PETER ASTON: Conductor

Peter Aston has combined a career in music education with work as a composer, conductor and musicologist. He has held senior academic posts at the universities of York and East Anglia, where he was Professor and Head of Music for 24 years.

His compositions include songs, chamber music for voices and instruments, choral and orchestral works and a children's opera, but he is best known as a church composer, his sacred choral music being performed regularly throughout the English-speaking world.

As a conductor he has worked with several of the leading British orchestras and with various national and international festival choirs. He has been permanent conductor of such groups as the Tudor Consort, the English Baroque Ensemble (both of which he founded) and the Aldeburgh Festival Singers. He appears as guest conductor at major music festivals and summer schools in Europe and America, and is frequently invited to conduct his own music at venues on both sides of the Atlantic.

Peter Aston has published editions of works by various Baroque composers and has written extensively on music of that period. Other writings reflect a broader range of interest. He has received a number of honorary awards in recognition of his contribution to music education and his work as a church composer.