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Jim Clements was born in 1983 in the tiny village of Lower Stoke, which sits in North Kent, between the rivers Thames and Medway.
In 1991, he became a chorister in Rochester Cathedral, and it was during the following five years in the choir that he became interested in composition; his first choral piece, Solomon's Prayer (1 Kings 8: xxiii), was sung by the boys of the choir at evensong on 23rd May, 1995. At the age of thirteen, Jim was awarded both choral and music scholarships to Tonbridge School, where he continued to sing (as an alto, then bass, then back up to tenor) in the chapel choir. His first composition for full symphony orchestra, Leda and the Swan (inspired by W.B. Yeats' eponymous poem), was performed in concert in 2001. Following a gap year working at St. Paul's Cathedral School in London, he began reading music at Manchester University, where he received his first formal instruction in compositional technique, tutored by Camden Reeves and Philip Grange. He also found a tenorial berth in the university's chamber choir, sang occasionally in Manchester Cathedral choir, and founded two close-harmony groups, thus satisfying his appetite for all things choral. It was here that he wrote his first song cycle, Concerning the Inevitable, for fellow undergraduate, Marcus Farnsworth. Shortly before graduating with a first-class degree in 2005, Jim was approached by a fledgling vocal ensemble, VOCES8, with a view to writing a few bespoke arrangements; two years and several commissions later, Voces8 appointed Jim its Arranger in Residence, and has since performed more than seventy of his arrangements in over a thousand concerts across the globe, and recorded them for posterity on multiple CDs, resulting in nominations for three CARA awards. |
Following his graduation, Jim decided to pursue his interest in singing and writing music. He moved to Worcester in 2006 to sing as a lay clerk in the cathedral choir, and then to London in 2008 for a post in Southwark Cathedral choir. From July 2009, he sang for seven years as a full-time member of the GRAMMY-nominated early music vocal ensemble, Stile Antico. Currently, he deputises regularly in several church and chamber choirs, including the BBC Singers, Cambridge Singers, Dmitri Ensemble, Ex Cathedra, Musica Beata, Philharmonia Voices, and Stile Antico. He continues to write arrangements for VOCES8 and original compositions for anyone who wishes to sing them; both arrangements and originals are published by Edition Peters.