Biography - Nick Gale

Nick Gale was born in 1975 and educated at Belmont Abbey School, where he was organ scholar and a pupil of Dom Alan Rees OSB. He graduated from the University of Oxford where he was organ scholar at Lady Margaret Hall.

He spent a number of years as Director of Chapel Music at Ratcliffe College in Leicestershire before being appointed Director of Music at St George’s Cathedral, Southwark, and Head of Academic Music at the London Oratory School. In July 2009 he left the Oratory School to concentrate on studies, directing chant workshops and his role as Director of Music at St George's Cathedral.

He has also studied Gregorian Chant at the world-famous Monastery of St Pierre de Solesmes in France under Dom Daniel Saulnier, Head of Chant Studies at the Pontifical Institute of Liturgical Music in Rome. He is an honorary fellow of and secretary to the Academy of St Cecilia.

Nick Gale has directed Gregorian scholas across Europe, recent highlights including directing Solemn Mass (ordinary form) and Solemn Vespers and Benediction at Westminster Cathedral, Solemn Vespers and Benediction in Cologne Cathedral and Solemn High Mass (extraordinary form) at the FSSP Church of Ss. Trinita dei Pellegrini in Rome. Recent tours include Germany, Italy and the US. He has also conducted choirs for a number of Solemn High masses for the Latin Mass Society of England and Wales.

Courses Nick has directed include a week-long residential school for the Panel of Monastic Musicians at Quarr Abbey, day courses for parishes in the Archdioceses of Southwark and Cardiff and the Dioceses of Brentwood and Arundel and Brighton.  He has given workshops in Brentwood, Shrewsbury, Lancaster, Southwark and Dublin cathedrals and a master class for the Schola Gregoriana of Belfast, as well as various courses for the RSCM and RSCM Ireland.

Nick organised the Academy of St Cecilia’s International Gregorian Chant Symposium in London in 2006, assisted by Dr Naji Hakim, Dom Daniel Saulnier and Prof. Nick Sandon, and the Academy’s next Gregorian Chant Study Day, assisted by Sr Bernadette OSB and Prof. John Caldwell of the University of Oxford, at St Cecilia’s Abbey in July 2009. He also taught the chant component of the Academy’s Choral Workshop, led by Jeremy Summerly of the Royal Academy of Music, in June 2011, and is preparing for a second study day for the University of Oxford Chant Group, the Schola Abelis.  He has taught residential courses for the Gregorian Chant Network in Ardingly School and the Oratory School, Reading, and is an advisor to the Network, which is affiliated to the Latin Mass Society of England and Wales.

Nick has worked with a number of choirs and scholas, including St George’s Cathedral Choir, of which he is director, and the London Oratory Schola, of which he was until recently assistant director. He has broadcast on BBC Radio 4 and BBC 1 television. He is a practising Roman Catholic and an ascribed member of the Institute of Charity.

For further details please contact Nick Gale.