Biography

Stephen Muir was born in Zambia and gained B.Mus. and Ph.D. degrees from Birmingham University, specialising in singing and percussion at Birmingham Conservatoire. He also studied conducting under George Hurst at the Canford Conducting Academy (now Sherborne).

 

As Associate Professor of Music at the University of Leeds (1998–2023), his research focused on choral repertoire and performance, nineteenth-century Russian music and Jewish liturgical music in the diaspora, particularly southern Africa.

 

He has worked extensively in the UK as a singer, percussionist and conductor, including recordings and broadcasts for BBC Radio 3 and Classic FM. With the Leeds Baroque Choir and Orchestra under the direction of Peter Holman, he has sung Bach’s Evangelist roles on several occasions, and recently appeared alongside trumpeter Crispian Steele-Perkins as timpanist for the debut of the new hand-crafted kettle drums of Leeds Baroque.

 

Now a freelance musician and teacher, Stephen is a Tenor Lay Clerk at Sheffield Cathedral, and frequently deputises at cathedrals across the North of England. He is co-director of the professional chamber choir Borealis, with whom he is about to release vol. 3 of ‘Hans Gál: Music for Voices’with soprano soloist Carolyn Sampson on the Toccata Classics label.