Natalie Clifton-Griffith
Natalie Clifton-Griffith was born in Cornwall and studied at The Birmingham Conservatoire and The Royal College of Music. She was a prize winner at Great Elm and The First London Handel Festival Singing Competition (2002).
Highlights of her career include Bach’s Magnificat (Barbican Hall, ECO), St John Passion and Cantata 82a (Hanover Band), Mass in B Minor (Lyon Early Music Festival), Cantata 209 Non sa che sia dolore (Purcell Room and CBSO centre), and Handel’s Messiah at most major cathedrals in England, Apollo e Dafne and Alexander Balus (London Handel Festival) and Laudate Pueri (Welsh Baroque Orchestra). Classical repertoire includes Haydn’s Creation (Bath Abbey), Nelson Mass (Lichfield Cathedral), Missa Sancti Nicholai, Salve Regina and Mozart’s Exultate Jubilate (CBSO Symphony Hall and English Haydn Festival) and Mass in C Minor (ECO).
Natalie appears regularly as a soloist with The English Concert (Biber Missa Christi Resurgentis, Handel’s Dixit Dominus, QEH and Bath Festival and Vivaldi’s Gloria) and Ex Cathedra on CD and concerts including Lalande’s Dies Irae (BBC Proms), Handel’s Solomon and Purcell’s Fairy Queen (Symphony Hall). Also with CBSO Baroque Ensemble, Armonico Tributo, Philomela, Camerata Cayrasco and Capilla Cayrasco (Canary Islands and Madrid).
Other concert engagements have included Mendelssohn’s Midsummer Night’s Dream (CBSO), Canteloube’s Chants D’Auvergne, Villa Lobos’ Bachiana Brasileira no.5, Paul Spicer’s Easter Oratorio (ESO), John Joubert’s Wings of Faith (CBSO), Orff’s Carmina Burana (Birmingham Royal Ballet and English Symphony Orchestra) and Mater Gloriosa in Mahler’s Symphony No.8 (Symphony Hall).
Operatic roles include Timea (La Liberta Contenta), Venus (Venus and Adonis), Despina (Cosi fan Tutte), Queen of the Night (Magic Flute) and Princesse (L’Enfant et les Sortilleges).
Natalie has recorded for EMI Classics (Rodrigo), Hyperion (De Lalande, Charpentier, and three discs of South American Baroque music), Archiv (Biber) and Lammas (Karg-Elert). She recently appeared in an article for Early Music News - ‘Rising Stars’.
Current and future engagements include the world premiere of Paul Spicer’s Advent Oratorio, Mozart’s Mass in C Minor and Bach Cantata 82a Ich Habe Genug at the St Davids Cathedral Festival, Bach’s St John Passion for Birmingham Bach Choir (Lichfield Cathedral and Hereford Cathedral); also Monteverdi Vespers (Truro Cathedral, Cadogan Hall and Birmingham Town Hall) and Orff’s Carmina Burana (Cadogan Hall). Natalie appears as soprano soloist on Ex Cathedra’s recently released live CD recording of Bach’s St Matthew Passion and is touring again to Madrid with Capilla Cayrasco in June 2010. In July 2010 Natalie will also be performing Patrick Hawes’ Song of Songs.
