Our Choral Scholars

The choral scholarship scheme here at St John’s is generously supported by the William Gibbs Religious & Educational Trust. Each year, eight scholarships are available to vocal students from London music colleges, many of whom go on to very successful careers in opera, oratorio and other singing work. We also welcome volunteer singers who would like to join us in song - please contact the Director of Music if you’re interested.

Choral Scholars 2024-2025

Rachel McLean

Soprano

Scottish soprano Rachel McLean is a Samling Artist and graduated in 2023 with a Master of Music in Vocal Performance at the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland under Wilma MacDougall.  She previously graduated with a First Class Honours Bachelors of Music degree under Margaret Izatt.

Operatic roles include Donna Anna Don Giovanni (Lyric Opera Studio Weimar), Youka in Chabrier’s L’Étoile (RCS Opera), Pamina Die Zauberflöte (LOSW). In spring 2024 she was cast to cover Donna Anna and was chorus in Hurn Court Opera’s production of Don Giovanni.

Operatic scenes include Fiordiligi Cosi fan Tutte, Arabella Arabella, Ilia Idomeneo, Rosalinde Die Fledermaus,Elettra Idomeneo, Vitellia La clemenza di Tito, and Anne Trulove The Rake’s Progress.

Concert highlights include Die Schöne Müllerin – An International Women’s Day concert with the RCS, soprano soloist in Haydn’s Nelson Mass with the Garleton Singers, Vivaldi’s Gloria with RCS Chorus and Orchestra, and Jenkins’ The Armed Man with the National Youth Choir of Scotland.

Future engagements include Countess Almaviva in Le nozze di Figaro with Lyric Opera Studio Weimar.

Rachel’s MMus studies were generously supported by the ABRSM. Rachel is currently training as a Young Artist on the Global Talent Programme at the National Opera Studio (NOS), London.

Madeleine Perring

soprano

Madeleine Perring started her musical career as a chorister at Wells Cathedral where she discovered her love of music. This was developed as a vocal specialist at the school, and even more so at the Royal College of Music. After graduating from the RCM with first class honours, she is thrilled to be studying with Rosa Mannion and is grateful to continue her Masters studies as a Brooks-Anderson Award holder. Highlights from the past year include various opera scenes; performing as Susanna in Mozart’s Marriage of Figaro and as Josephine in Gilbert & Sullivan’s HMS Pinafore under the direction of Saffron van Zwanenberg, as well as Barbarina in Jonathan Dove’s Little Green Swallow under the direction of Stuart Barker and Despina in Mozart’s Cosí fan tutte. Madeleine has also enjoyed working as a soprano soloist with the Somerset and Plymouth choral societies, and most recently with the Civil Service Choir in St John’s Smith Square. Maddie looks forward to her final year of Masters with generous support from both Help Musicians and the Countess of Munster Musical Trust.

Esmee Loughlin-Dickenson

Mezzo-soprano

Esmée is a graduate of the Royal College of Music, where she obtained her Bachelors of Music under the tutelage of Sally Burgess.
At the RCM, she has covered the role of La Regina (La bella dormente nel bosco, Respighi) and has sung in the chorus for L’enfant et les sortilèges (Ravel) and Don Giovanni (Gazzaniga). Most recently Esmée has appeared in the RCM’s opera scenes as Roland (Les Bavards, Offenbach) and performed as the alto soloist the RCM’s annual Bach project. She was also the 2024 recipient of the Undergraduate prize for the Brooks Van der Pump competition.
Esmée has taken part in masterclasses with Edith Wiens, Ann Murray, Michael Chance and Bernarda Fink. She is a SongEasel Young Artist and will be taking part in the 2024/2025 series of the Udo Reinemann International Masterclass in Brussels.
She looks forward to continuing her studies at the RCM as a Postgraduate student in September 2024.

Will Prior

Counter-Tenor

Will is a recent graduate of Magdalen College, Oxford where he read Music, sang in the College Choir, and graduated with a first-class degree. He spent two years in Oxford after graduating, spending the first year in the music department at Magdalen College School and the second as a Lay Clerk at Christ Church Cathedral. Growing up in Cheshire, Will spent many years as part of the Hallé youth ensembles and has since gone on to sing with a variety of groups, from large choirs such as The Beaufort Singers to small consorts such as Selene, a recently formed octet, and The Gesualdo Six. Last year, will was also VOCES8 scholar and has since sung in concerts as part of the VOCES8 foundation choir as well as being involved with their educational project. Will is in his first year of a Master’s in Performance at the Royal College of Music. He holds with a full scholarship funded by the ABRSM and is grateful to be supported also by Drake Calleja Trust and The Countess of Munster Music Trust, who offered him their inaugural Dame Janet Baker Award for most promising singer at audition. Will studies with Veronica Veysey Campbell.

Tim Burton

Tenor

Tim has recently graduated from the Royal Birmingham Conservatoire, studying with Christopher Turner. He is looking forward to continuing his studies with Tim Evans-Jones at the Royal College of Music on the MPerf programme in September 2024, generously supported by the college with a scholarship.

Whilst at RBC he has taken part in various opera productions, with roles including The Schoolmaster in The Cunning Little Vixen – Janáček, Mr Bobo in Coraline – Turnage, Moon and King of the East, The Enchanted Pig – Dove, and Le Doyen de la Faculté, Cendrillon – Massenet. Opera scenes productions at RBC include performances as: Vasek (Bartered Bride), Jaquino (Fidelio), Polidoro (La Finta Semplice), Lysander (A Midsummer Night’s Dream), Max (Der Freischütz), Don Ottavio (Don Giovanni). Tim was awarded first place in the Edward Brooks English Song Prize in 2023.

At the 2023 Grimeborn festival at Arcola Theatre, he played the tenor in the Trio of Bernstein’s Trouble in Tahiti, directed by Finn Lacey. This production was awarded an Offie in February for Opera Production.

Tim started his musical career as a chorister at Gloucester Cathedral, and has since been a Lay Clerk at Gloucester, and Birmingham St Philip’s Cathedrals. He enjoys Oratorio work with repertoire including Messiah, Samson, Handel, St John Passion (solos), Bach, Petite Messe Solenelle, Rossini, Requiem, Saint-Saens. He was part of the 10th Cohort of Genesis Sixteen from 2020-21 and an Ex Cathedra Scholar from 2019-21 and has since sung with The Dunedin Consort, Ex Cathedra, and The Sixteen.

Archie Inns

Tenor

Archie’s musical journey started as a chorister at Durham Cathedral. Archie then moved to Glasgow, where he began learning with Paul Keohone and attended the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland’s Junior Department from where he won a number of solo competitions including, as the youngest ever winner, the 2018 Glasgow Music Festival Agnes Duncan Trophy and was the national winner of the Rotary Young Musician of the Year in 2020. Archie spent his gap year singing at St John’s College Cambridge where he started his ongoing tuition with Miranda Wright who is based at the Royal College of Music. Archie is also taught, alongside Miranda, by Nicky Spence.

Archie is a graduate of Christ Church, Oxford where he studied Philosophy and Theology and also held a Choral Scholarship. Archie freelances with groups such as the BBC Singers, Ensemble Pro Victoria and Coro Spezzato and has lately begun fulfilling more solo engagements, such as his debut at the Oxford Song Festival alongside James Gilchrist in November.

Archie has also had competition success at university, including the Mendl-Schrama Song Prize and Oxford Cambridge Club Music Prize. Archie’s operatic roles have included Prince Gvidon in Orchestra Vox’s performance of “The Golden Cockeral” and he has held the Young Artistship at Vache Baroque Opera and in 2023, was the Emerging Artist for Westminster Opera Comapany.

Archie is now pursuing a freelancing career as soloist and consort singer alongside completing a GDL at BPP University for which he holds the Sir Elihu Lauterpacht scholarship from Gray’s Inn and the Career Commitment Scholarship from BPP University.

Daniel Barrett

Baritone

Daniel Barrett is a Glaswegian baritone studying with Russell Smythe at the Royal College of Music Opera Studio.

In January 2022 Daniel won 1st Prize at the RCM’s Lieder Competition; he claimed 2nd Prize in RCM’s Brooks van der Pump English Song competition 2022 and, most recently, 3rd Prize in the Lies Askonas Competition Finals 2023.

During the summer of 2022, Daniel was part of the Verbier Festival’s Atelier Lyrique program where he performed the role of Sam in Verdi’s Un Ballo in Maschera. He recently performed the role of Figaro in The Barber of Seville as a Young Artist at Opera Holland Park (Summer 2024).

Theodore Day

Baritone

Ted is a baritone from Cambridge and began singing as a chorister with St Johns College Choir. He read French and Classics at the university of St Andrews. There he held a choral scholarship for four years, and both founded the University of St Andrews Opera Society and performed with the Byre Opera group, leading to him winning the Cedric Thorpe Davies prize for outstanding contribution to music. He was a member of the Genesis Sixteen, working with Eamon Dougan and Harry Christophers, and worked as a lay clerk at Coventry Cathedral. Ted has appeared as a soloist with several groups, including the Coventry Cathedral Chorus, Collegium Warwick, the Charles Wood Singers, the Lloyds Choir and Putney Choral Society. In 2022, Ted began postgraduate studies at the RCM as a recipient of first the Vivian Prin Scholarship and now the Douglas and Hilda Simmonds scholarship. He studies with Tim Evans-Jones and Sebastian Wybrew. He has participated in several projects with the RCM, including The Merry Widow in March 2024, playing the role of Kromow, and premiering the chamber opera Fanny & Stella’s Last Day Out in the titular role of Fanny.