New Music Programme

The Marian Consort is a leading commissioner of new music for vocal ensemble, having presented the world premieres of over 30 works. It’s a crucial part of our activity — an opportunity for us to reinvigorate the choral tradition we love, champion new talent, and reach new audiences through performance and recording.

We explore a number of themes in our commissioning work, including underrepresented voices and perspectives, and musical styles outwith typical classical choral music. We like to challenge traditions and tropes of choral music, and we champion emerging and early career composers who have had fewer opportunities to write for vocal ensemble, and provide an environment in which they can develop. In recent years we have presented world premieres of works by David Fennessy, Laurence Osborn, Dani Howard, Electra Perivolaris, Barbara Monk Feldman, Tom Coult and Roderick Williams at the likes of Wigmore Hall, Aldeburgh Festival, Brighton Festival and the V&A London. Some of our recent work with composers can be heard on our album, A Winged Woman, which showcases seven of our commissions.

Our New Music Programme is made up of two strands:

  1. New Music Studio, our programme of mainstage commissions which we perform around the UK and internationally, and record.

  2. Emerging Voices, a talent development programme supporting the best emerging UK composers to develop their skills in writing for voices. Emerging Voices supports three composers each year, recruited through an open call, with writing, mentoring and workshop opportunities. Applications for our 2024-25 scheme are now open - find out more here.

Our commissioning work is possible thanks to support from the John Ellerman Foundation, and the PRS Foundation Talent Development Network supported by PPL. We’re grateful for the support of a number of other funders and partners in enabling our programme of commissioning, including the Royal Philharmonic Society, Choir & Organ Magazine and a number of generous individuals. If you’d like to help us continue this important work, please consider supporting us.

“The Marian Consort are an exquisite vocal ensemble, and writing my first vocal work for them was a wonderful opportunity. They are such champions of music both old and new, and I know that so many composers have, and will benefit from their expertise and talents. It was a huge development opportunity for me, and I look forward to hearing the many more works they will commission and perform in the years to come.”
— Dani Howard

Composers we’ve worked with: Hugo Bell, Hilary Campbell, Iain Chambers, Stef Conner, Phillip Cooke, Tom Coult, Nneka Cummins, David Fennessy, Cheryl Frances-Hoad, Andrew Gant, Vivek Haria, Dani Howard, Fraz Ireland, Gabriel Jackson, Sarah Francis Jenkins, Chloe Knibbs, Emily Levy, Geraint Lewis, Cecilia MacDowell, Nick Martin, Matthew Martin, Donna McKevitt, Laurence Osborn, Electra Perivolaris, Daniel Pioro, Juta Pranulytė, Deborah Pritchard, Marcus Rock, Ben Rowarth, Anna Semple, Oliver Tarney, Joanna Ward, Roderick Williams