About me

The background

I’m lucky enough to have a very varied career as singer, composer, arranger and record producer. It all began when I was six years old, studying the violin at the Royal Academy of Music. After years of practice and study I went on to read music at Trinity College, Cambridge on a choral scholarship and then on to the Guildhall School of Music and Drama from which I graduated with distinction. I rather naively thought that was it and I’d walk into lots of work but then followed several years of auditions, working my way up from a mezzo in the chorus to covering (understudying) and finally to my first roles.

The first album, Venezia

Four years ago, whilst working as a jobbing opera singer and writing music for tv, I sent a demo of songs to Universal which I’d written and recorded with James, my partner. They loved the songs but said they had just signed a blonde soprano who was very young and beautiful and although she had no experience of singing professionally, they thought she was  a marketers dream and if we would allow her to use the songs, we could produce the album. She was Katherine Jenkins. I’m not proud, was very happy to give her the songs and produce the album. I was right to be pragmatic, it opened doors for me with other record companies and a year later, I came to the attention of record company executives at Sony BMG – and was signed to record my debut album, Venezia, released in 2006. Classic FM made it their Record Of The Week and my voice even inspired renowned chocolatiers Hotel Chocolat to design and name the “Juliette” chocolate. Brilliant!

Domestic Diva

My greatest achievement in life is becoming a Mum to my 7 year old daughter, Anna and 8 month old twins. It has taken years of fertility treatment and rather more money than I care to mention out loud but I now have the family I always dreamt of.  I was nicknamed the Domestic Diva by the Daily Mail after they published my diary which detailed my mad attempts to juggle my career with my family – as well as making my own concert dresses and growing my own vegetables – with varying degrees of success!

Opera Singing

My operatic and concert career has led me to perform with many orchestras all over the world, including the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra, Philharmonia,, CBSO and Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra, although most of all I love the variety of sharing a stage with musicians as wide ranging as Sir Simon Rattle and Meatloaf! I’ve also sung on the soundtracks to Lord of the Rings, Harry Potter and Star Wars- the Phantom Menace and I regularly sing the national anthem at Wembley, Twickenham and the Millenium Stadiums.  I was very proud to be asked to perform at the United Nations MDG Awards launch in Canada and was the soloist in the BBC Last Night of the Proms with the BBC Philharmonic in a live television link up from Salford.

Record Producing and songwriting

In addition to my singing, I compose and produce as one half of the partnership Morgan Pochin. TV credits include the EMMY/BAFTA award-winning Kumars at No.42 and According to Bex (BBC1). I wrote and produced Katherine Jenkins’ No.1 album Premiere, which was nominated for a Classical Brit and have worked with artists as diverse as Julian Lloyd Webber  and Elton John. I’ve orchestrated for groups as wide ranging as Glyndebourne and Fat Boy Slim and recently produced the album Songs Without Words for Classic FM which made the top 20 of the pop charts.

EP and new album

My new album will be released later this year but you can hear a taster of 4 of the songs from it by ordering the EP on the homepage of this blog or from my website. Would love to receive your comments about it.