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The English musician, Benjamin (John) Costello, read Music at Kingston University, winning the conducting prize. He continued his conducting studies at the London College of Music. In 2006 Benjamin returned to Kingston as a research student and is currently working on two major projects into the music of John Kelsall, and on early 20th century British Bach transcriptions.
Benjamin Costello has a portfolio career as a freelance musical director, singing coach, accompanist, arranger and adjudicator working in diverse genres ranging from the Renaissance period to contemporary music, but principally musical theatre and vocal music, and has been involved as a musical director with numerous productions across the UK. He has been musical director on over forty-five productions across the UK, working with a variety of professional and amateur singers and instrumentalists.
In addition to extended periods as a music staff member at the renowned Arts Educational School of Musical Theatre, London, and the London College of Music, Benjamin Costello has worked extensively as a musical director, singing coach and lecturer for many other institutions, including Mountview Academy, GSA Conservatoire, the London Academy of Music and Dramatic Art (LAMDA), the Royal Academy of Music (RAM), and LCM (staff MD for six years), the Universities of London, Surrey and Kingston. He is currently on the staff at Laine Theatre Arts.
Benjamin Costello is an experienced vocal coach and maintains a busy private practice, with many of his current and former students pursuing successful careers in the West End and beyond. He is Singing Tutor and Staff Accompanist at Shrewsbury House School, and since 1998 has been accompanist to the distinguished international soprano soloist Alison Pearce, giving recitals and master-classes together across the UK and in Europe.
Ben adjudicates at competitive festivals and schools throughout the UK as an adjudicator member of both the British and International Federation of Festivals and the Schools Music Association. He accompanies a wide variety of performers, with concerts throughout the UK and overseas including France, Poland, Crete, Italy and Zimbabwe.
Chairman of Kingston Arts Council (the umbrella group for artistic organisations within the Royal Borough of Kingston-upon-Thames) from 2006 to 2010 and Artistic Director of the biennial Kingston Festival of the Voice from 2007 to 2011, Benjamin Costello is presently Artistic Director of Thames Concerts Ltd, Founding Director of Kingston Chamber Singers and Chorus Master for the Leith Hill Musical Festival. He is also a member of the Incorporated Society of Musicians, the Musicians' Union and the Performing Right Society |
