Lucy Ballard

Mezzo-soprano

Lucy Ballard began singing while at school in Oxford. After completing a BSc in Archaeological Conservation at Cardiff University, she went on to study at the Royal College of Music.

Since leaving college in 1995, Lucy has enjoyed a thriving career in solo and consort singing, performing and recording with many of the leading early music ensembles both in the UK and abroad.

These include Anthony Rooley’s Consort of Musicke, with whom she has recorded Dowland and his contemporaries. She spent five years performing all over the world with the Monteverdi Choir and orchestra under Sir John Eliot Gardiner, working on a wide range of projects and opera productions in Paris (Gluck’s Orphée et Euridice and Alceste) New York and Salzburg (Beethoven’s Leonora) Baden-Baden and Cagliari (Verdi’s Falstaff). She also took part in their millennial J.S.Bach Cantata Pilgrimage. Other Opera work has included touring Japan with Purcell’s Dido and Aeneas with the Purcell Quartet, and Hildegarde of Bingen’s Ordo Virtutem, which she has performed all over Europe. Lucy is a member of the Clerks’ Group, and also performs regularly with the Gabrieli Consort, the Cardinal’s Music, the Kings’ Consort, Ex Cathedra and the Tallis Scholars.

2005 saw Lucy singing a quantity of Tallis and Obrecht with the Clerks’ Group in their 500th anniversary year, and having a live Early Music Show on Radio3 showcasing the group. She has been experimenting with later repertoire, and sang excerpts from Aida (Amneris) and Strauss’s Die Rosenkavalier (Octavian) with Morley College Opera School.

In 2006, Lucy will be performing in Monte Carlo, Nuremburg, Darmstadt, Stresa in Italy, and the York and Stour festivals. She will also be teaching at Dartington Summer School with Ex Cathedra. All this while juggling two small sons…