gritton
“Musically and socially, these were halcyon days”
“I owe much of my present existence as a conductor of choirs in my ‘dayjob’ (St Paul’s School), and ‘outside’ as a choral composer and director, to Tim Brown. My two years in the fabulous choir at Clare rekindled what I had absorbed as a Salisbury chorister six years earlier. Tim always instinctively responded to the essence of the music we were singing, which taught me to believe in my own instinct for music. The opportunities we experienced were varied – recordings, tours and the staple diet of Evensongs. Musically and socially, these were halcyon days: at the time, Clare Choir was the friendliest group of people I had yet met in life! When I look back at my time in Cambridge, I don’t think much about the Tripos – central in my mind is the Choir. Thank you, Clare Choir!”