Biography
Russell Pascoe (Born 1959) is a Cornish composer and conductor. He was educated at Helston School and Bristol University, studying composition with Derek Bourgeois. He was the founding conductor of the Cornwall Youth Chamber Choir, has been repetiteur and chorus master for Duchy Opera and currently conducts City of Truro Male Choir. He was Director of Music at Richard Lander School and has taught composition for the South West Music School. In 2000 he was nominated as one of Classic FM's Music Teachers of the Year and was runner-up in the South West Teacher of the Year 2004. Russell is a Bard of the Cornish Gorsedd.
As a composer he is one of a handful of Cornish composers to have written opera - The Murder of Charlotte Dymond, with a libretto by Christopher William Hill, was staged in the newly opened Hall for Cornwall in 1999
Many of his works have Cornish links, such as the orchestral works, The Martyrdom of An Gof and Yseult of the White Hands and Four Cornish Folksongs composed for Benjamin Luxon.
Russell has composed much music for Truro Cathedral Choir. Many of these
pieces have been recorded by Regent Records, including Love’s Agonie (Three
Medieval Lyrics) Salmow Kernewek (Cornish Psalms), Pader an Arleth, (Lord’s
Prayer in Cornish), Missa Brevis and the Truro Evening
Service.
His partnership with librettist, Anthony Pinching has resulted in many choral works, two song cycles and the large scale cantata ‘The Childhood of Christ' (A Different Child).
For a Three Spires Singers commission in 2013, Russell teamed up with Anthony to create the Secular Requiem. The recording, with Truro Cathedral Choir and BBC National Orchestra of Wales conducted by Christopher Gray, went on to win Critic’s Choice in Gramophone Magazine.
https://naomibelshaw.com/russell_pascoes_secular_requiem