Thomas Guthrie

Thomas Guthrie began singing as a boy under George Guest at St John's College Cambridge. He then returned to Cambridge to read Classics at Trinity before winning a scholarship to study at the RNCM, where he won prizes including the Fassbaender Award for Lieder, the Schubert Prize, and an ESU scholarship to study with Thomas Allen in Chicago.

Today he is considered one of the county's leading young baritones, and has received critical acclaim at the highest level for his performances in opera, recital and oratorio. Highlights have included regular appearances at the Wigmore Hall and the South Bank, solos for Sir John Eliot Gardiner's Bach Cantata Pilgrimage and recordings of Rameau, Biber and Charpentier for ASV. His recording of Biber with Sonnerie was awarded a Gramophone Award in 2002. He currently studies with Ulla Blom.

On the operatic stage roles include title role in Don Giovanni and Count (Marriage of Figaro), Papageno (Magic Flute) for Opera Theatre Company, Ferryman (Curlew River - cover) for Opera de Rouen, Denisov (War and Peace) at the 1999 Spoleto Festival (recorded by Chandos), Mr Jenks (The Tender Land) at the Barbican, and Sir Hugh Evans (Sir John in Love) all for Richard Hickox, Cold Genius (King Arthur), Drunken Poet (Fairy Queen), Aeneas (Dido and Aeneas), various roles for Bampton Classical Opera, Malatesta (Don Pasquale), Simone (Gianni Schicchi), and Duke (Gondoliers) for Cambridge Chamber Opera, and Mister Gedge (Albert Herring) while still at college. He has sung Hel Helson (Paul Bunyan) and Sir Henry Cuffe (Gloriana) for Richard Hickox at the St Endellion Festival and has been a member of Glyndebourne Festival Chorus. Recently he performed in Tête à Tête/Streetwise Opera's acclaimed Britten Canticles at Westminster Abbey.

Thomas has also had success as a director for Bampton Classical Opera for the last two years, including a production of Mozart's Impresario at St John's Smith Square.

Perhaps most of all Thomas is becoming known as a recitalist of distinction. Alongside his work with Peter Seymour at York University, where he is researching ornamentation in early Lieder, he performs regularly with Paul Plummer and with many of the other leading accompanists of the day, including Richard Pearce, Julius Drake, Simon Over and Christopher Glynn. Recent performances include Winterreise at the Purcell Room, Die Schöne Müllerin and Dichterliebe at St John's Smith Square, and recitals at festivals in York, Hampstead, Swaledale, St Endellion. He and Paul Plummer will perform the final concert in this year's Oxford Lieder Festival.