Caroline Trevor (born 1958) is an English contralto, focused on early music and Baroque music in historically informed performance. She has been one of two alto voices in the award-winning ensemble The Tallis Scholars since 1982.

Career

Trevor's first musical experience was singing in a church choir led by her father. ^[1] She has performed frequently with the singers and players of the Taverner Consort, ^[2] conducted by Andrew Parrott. ^[2] They recorded Bach cantatas such as Christ lag in Todes Banden, BWV 4. ^[2]

Since March 1982 Trevor has been one of two regular singers in the alto section of the a cappella ensemble The Tallis Scholars. ^[2] As of 3 November 2003, she had performed 800 concerts with the group, which had then given 1297 concerts; their 2000th concert was in September 2015. ^{[3] [4]} She is the wife of the ensemble's founder and director Peter Phillips. ^[5] The Tallis Scholars have focused on rarely performed music from the Renaissance to contemporary. ^[1] One example is their recording of three masses based on the same " Western Wind" secular tune, Western Wind Masses, by Tudor composers John Taverner, Christopher Tye and John Sheppard. ^[6] She has performed internationally with the ensemble, which has won prizes including Gramophone Awards during her tenure. ^[7] The Tallis Scholars celebrated their 25th anniversary in 1998 with a tour that included concerts at New York's Church of St. Ignatius Loyola, singing music by English composers of the Tudor period ( Thomas Tallis, William Byrd, and William Mundy, among others), and by continental composers such as Palestrina and Nicolas Gombert. ^[5] James R. Oestreich of The New York Times noted that the group's "characteristic sound, bright, clear and balanced, has become a model for many other choirs". ^[5]

Trevor appeared as a soloist on a 1989 recording, Elizabethan Christmas Anthems, with the ensembles Red Byrd and the Rose Consort of Viols, singing William Byrd's Lullaby. ^[8] She subsequently was the soloist with the Rose Consort of Viols and lutenist Jacob Heringman on a 1992 recording, John Dowland's Lachrimae. ^[9] In 2011, she was the first woman to be engaged by St Paul's Cathedral in London for a singing position in the traditionally male cathedral choir, ^[10] breaking the tradition of male voices only which had been observed for nine centuries. ^{[11] [12]}

References

External links

• Caroline Trevor at AllMusic