Biography

Thomas Herford began his singing career as a boy chorister in the choir of New College Oxford, and went on to study at Trinity College Cambridge and the Guildhall School of Music and Drama in London. While on the Guildhall Opera Course he won numerous prizes and scholarships, and has since performed on many stages in both concert and operatic repertoire.

On the concert platform, Thomas sings much of the core repertoire, from Monteverdi to Puccini and beyond, and has appeared at many of the world's most important venues, from the Barbican to the Lincoln Center to the Concertgebouw and many others. He has recently Evangelised the St John Passion at Wigmore Hall, Snape Maltings, Leipzig Bachfest (Nikolaikirche Leipzig), Thüringer Bachwochen (at Bachkirche Arnstadt) and at the Bachwochen Thun in Switzerland, sung the solos in the B minor Mass at the Spitalfields Festival, St John's Smith Square and Southwell Festival, and opened the Bachfest Leipzig at a soloist in Bach's Magnificat. With the Philharmonia, Thomas has performed David Die Meistersinger in a Wagner Gala and the solos in Mozart's Requiem, and, with the London Symphony Orchestra, he sang the world premiere of 'Two Sisters, A Rose, A flood and Snow' by Alasdair Nicholson. Many of his concerts have been broadcast on radio and TV, most notably as Bach's St John Evangelist from the Leipzig Bachfest, as the tenor soloist in Handel's Israel in Egypt from Salisbury Cathedral with La Nuova Musica, and as a member/soloist of Solomon's Knot singing Bach Cantatas from the BBC Proms.

Thomas enjoys working as part of small ensembles and particularly values his membership of the Solomon's Knot Baroque Collective, with whom he has performed many of the great oratorios from memory and without a conductor, featured as a soloist of their debut CD 'Christmas in Leipzig' (Sony Classical) and appeared as Il Cortigiano in 'L'Ospedale', a rediscovered anonymous Venetian opera about mental health which was staged at Wilton's Music Hall in London and filmed for a DVD. As a member of the Monteverdi Choir under Sir John Eliot Gardiner, Thomas has been part of several landmark projects, including it's first ever concert tour of South America, the 2018 Bach Cantata Ring, and a 17-concert tour and CD recording of the St Matthew Passion which celebrated the 50th anniversary of the Monteverdi Choir's foundation. He continues also to enjoy regular performances with I Fagiolini under Robert Hollingworth - recently joining them for a tour of Scotland in collaboration with the Scottish Ensemble (tenor solos) -, La Nuova Musica under David Bates, and as a member of the Choir of St Bride's, Fleet Street. With the early music consort Stile Antico, of which he was a member between 2006-2008, Thomas recorded extensively, won a Gramophone Award, and toured Europe with the rock star Sting as part of his lute-song project.

Stage roles include Don Narciso Il Turco in Italia and cover Don Ottavio Don Giovanni (Garsington Opera), Il Cortigiano in L'Ospedale (Solomon's Knot), Eisenstein in Die Fledermaus (Opera Danube), Tenante in Salieri's La Sculoa di Gelosi and Imeneo in Bertoni's Orfeo (Bampton Classical Opera), Bad'un in Birtwistle's Yan Tan Tethera (Britten Sinfonia) and tenor roles in Gloria - A Pig Tale by HK Gruber (Mahogany Opera), Don Ramiro La Cenerentola (Clonter Opera), Schoolmaster/Mosquito Cunning Little Vixen at the Ryedale Festival, cover Tenor Roles in The Golden Dragon by Péter Eötvös (Music Theatre Wales), Florville Il Signor Bruschino and Prunier La Rondine (British Youth Opera), and Albert Albert Herring (GSMD). He was proud to perform in the opening season of the Hamburg Elbphilharmonie, singing the small tenor roles in Britten's Curlew River alongside Ian Bostridge and the Britten Sinfonia, a Netia Jones production that had previously travelled to New York (Lincoln Center) and Berkeley University.

2016 saw the launch of Thomas's own ensemble, Canzoni da Camera, which gave two debut concerts of Monteverdi songs and madrigals at La Carrière, followed by a successful first London appearance at Leighton House in February 2017.

Upcoming projects include performances of the St Matthew Passion (evangelist, arias and ensemble) and Telemann's Donnerode with Solomon's Knot/Les Passions de l'Âme in Switzerland, Beethoven's Missa Solemnis and 9th Symphony in Europe and the United States with Sir John Eliot Gardiner (as part of 'Beethoven 250'), further solo appearances at the Leipzig Bachfest and Wigmore Hall with Solomon's Knot, and a CD recording of Monteverdi, Carissimi and Scarlatti with the Monteverdi Choir.

Thomas continues his vocal studies with David Pollard.

To concert promoters: Please do not use the following text for Programme biographies. Instead, please contact Thomas for the most up-to-date and relevant information.

For a comprehensive CV, please contact Thomas via email (see 'Contact' page for details)