Jonathan Grieves-Smith, born in Westmorland in 1962, was educated at Kingswood School, Bath and the University of Sussex, studying organ with Marcus Sealy and John Birch and working as organist at Charlecombe Parish Church, St Paul’s Brighton, and as Organ Scholar at the University of Sussex. Whilst studying at the University of Sussex he was appointed Music Director of the University Choir and founded the Sussex Philharmonic Chorus and Orchestra. He was admitted as a tenor to the Brighton Festival Chorus and within a year was starting a fifteen-year association with this great choir and their legendary Music Director, Laszlo Heltay, as Associate Music Director and later as Music Director. This period of apprenticeship included concerts across Europe, from the BBC Proms to Granada, working with some of the world’s finest conductors – Rattle, Ozawa, Previn, Tennstedt, Masur, Levine, Maazel, Temirkanov, Handley, Norrington – and some extraordinary composers, notably John Woolrich and Krzysztof Penderecki.

Jonathan enjoyed notable success with Reading Festival Chorus, BBC Singers, Academy of St. Martin-in-the-Fields Chorus, HallÈ Choir and Huddersfield Choral Society. He conducted the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra, Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra and Bournemouth Sinfonietta, the HallÈ Orchestra (and Bryn Terfel), Royal Liverpool Philharmonic Orchestra and Orchestre National de Lille. He toured Brazil with Rome’s Coro dell’Accademia di Santa Cecilia and the Saltzburger Kammervirtuosen, and also with the London Mozart Players and pianist Nelson Freire. He enjoyed an eleven-year relationship with Dartington International Summer School, two appearances at Europa Cantat (Herning and Linz), and regular guest conducting at Trinity College and Royal Academy of Music in London. In 1998 he was appointed Artistic Director and Principal Conductor of Melbourne Chorale. This wonderful and extraordinary eight years has seen a dramatic development of standards and achievement, many commissions (Brett Dean, Richard Mills, Ross Edwards, Christopher Willcock), many Australian premieres (Schnittke, Henze, Macmillian), performances across Australia (Sydney Olympic Festival with Sydney Symphony Orchestra; Perth with West Australian Symphony Orchestra), a tour to Brazil, wonderful partnerships with the Melbourne Symphony Orchestra, their Chief Conductors Markus Stenz and Oleg Caetani, and their many guests, and the teaching and mentorship of young conductors.