Ralph Allwood MBE
Ralph Allwood MBE
Ralph Allwood MBE DMus was Director of Music at Eton College for 26 years and is now a freelance choral director. He is the Director of the Eton (now Rodolfus) Choral Courses, which he founded in 1980. 9000 8 to 21 year olds have been students on courses over the last 42 years. He co-founded the Junior Choral Courses in 2012, and in recent years has launched courses in Texas, Shanghai and Shenzhen. The Rodolfus choir, made up of the best singers from the courses, has produced over 20 CDs since he founded it in 1982.
Ralph is co-founder and conductor of Inner Voices, a choir made up of singers from state schools in London. He is also Director of Chapel Music and an academic supervisor at Queens’ College Chapel, Cambridge and an Honorary Fellow of University College, Durham.
Biography
BA (Dunelm) DMus (Aberdeen)
Hon ARAM, Hon FRSCM, Hon FNMSM
Ralph has conducted choirs for 40 live broadcasts for BBC Radio 3, is a judge for the Llangollen Eisteddfod and has written much music heard worldwide on radio and television. He also teaches at his old school, Tiffin.
In 2015 he co-founded the Pimlico Musical Foundation to enable children from Pimlico Primary Schools to sing in choirs, particularly at St Gabriel’s Church. Since then, in addition to their own choirs, Pimlico’s five primary schools have produced a Pimlico Children’s Choir and, since September 2018, a Foundation Choir which sings regular Evensongs in St Gabriel‘s Church.
In 2012 Ralph was awarded a Doctorate of Music by Aberdeen University. He was made MBE in the 2012 New Year’s Honours list. In 2017, the Archbishop of Canterbury presented him with the Thomas Cranmer Award for Music and Worship. – 2012 Ralph Doctorate of Music by Aberdeen University.