CCS President - Dame Felicity Lott

Dame Felicity Lott, affectionately known as 'Flott', was born and educated in Cheltenham and still has family links with the town and with Cheltenham Choral Society, where her cousin is a long-standing member. We were delighted when in 1993 Dame Felicity accepted an invitation to become the society's President. Flott has maintained a kindly interest in CCS's activities despite her very busy engagement schedule, and in April 1999 she sang the soprano part in our world premiere performance of the Requiem commissioned by the choir and composed by our conductor Ian Higginson in honour of Morgan Islwyn Jones, the choir's founder and conductor for 35 years.

A world-renowned soprano, Dame Felicity made her debut at the English National Opera in 1975, as Pamina in Mozart's Magic Flute. She has a long-standing relationship with Glyndebourne and has appeared at all the major opera houses of the world in operas by Mozart, Richard Strauss, Britten and Poulenc. Of recent years she has become increasingly fond of operetta, playing central roles in Lehar's Merry Widow, Johann Strauss's Die Fledermaus and Offenbach's La Belle Helene.

Dame Felicity also has a great international reputation as a concert artist. She has worked with nearly all major orchestras and festivals under such conductors as Carlos Kleiber, Georg Solti, Bernard Haitink, James Levine, André Previn, Neeme Järvi, Klaus Tennstedt, Andrew Davis, Kurt Masur and many more. Her repertoire includes, among others, works by Handel, Bach, Mahler, Brahms, Elgar and Walton.

Flott also has a special love of the song repertoire. She has given enchanting performances of songs by Strauss, Schubert, Schumann and Brahms as well as the French Mélodies, and has a particular affection for British songs, such as those by Britten. Flott's duet recitals with her friend the Irish mezzo-soprano Ann Murray are legendary.

Dame Felicity Lott is married to the actor Gabriel Woolf. They live in Sussex with their daughter Emily.

Dame Felicity Lott's web site

Dame Felicity Lott

"I am very proud to have been involved with Cheltenham Choral Society since the early 1970's! It seems like yesterday-or perhaps the day before! I remember that my mother and father-both CCS members- gave "hospitality" to John Carol-Case in between rehearsal and concert, and were stunned when he refused all of Mum's culinary delights in favour of the "Complan" he had brought with him!

I remember being paralysed with nerves in a performance of Messiah at the Town Hall, in my early days as a soloist, and having a glass of port in the interval. Part 2 went much better-or maybe I just thought it did. I sang with Islwyn Jones, Roger Smith, and Ian Higginson, each of them inspiring and charismatic in different ways. I send my love and best wishes to the Cheltenham Choral Society in this new century. I'm very proud to be your President."

From Felicity Lott