John Mark Ainsley is a highly versatile concert singer whose international engagements include appearances with the London Symphony under Sir Colin Davis, Rostropovich and Previn, the Concert D’Astrée under Haim, the London Philharmonic under Norrington, Les Musiciens du Louvre under Minkowski, the Cleveland Orchestra under Welser-Möst, the Berlin Philharmonic under Haitink and Rattle, the Berlin Staatskapelle under Jordan, the New York Philharmonic under Masur, the Boston Symphony under Ozawa, the San Francisco Symphony under Tate and Norrington, the Vienna Philharmonic under Norrington, Pinnock and Welser-Möst, the Academy of St Martin in the Fields under Marriner and Langrée, and both the Orchestra of the Maggio Musicale Fiorentino and the Orchestre de Paris under Giulini.

At the 2005 Saito Kinen Festival he appeared in Schoenberg’s Gurrelieder under Ozawa. His discography is extensive, including Handel’s Saul with Gardiner, Britten’s Midsummer Night’s Dream with Davis, Stravinsky’s Pulcinella with Haitink and J.S. Bach’s Mass in B minor and the Evangelist in the St Matthew Passion with Ozawa, L’enfance du Christ, Alexander’s Feast, Acis and Galatea, the Berlioz Requiem and the title role in Monteverdi’s Orfeo. He has made a series of recital records of Schubert, Mozart, Purcell, Grainger, Warlock and Quilter, with a recording of Vaughan Williams’s On Wenlock Edge nominated for a Gramophone Award. Other recordings include the Britten cycles Serenade for tenor, horn and strings, Les Illuminations and Nocturne, Charlie in Brigadoon and Don Ottavio in Don Giovanni. On the operatic stage he has sung Don Ottavio at the Glyndebourne Festival under Sir Simon Rattle, and at the Aix-en-Provence Festival under Claudio Abbado. He has appeared with Opera Australia as Tito and Idomeneo, with the Netherlands Opera as the title role in Handel’s Samson, with the San Francisco Opera as Don Ottavio and Jupiter in Semele and at the Munich Festival as Jonathan in Saul and as Orfeo, for which he received the Munich Festival Prize. In 2002 he made his début at the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden, as Don Ottavio under Mackerras. At the 2003 Salzburg Festival he created the rôle of Der Daemon in the world première of Hans Werner Henze’s L’Upupa, which he reprised at the Teatro Real, Madrid. He returned to Salzburg in 2006 where he sang Soliman in Zaide and Belfiore in La finta giardinera. He sang The Madwoman in Britten’s Curlew River in Frankfurt and his first Pelléas for the Deutsche Oper, Berlin.

Neal Davies studied at King’s College, London and the RAM, and won the Lieder Prize at the 1991 Cardiff Singer of the World Competition. Neal Davies appears with the Royal Opera, the English National Opera, the Scottish Opera, Garsington Opera, Opera de Montreal, Opera de Marseille, the Deutsche Staatsoper, Berlin and the Lyric Opera of Chicago, and regularly with the Welsh National Opera; in concert with the Oslo Philharmonic ( Jansons), BBCSO (Boulez), Cleveland and Philharmonia Orchestras (Dohnanyi), COE (Harnoncourt), OAE (Brüggen), Gabrieli Consort (McCreesh), the Hallé (Elder), Les Arts Florissants (Christie) and the Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra (Harding). He appears regularly at the Edinburgh Festival and has recorded for the major labels. Engagements include Don Alfonso for the Welsh National Opera, a tour of Jephtha with Les Arts Florissants, Death of Klinghoffer with the English National Opera, and Charpentier’s David et Jonathas with the Aix-en-Provence Festival and William Christie.

Amanda Roocroft studied at the Royal Northern College of Music. She enjoys a close relationship with the Royal Opera House Covent Garden, the English National Opera, the Welsh National Opera, the Glyndebourne Festival, Bayerische Staatsoper, Teatro Real, Madrid, Houston Grand Opera and the Netherlands Opera where her roles have included Fiordiligi (Cosi fan Tutte), Countess (Le Nozze di Figaro), Donna Elvira (Don Giovanni), Desdemona (Otello), Amelia (Simon Boccanegra), Mimi (La Boheme), Eva (Die Meistersinger), title roles in Madama Butterfly, Katya Kabanova and Jenufa, Genevre (Ariodante), Cleopatra (Giulio Cesare), Jenifer (!e Midsummer Marriage), Tatiana (Eugene Onegin) and Ellen Orford (Peter Grimes). Amanda won the 2007 Laurence Olivier Award for Outstanding Achievement in Opera as Jenufa for ENO. In concert she has appeared with leading orchestras throughout Europe and North America with conductors including Sir Simon Rattle, Zubin Mehta, Mariss Jansons, Ivor Bolton, Sir John Eliot Gardiner, Daniele Gatti, Sir Neville Marriner, Sir Andrew Davis, Sir Charles Mackerras, Valery Gergiev and Bernard Haitink. Recital engagements have included London’s Wigmore Hall, Queen Elizabeth Hall, the Concertgebouw Amsterdam, Vienna’s Musikverein, La Monnaie in Brussels, and New York’s Lincoln Center.

Fiona has had a distinguished career performing extensively in both Australia and Europe in opera and concert. Her repertoire includes: Adalgisa, Angelina, Donna Elvira, Zerlina, Mercedes, Rosina, Sesto in both Julius Caesar and La Clemenza di Tito, Isabella, Composer, Dorabella, Annio and Mistress Quickly. Other performances include: Siebel (Victorian & Queensland Opera), Nero (Buxton Festival), Rosina (Netherlands Opera, ENO & Welsh National Opera), Second Lady & Meg (ENO), Sesto in La Clemenza di Tito (Glyndebourne Touring Opera), Idamante (Flanders Philharmonic), Margherite (Scotland & Lyric Opera of Queensland), Ascanio in Les Troyans for LSO with Sir Colin Davis, Angelina (Semperoper Dresden & New Zealand) and Scitalce in Meyerbeer’s Semiramide with Bonynge (Rossini Festival in Germany). She has worked for the Royal Opera House Covent Garden, Scottish Opera & Edinburgh Festival and sung for all the major Australian orchestras. In concert she has performed Verdi Requiem, Dream of Gerontius, Mahler Symphony No.2, Rossini Stabat Mater, Messiah, Mozart Requiem, Berlioz Roméo et Juliette, Beethoven Missa Solemnis, Mass in C and Symphony No.9. Recordings: Semiramide and Lurline with Bonynge (Naxos), Pulcinella (Naxos), Parisina (Opera Rara) & Mozart Centenary. She was the producer and starred in Richard Bonynge’s 80th Birthday Concert in 2010 in Sydney