Wednesday 8 July 2015

Meet the Choirmaster!

Mr Chris Dixon is our superb Choirmaster at Jubilate Community Choir, Eastbourne. He is also our first Sing it! practitioner, and will be heading to Crowborough in September to begin working with Year 3 and 4 children. Here's a little a bit about Chris.
He was born in Beverley in the East Riding of Yorkshire.  He attended Millfield School, read Modern and Medieval Languages at Clare College, Cambridge where he was a choral scholar, gained a Diploma in Posgraduate Opera Performance at the Royal Academy of Music and studied at Great Britain's National Opera Studio.
He has sung the title role in Tchaikovsky's "Eugene Onegin" for Welsh National Opera, the title role in Mozart's "Don Giovanni" conducted by Sir Colin Davis, and various solo roles for Glyndebourne, WNO, Scottish Opera and the BBC Proms.
Chris has taught a mixture of singing, class music, class languages and sport at Bede's since 2008.  

This past year he has been the Teacher of Music at Gildredge House Free School in Eastbourne.
Chris is very much enjoying taking the 'Jubilate Community Choir' rehearsals and preparing for the 'Sing it!' project.

Saturday 4 July 2015

Meet our CEO!

Philippa Smith was educated in South Wales. At a young age she won scholarships to study singing at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama and also to the Royal Academy of Music, where she studied opera as a post-graduate. For some years she sang professionally as a mezzo- soprano, performing frequently with regional opera companies and also in concert halls throughout the country.
Since graduating she has had a passion for teaching and has taught extensively in private practice, at schools and at colleges, covering a wide range of ages, abilities and genres.
During her career she has worked creatively with adults with special needs, written and devised education projects for schools and given masterclasses in educational establishments. Many of her past pupils have gained places to study singing at universities and conservatoires and some are now singing professionally.
As well as co parenting their children, Tom and Will, she also coached Rob throughout his career, working in great detail on every role that he sang.

Philippa is now the CEO of the Robert Poulton Foundation and takes great pride in leading its two current projects, which very conveniently combine her professional expertise with her dedication to Rob’s memory.

Monday 29 June 2015

Welcome!

This is the first blog post for the Robert Poulton Foundation. Our aim here is to keep you up to date with all our news. We have two amazing projects already up and running, Sing it! and Jubilate, and we're really excited about both of them! 
Robert Poulton
So who are we? Over the coming weeks we will introduce you to the key members of the RPF team. For now, we'd love it if you could take the time to read about the man who has inspired our charity, Robert Poulton. Please come back soon to stay up to date with all our comings and goings!