The score is available for free download until 30 November 2025.

‘Highgate School [in north London] was fabulous for music. I spent most days in that department, singing in barbershop quartets and concert choirs. I owe them a lot for that education. I also spent hundreds of hours on the cricket field and harboured dreams of pursuing that as a career. I didn’t know then that I wanted to be a musician.’  

For Jamie Powe, making arrangements of music contributed to an interest in composing, which, combined with choral singing and developing his tenor voice, led to reading Music at Somerville College, Oxford, where a tenor choral scholarship and composition studies with Toby Young and Deborah Pritchard were his main specialisms. The idea of making music a career only began to dawn on him then.

‘Finding one’s compositional style can be as challenging as developing one’s life. I tried lots of different things to see what really clicked for me… everything from electroacoustic composition through to choral music and music theatre.’ The composition module at Oxford enabled students to write choral pieces to be workshopped by the BBC Singers – not a bad opportunity for undergraduates. The feedback was invaluable. ‘They were very supportive, and honest about what could be improved from a practical point of view, particularly about understanding how to write for voices. Just hearing a choir of that calibre sing your music is very educational and confidence building. They seemed to like my piece and I thought, maybe this is something I could do professionally.’ 

A scholarship to study choral conducting led to a distinction in the two-year Master’s degree course at the Royal Academy of Music (RAM), as well as an award for outstanding choral leadership. Powe also continued composition studies there with David Gorton and Gareth Moorcraft. ‘It was great to be free of the undergraduate model where, whatever you do creatively has to be judged and marked. At the Academy I had the freedom to do what I wanted.’ Powe feels indebted to the support he received from his principal tutor at RAM, choral conducting professor Patrick Russill, who introduced him to new avenues of listening as well as building his conducting technique. ‘Without Paddy taking a leap of faith in my potential, and giving me a place at the Academy, I really don’t know whether I would be a musician now.’

Currently musical director of an array of London-based choirs: The Fourth Choir, Laurelin Voices, The New London Singers, Putney Choral Society and The Aubrey Singers, Powe also directed The Arcadian Singers (an Oxford chamber choir) 2019-23. ‘Maybe you can tell… I love the variety of those very different ensembles.’ Mainstream repertoire comes with the choral society (Mozart’s Requiem this season), and conducting an orchestra with that is exciting, he says. The Fourth Choir (founded in 2013 to give LGBTQ+ amateur and professional singers and associated artists an opportunity to explore a cappella music to the highest standards) is performing at The Concertgebouw, Amsterdam, in August, and at Wigmore Hall this summer with CN Lester (a multi-genre musician, researcher, writer and activist).

Choral conducting is obviously a mainstay of Powe’s musical career. His leadership style is founded on listening, empathy and building trust. Is it mainly about building confidence too? ‘Absolutely. It depends on the people. Each group I conduct has a different psychology, so I interact with them slightly differently, but I try always to be kind and helpful. For example, a choir that has previously had a “scary” conductor are probably a bit terrified. I say, “I expect you to be well prepared for rehearsals, but I don’t mind if you make a mistake… expression is more important at this point.” And once they hear how that works, then they buy into it and more success follows… With some choirs it comes quickly, with others it can take some time, depending on the psychology, but all my choirs are making great strides.’ A key aspect of choral directing, with any group, is convincing the singers that you’re actually on the same side as them. Even though you’re standing in front of them, facing the other way, you’re all in the same boat. ‘Exactly. You’re a team – I couldn’t agree more.’

Spending a valuable year on the National Youth Choir’s Young Composers scheme, as some of our other New Music composers have done, Powe worked with Héloïse Werner, and with Joanna Marsh on his piece The New Moon. ‘Joanna is excellent at working with text and she said, “This is great, but how do we elevate it? How do we take it to a level above what it is, in every moment?” That switched my brain on: how to make it more engaging, to make the words come alive?’ Composed earlier this year, The New Moon is formed of homophonic textures that make the words clear while using a rhythmic energy to drive the music on. As the impetus subsides, the colourful harmony deepens and the piece draws to its close. An earlier piece dating from 2023, The Gun Mass sets poetry, by American musician and writer Haley Hodges, around the structure of the ordinaries of the Mass, and responds to the theme of gun violence in the USA, especially in the wake of the 2022 Robb Elementary School shooting in Texas. Choral textures are clear and expressive, sometimes with solo lines accompanied by the chorus, with communication of the words paramount. Can Powe describe his musical language and pinpoint any influences?

‘That’s difficult. I think it is an ever evolving thing. I’ve been influenced by David Lang, and… it’s not hard to be influenced by James MacMillan.’ Powe loves the MacMillan Miserere: ‘Some parts of it are quite angular and stark, and then it has this gorgeous, rich ending. I like playing with angularity, then having moments of beauty or calmness.’

Despite his immersion in choral music, we persuaded Powe to write an organ piece for the 2025 New Music series. The result is engaging: Surge opens with a syncopated ostinato (marked ‘fresh, brash, punchy’) followed by a calm, almost minimalistic meditation, which grows in dynamic before the opening toccata-like textures return and a triumphant coda completes the whole. Powe visited Trinity College, Cambridge and sat in the chapel’s organ loft with Steven Grahl and the renowned Metzler organ on which his piece has been recorded. ‘Hearing Steven play there was fantastic. He talked me through the whole instrument, its different qualities and its idiosyncrasies. We talked about how every organ is different – how do I write something that suits that specific instrument really well, but also can be performed anywhere? We spent quite some time there. It was an education meeting Steven and I’m grateful.’

Beyond the New Music project, Jamie Powe has irons in the fire and is continuing with his busy schedule as a diverse choral director. ‘Here’s some variety for you. Last week I wrote backing vocals for Olya Polyakova, a Ukrainian pop star.’ Really? ‘Yes, she’s very big in Ukraine! Her people messaged me and wanted something in a choral style. We’re going to record them with The Fourth Choir.’ More upcoming composing includes a reworking for lower voices of The Gun Mass, continuing to attract positive attention in the USA, plus a new work taking David and Jonathan (from the book of Samuel) as its theme, another collaboration with librettist Hayley Hodges. Jamie Powe is also in the early stages of setting up his own professional vocal ensemble with a difference. ‘It’s aimed towards narrative-driven staged performance, with a lot of singing from memory. I want to tell stories in a more immersive way.’ Watch this space.

Download the score

The score for Surge, commissioned by Choir & Organ in partnership with The Choir of Trinity College Cambridge, is available to download and perform until 30 November 2025.

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