Representing the Royal Welsh College of Music and Drama

Programme 

Ludwig van Beethoven (1770 – 1827) – Adelaïde

Francis Poulenc (1899 – 1963) – Hyde Park

Francis Poulenc (1899 – 1963) – Voyage a Paris

Reynaldo Hahn (1874 – 1974) – Lʼheure exquise

Richard Strauss (1864 – 1949) – Ich trage meine minne

Richard Strauss (1864 – 1949) – Breit uber mein haupt

Benjamin Britten (1913 -1976) – Canticle 1

Sergei Rachmaninov (1873 – 1943) –Beloved, let us fly

Ben Moore (b.1960) – This heart that flutters

Jean Sibelius (1865 – 1957) – Var det en dröm

Edvard Grieg (1843 – 1907) – Ein Traum

Edvard Grieg (1843 – 1907) – Ich liebe dich (encore)

Performer

Hartlepool born tenor Tom Smith is a Samling Young Artist, and has recently graduated from the Royal Welsh College of Music and Drama with an MA Opera (Distinction). Tom’s training at the College was generously supported by Christopher Ball, Leverhulme Trust, Tillett Trust, Waterloo Foundation and the Friends Connect fund. During his studies Tom has taken part in masterclasses with Susan Bullock, Simon Keenlyside John Fisher, Kathryn Harries, Michael Pollock and Simon Lepper.

Last summer Tom made his debut at Glyndebourne Festival Opera as one of the Lehrbuben in Sir David McVicar’s award winning production of Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg.Operatic roles at RWCMD include The Mayor (Albert Herring) Schoolmaster (Cunning Little Vixen), Jupiter (Semele), Lippo (Street Scene) and Fenton (Falstaff) conducted by Carlo Rizzi. In Opera scenes Tom has performed Lionel (Martha), Idomeneo (Idomeneo), Jaquino (Fidelio), Nemorino (L’elisir d’amore), Rodolfo (La Boheme). External operatic engagements include, Ruiz (Il Trovatore), Flavio (Norma) and Spärlich (Die lustigen weiber von windsor).  A keen recitalist, Tom is proud to be an Artist on the Yehudi Menuhin Live Music Now scheme.

Ella O’Neill is a postgraduate student at the Royal College of Music, where she studies piano accompaniment with Simon Lepper and Kathron Sturrock. She graduated from her undergraduate degree at the Royal Welsh College of Music and Drama (RWCMD) in July 2017 with first class honours, under the tuition of Mei Yi Foo. During her time there she also enjoyed masterclasses with Jeremy Denk, Peter Jablonski, Charles Owen, Llyr Williams, Joseph Middleton and James Baillieu, amongst others. In 2016, she won the RWCMD Bryan Davies Memorial Prize for piano accompaniment.

Recent performance venues include St-Martin-in-the-Field’s, the Wales Millenium Centre for HRH the Prince of Wales, Brel Academy of Song (France), Leeds Lieder Festival and the Dora Stoutzker Hall, Cardiff, where she accompanied Brahms’ Liebeslieder Waltzer as part of BBC Cardiff Singer of the World 2017. Also last year, Ella was a semi-finalist in the Somerset Song Prize and the National Mozart Singing Competition. She also performs for Live Music Now, enabling her to deliver music to the wider community- something very close to her heart.

Away from the concert platform, Ella works as an exam accompanist for the Corps of Army Music and as a ballet pianist for various dance schools. She is a keen répétiteur, having developed her interest in opera when she played orchestral piano and celeste for a production of The Turn of the Screw in 2014. Since then, Ella has worked with Welsh National Opera, Mid Wales Opera, Barefoot Opera, Operasonic, Opera’r Ddraig and RWCMD Opera.