Excelsis will perform the Mozart Requiem and the Fauré Requiem on Saturday, 14 March, for the opening concert of Grayshott Concerts’ 2015 season, conducted by Rob Lewis. The chamber choir will be accompanied by the London Mozart Players and joined by familiar soloists Lucy Knight and Håkan Vramsmo, as well as Rebecca Afonwy-Jones and Paul Curievici.

Soprano Lucy Knight performed with Excelsis for the world premiere of Karl Jenkins’ The Healer – A Cantata for St Luke, in 2014. London-born Knight read Music at Cambridge University and trained at The Guildhall School of Music and Drama and English National Opera. She is a 2013 International Opera Awards Foundation winner and recipient of Making Music’s Philip and Dorothy Green Award for Young Concert Artists. She made her US concert debut as the soloist in the US premiere of The Healer at Carnegie Hall, New York.

Håkan Vramsmo also shared the stage with Excelsis when he sang the baritone solo in The Healer. He has appeared at major venues and festivals including the BBC Proms opening night and has recorded for BBC, Signum Records and Chandos Records. Vramsmo teaches singing at Citylit Institute in London and masterclasses at Koninklijk Conservatoire Brussel.

Making her first appearance with Excelsis and Grayshott Concerts is Welsh mezzo-soprano Rebecca Afonwy-Jones. She studied at The Guildhall School of Music and Drama and is a graduate of the Alexander Gibson Opera School at the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland. Afonwy-Jones was a Scottish Opera Emerging Artist for 2010-11.

Tenor Paul Curievici studied at The Guildhall School of Music and Drama and made his debut with the Royal Opera House Covent Garden in performances of Gerald Barry’s The Importance of Being Earnest at the Linbury Theatre. Curievici won the Scottish Opera’s John Scott Award and the Basil A. Turner Prize awarded by British Youth Opera.