Julie Kennard
“The aria With Verdure Clad The Fields Appear amazingly inspired Haydn to create one of his most lyrical settings, and soprano Julie Kennard sang it with infectious charm.”
Review of York Musical Society concert, June 2011
Julie Kennard read music at the University of Southampton and then went on to the Royal College of Music to study singing with Ruth Packer.
Julie has always specialised in oratorio although early on in her career she took lead roles in several operas. She has appeared in all major UK concert halls and Cathedrals and in many venues abroad. In Ireland, she was a soloist in Mahler’s Eighth Symphony for RTE Television and Bach’s Mass in B Minor; in Italy, Poland Switzerland and France she performed the role of Dido in Purcell’s Dido and Aeneas; in Iceland she featured as soprano soloist in John Speight’s Symphony No. 2 for the Symposium of Nordic composers – a work she has subsequently recorded. Verdi’s Requiem has also played a large part in Julie’s career and to date she has sung 80 performances of that great work. English music has featured strongly in her repertoire –giving numerous performances of Vaughan Williams’ Sea Symphony, Elgar’s The Kingdom and Apostles, Herbert Howells’ Hymnus Paradisi and Britten’s War Requiem. The War Requiem was highlighted in a television documentary of Britten and showed Julie singing in a commemorative performance from Coventry Cathedral with CUMS and Stephen Cleobury.
As well as more conventional repertoire, other concerts have included Sullivan’s Te Deum, Rutter’s Mass for the Children, Elgar’s Spirit of England, Karl Jenkins The Armed Man and a concert to celebrate William Wilberforce. There have been recitals in the Brancaster, Chipping Camden and Chelmsford Festivals featuring a programme that she shares with her husband Michael George. Solo recitals in Luxemburg and at the Three Choirs Festival have featured Schumann’s Frauenliebe und -leben, and On this Island by Britten. More recently she has performed the Four Last Songs by Strauss, Sieben Frühe Lieder by Berg and a recital for soprano and organ featuring a new commission by Pavel Novak, The lake of heavenly Desires. She was the soprano soloist in a programme of words and music celebrating the life of Admiral Lord Nelson with Richard Baker as the narrator and also in a programme featuring Dame Judi Dench and her family.
Brahms’ German Requiem has featured numerous times over the past few years – one of which was in Istanbul with King’s College Cambridge. There have also been performances of Elgar’s The Apostles, Mozart’s Vespers and Beethoven‘s Ninth Symphony, several performances of Rossini’s Petite Messe, Mendelssohn’s Hear my prayer“, the Sea Symphony, Poulenc Gloria and Haydn’s Creation.
Julie’s recordings show her versatility – Monteverdi’s Christmas Vespers, Haydn’s Nelson Mass with St. Paul’s Cathedral, Howells’ Hymnus Paradisi with Vernon Handley and the RLPO and a CD of Victorian and Edwardian Carols entitled “All Hayle to the Days”.
Julie also enjoys teaching singing at the Royal Academy of Music and is the Artistic Director of the Grove Park Music Festival.
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