Performer: Ben Palmer

© Andy Staples Photography

Ben Palmer is Artistic Director of OSP (the Orchestra of St Paul's) and chamber choir The Syred Consort. Recent guest conducting engagements include the Deutsches Kammerorchester Berlin, Aurora Orchestra, the Royal Philharmonic Concert Orchestra, the Deutsche Philharmonie Merck, the London Mozart Players, the Royal College of Music Classical Orchestra (replacing Sir Roger Norrington at short notice), the RCM Philharmonic, Southern Sinfonia, the Kazakh State Chamber Orchestra and the Kharkov Philharmonic Orchestra, as well as acting as rehearsal conductor for Bernard Haitink and, later this month, chorus master for the BBC Singers. 

Other orchestras he has conducted include the Gabrieli Consort & Players and Wroclaw Baroque Orchestra (as assistant to Paul McCreesh), Britten Sinfonia and Birmingham Contemporary Music Group. He has made a speciality of conducting films live to screen, with performances of Casablanca, Hitchcock's Psycho, Charlie Chaplin's The Gold Rush, Peter and the Wolf, and The Snowman, in venues such as the Royal Festival Hall, Roundhouse, Queen Elizabeth Hall, Purcell Room and Milton Court. He is more than halfway through his lifetime ambition to conduct all 107 Haydn symphonies.