Introducing: Roderick Williams

British baritone and composer Roderick Williams OBE joins the Oxford Philharmonic Orchestra under the baton of Martyn Brabbins for the first orchestral concert of the 2026/27 season. The programme is fittingly one of English Melodies, with music from Vaughan Williams, Holst and Walton, alongside arrangements and compositions from Williams himself.

Roderick Williams’s accomplishments have cemented his status as one of the UK’s pre-eminent baritones, though his choice to become a singer came in his late 20s, when he decided to attend Guildhall School of Music in London. Before that, Williams had attended Christ Church Cathedral School, been a choral scholar at Magdalen College and then taken up a position as a Director of Choral Studies.

Williams made his operatic debut performing as Tarquinius in Britten’s The Rape of Lucretia. Soon after, in 1996, he made his first appearance at the Proms performing Verdi’s opera Don Carlos.

Since then, his recorded output has been remarkable for its breadth. Alongside his consistent performance of British composers, Williams has been devoted to shining a light on lesser-known works from the likes of Moeran, Boyle and Butterworth (as in this concert). His services to music were rewarded with an appointment as an Officer of the Order of the British Empire (OBE) in the 2017 Birthday Honours, later performing at the Coronation of King Charles III and Queen Camilla.

As always, we hope to see you at the Sheldonian Theatre on October 7, for this fantastic programme and our first orchestral concert of the season. A pre-concert talk by Sir Nicholas Kenyon precedes the event. Find tickets here.

Cover photo by Theo Williams

No country’s music embodies a pastoral spirit quite like England’s, and no piece quite enshrines that idea like Vaughan Williams’s image of countryside serenity rendered in the most lyrical music imaginable, The Lark Ascending. Doyen of English music and former Music Director of English National Opera, Martyn Brabbins opens our symphonic season at the Sheldonian Theatre with works that portray dark clouds above green fields, including deeply moving music by composers killed at the front during the First World War. A concert that speaks of tragedy but also of comradeship includes Roderick Williams’s flute concerto, written for his childhood friend and our own Solo Flute, Anthony Robb.

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