Will Todd has been playing the piano since he was three and composing since he was seven years old. His output includes works for choir, stage works, and orchestral works, and his music has been featured on BBC Radio 2 and 3 and Classic FM, and performed all over the UK, Europe and the USA.
Will’s flagship work is the 2003 jazz mass setting Mass in Blue, which has been performed more than 100 times around the world since its premiere; on most occasions with the Will Todd Trio and Will at the piano. The larger Will Todd Ensemble has also recorded Mass in Blue with the Vasari Singers for Signum Records.
His opera The Blackened Man won second prize in the International Verdi Opera Competition 2002, and was subsequently staged at the Buxton Festival. Music theatre work The Screams of Kitty Genovese has had three productions in the US following successful development work both there and in the UK, and was produced by Tête á Tête Opera in London and Edinburgh in 2010. Will Todd’s theatre works have been staged at the Millennium Centre (WNO); the Linbury Studio Theatre at the Royal Opera House; Buxton Opera Festival; the New York Music Theatre Festival; Public Theater New York; and The Sage Gatehead, and he has collaborated with some of the UK’s most high profile directors including Keith Warner, David Edwards, John Caird and Jonathan Munby.
Other choral works include the oratorio Saint Cuthbert which has been performed many times and recorded by the Hallé Orchestra, and a cantata to celebrate the 60th anniversary of the Jarrow March – The Burning Road. Will Todd has also written a large body of smaller-scale choral works including many liturgical and anthem settings. Notable examples include Among Angels and Stay with me Lord – both of which were commissioned by the Genesis Foundation for The Sixteen and Harry Christophers, and Before Action, commissioned by the BBC Singers.
Recent projects have included a setting of Keat’s Ode to a Nightingale for Hertfordshire Chorus; Jazz Concerto for Clarinet – a new clarinet concerto for Emma Johnson; and a new CD recording – Evensong in Blue with the Will Todd Trio and the Choir of St Martin in the Fields. Plans for 2012 include a number of exciting premieres – Songs of Peace for choir and jazz trio; Love Songs – commissioned by Symphony Silicon Valley Chorale; and a new work for the Diamond Jubilee Thanksgiving Service at St Paul’s Cathedral.