Last update2
18 January 2011

Conductor and Soloists

Guy Woolfenden - Conductor

With more than 150 scores for the Royal Shakespeare Company and an impressive list of credits with major European theatre companies, including the Comédie-Française, Paris and the Burgtheater, Vienna, Guy Woolfenden’s theatre music is highly regarded throughout the world. During his thirty-seven years as Head of Music to the RSC, he collaborated with some of the world’s finest directors in many award-winning productions.

In collaboration with choreographer André Prokovsky, Guy arranged the music for four full length ballets, which he has subsequently conducted in productions all over the world, including the acclaimed Russian première of his Anna Karenina with the Kirov Ballet at the Mariinsky theatre in St. Petersburg. A new production of Anna Karenina is currently showing in Antalya, Turkey, by the Turkish State Opera and Ballet.

Many of Guy’s compositions for chamber ensembles and wind orchestras evolved from work that began life as incidental music for the theatre, and scores such as Gallimaufry and Illyrian Dances are performed and recorded world-wide.

Guy is an Honorary Associate Artist of the Royal Shakespeare Company and was awarded an OBE in the New Year Honours List 2007 for services to music.

Jeremy Ballard - Leader

Jeremy is the orchestra's long-serving leader. He started playing the violin when he was seven years of age. At fourteen his distinguished musical career started as a band boy in the Royal Marines, playing cornet and violin. In 1957, he won the prestigious Cassels Prize for musician of the year with his performance of Beethoven's Violin Concerto. During his years as a Royal Marine he served on the Royal Yacht Britannia, playing many solos for HM The Queen and the Royal Family.

In 1962 Jeremy joined the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra whilst still studying with Sascha Lasserson (a pupil of Leopold Auer) in London. He was leader of the second violins for twenty-five years and has travelled the world with many great soloists and conductors. In 1991 he left the CBSO to concentrate on his other interests and is currently a member of the Midland Chamber Players giving regular lunchtime concerts in Birmingham Cathedral. Jeremy also enjoys working with the Royal Shakespeare Company at Stratford-upon-Avon. The other string to his bow is drawing, for which he has had many fine opportunities at the theatre.

Ruth Palmer  - Violin

Described as one of the most distinctive violinist of her generation by Anna Picard in the Independent on Sunday, Ruth Palmer has garnered international recognition, including a Classical BRIT award for her debut recording of Shostakovich with the Philharmonia Orchestra.  

Ruth was educated with scholarships at: Wells Cathedral School; Purcell School; Royal Academy of Music; Vienna’s Hochschule fur Musik und Darstellende Kunst; and at the Royal College of Music where she studied with Dr Felix Andrievsky, later holding the RCM Mills Williams and Ritterman Junior Fellowships.

Recent performances include appearances with the English Chamber, Royal Liverpool Philharmonic, Sinfonia Viva, Opera North, Ulster, London Chamber, and Academy of Saint Martin in the Fields orchestras with conductors including Andre de Ridder, Vasily Petrenko, Mischa Damev, Carlo Rizzi, David Hill, and Benjamin Wallfisch. She has performed at the Bath Mozart, Cheltenham, Ravinia, and Edinburgh festivals, and for the LSO/BBC Radio 3 violinists’ series, Munich Opera House, Royal Albert Hall, World Economic Forum Davos, and she gives regular performances at the Wigmore Hall.

Collaborations with other artists of international standing include UK and World premieres of two pieces by Sir John Tavener, performing with Sir Richard Rodney Bennett and giving World premieres of his music, and making multiple films with film director Tim Meara. Ruth has featured in two BBC documentaries about Shostakovich and also In Search of the Messiah, a film about Stradivari. 

She has worked with choreographer Rafael Bonachela in association with Rambert Dance Company and Sydney Dance Company, joining dancer Amy Hollingsworth, on stage for their internationally critically acclaimed duet Irony of Fate for violin and dancer. 

She has also recorded Tavener's Mahashakti on EMI, and Jon Lord’s Durham Concerto on AVIE, both with the Royal Liverpool Philharmonic Orchestra. Ruth’s latest CD, Hidden Acoustics, featuring works by Bach and Bartok, was released in October 2010 to international critical acclaim. Hidden Acoustics is also the name of Ruth’s latest concert tour where music reveals architecture in programmes centred on Bach.

Ruth is a grateful recipient of a Musicians Benevolent Fund Professional Development Award 2010, which enabled Ruth's further study with Miriam Fried