Profile

On graduating from Oxford he was appointed Artistic Director of the Texas Boys' Choir (Dallas, USA). As Artistic Director and conductor of this major US secular Choir School and its professional Touring Choir, he made five trans-national tours of the US, as well as tours to Japan and Hong Kong. Whilst in the USA he prepared choruses for several major orchestras including the Los Angeles Philharmonic, the Dallas Symphony and the New York City Opera (in Los Angeles).

Conducting debuts were at Carnegie Hall and the San Antonio International Music Festival in the USA, in which country he has directed performances at many of the major concert halls. His London orchestral debut, conducting the Orchestra of St. John's, Smith Square, was followed by an invitation to work as assistant to Arnold Östman in Italy and a subsequent operatic conducting debut in Sweden, with Mozart’s Le Nozze di Figaro. Studentships in Prague and at the Netherlands Opera in Amsterdam (Wagner, Die Walküre), led to an invitation from the Netherlands Opera as an assistant to Chief Conductor, Hartmut Haenchen, in Alban Berg’s Wozzeck.   He was also Artistic Director of the first UK WARCHILD Festival (1993) at the Royal Festival Hall, London.

Graham has coached several major opera singers in preparation for their operatic and concert engagements and for some years worked closely with the American mezzo-soprano, Kathleen Kuhlmann.

In the UK he has directed the English Performing Arts Ensemble, which he founded with members of London’s leading orchestras, and the Elizabethan Singers of London - one of London’s longest established Chamber Choirs. Together they have performed on London's South Bank (Royal Festival Hall; Queen Elizabeth Hall) toured in Europe and the USA.  

Since then he has conducted and performed widely in Europe, Scandinavia and Africa in recording, radio broadcast and concert - in Europe conducting the WDR (West German Radio) Symphony Orchestra (Köln) in Germany, the Hanover Band in the UK, the Orchestra da Camara di Firenze in Italy, the Goteborg Opera in Sweden and in South Africa several seasons with the Cape Philharmonic Orchestra, recorded for broadcast on the SABC.

Directing the Hanover Band one of the UK’s leading period instrument orchestras, his world-premiere recordings on ASV (now Sanctuary Classics/Universal) have received outstanding international acclaim and a nomination for the Classical Grammy Awards in the USA.   

As a scholar he has become noted for his pioneering editions of works by 18th century British composers made from autographs in the UK and the USA. In Sweden, he researched the Gustavian manuscripts of the works of Gluck at the invitation of Arnold Ostman, for the cycle of Gluck operas at the Royal Drottningholm Theatre in Stockholm. Graham has been a ‘British Council Artist in residence’ to Sweden, the Czech Republic and Zimbabwe.   

Current Repertoire:

Graham's recent repertoire includes solo concertos, Symphonic works, Operatic and Symphonic choral works of Dmitri Shostakovitch and Sergei Prokofiev, Britten, Tippett, Takemitsu, Janáček, Finzi, Dallapiccola, Schoenberg, Webern, Debussy, Ravel, Faure, Delius, Dukas, Elgar, Glazunov, Rossini, Schumann, Mendelssohn, Dvorak, Brahms, Beethoven, Schubert, Mozart, Haydn as well as his own critical editions of British Symphonies and works by Handel, Arne, Boyce, Clementi, SS Wesley and William Sterndale Bennett, Vaughan William and Walton. With the Cape Philharmonic Orchestra he has conducted the South African premières of several major orchestral works by leading contemporary South African composer Hendrik Hofmeyr.

2010 Season and beyond:

In the 2009-10 Season in Mexico Graham Lea-Cox will conduct 20th century works by British and contemporary South African composers as well as Mexican repertoire, including Silvestre Revueltas' iconic score for large Symphony Orchestra, La Noche de Los Mayas.  His  orchestral variations 350.org (ppm) for chamber orchestra and projection was composed for and premiered by Orquesta Nuevo Milenio da Monterrey in December 2009, with the composer conducting.  Graham Lea-Cox is the initiator and Artistic Director of the Academy of Future Music, an international roving resource for professional artists to exchange skills and collaborate, Artistic Director of the planned Festivals of Mexican and South African Film and Music (to be staged in South Africa and Mexico between 2010 and 2012, in collaboration with the Embassies and Governments of Mexico and South Africa) and Artistic Director of Creative Beetroot, a South African based radical Arts Facilitating project.

Educational Work:

Encouraging young people in their study and appreciation of music is expressed through his work as often as possible. In the UK through the 1990s, he conceived and directed a 5 year Educational project, Explorations, with the English Performing Arts Ensemble and, as Artistic Director and Conductor, directed events at the Royal Festival and Queen Elizabeth Halls, London. From this work a national UK charity was established, the English Performing Arts Educational Trust, and Graham has since directed similar projects internationally, for example in the USA and for the British Council in Zimbabwe.   

In South Africa he has given master classes and lectured on Performance Practice and Contemporary music at UNISA (South Africa), at the University of KwaZulu-Natal, Durban, at Rhodes University, Grahamstown and has lectured as a keynote speaker at the South African Music Teachers Conference.   

In Mexico he has lectured and given master-classes at the Escuela Superior de Musica y Danza de Monterrey and at the Universities of Monterrey and Saltillo.

June 2010