The Chesterton Choral Society started in 1964 as a local community choir in Chesterton, North-East Cambridge.
Selwyn Image has been our Honorary President since February 2018. Rosemary Tice, longstanding choir member, joined as Vice-President in 2016. Martin Harvey held the post of Vice-President from 2016 to 2023. The choir would like to thank him for all his support during that period.
Joint charity events
We have twice teamed up with the Cambridge Concert Orchestra for special charity events. The first was in 2008, a Grand Charity Concert in Cambridge Guildhall, which included ‘Be Still, my Soul’ from Sibelius’ Finlandia, and a selection from ‘My Fair Lady’.
Then again in March 2011, under the title ‘Some Enchanted Evening’, at West Road Concert Hall, when we performed with the orchestra Verdi’s ‘Chorus of the Hebrew Slaves’ from Nabucco, a setting by our then Director of Music Quintus Benziger of Fauré’s Pavane to words by Shakespeare, and a selection of music by Richard Rodgers, as well as each performing other pieces.
Conductors / Directors of Music
Sidney Perrin 1964 and 1965
Donald Faux 1965 and 1966 – 1969
Margaret Owen 1970
Cedric Haslop 1970
Cyril Strevens 1971 – 1978 and 1980
Clive Grant 1978
Peter Stearn 1979
Colin Ashurst 1981 – 1983
Jeremy Wong 1984 – 1988
Jeannette Bannon 1988
Eileen Halstead 1988 – 1998
Greg McKenzie 1999 – 2005
Mark Aldous 2005
Quintus Benziger 2005 – 2022
Owen Elsley 2022 –
Accompanists
Mr P. Jacobs 1964
Donald Faux 1965
Dorothy Garwood 1966 – 2005
Mark Roberts 2006 – 2007
Xiaotian Shi 2008 – 2009
Edward Lilley 2010 – 2012
Peter Luck 2012 – 2013
Joanna Blakeman 2013 – Present
Presidents
Ludovic Stewart 1967 – 1969
Cedric Haslop 1972
Anthony Burch 1973 – 1978
Reg. Smith 1979 – 1982 and 1998
Cyril Strevens 1994 – 1997
Dorothy Garwood 2006 – 2012
Don Flory 2013 – 2018
Selwyn Image 2018 – Present
Chairs
Cedric Haslop 1964 – 1969
Reg. Smith 1970 – 1971, 1976, 1990 – 1995
Mr. L. Fields 1972 – 1973
Mrs E. Mason 1974 – 1976
Mr. Hale 1977
Mrs Hardy 1978 – 1979
Irene Hardy 1980 – 1982
Betty Adams 1983 – 1985
John Dent 1986 – 1988
David Cole 1989
Michael Huss 1996 – 1999
Angela Agarwala 2001 – 2004
Margaret Ingram 2005 – 2007
Ann Bradfield 2008 – 2010
Andrew Wilson 2011 – 2015
Ann Bradfield 2015 – 2020
Jan Baiton 2020 – Present