Adrian Partington has been Director of Music at Gloucester Cathedral since 2008. During his years there he has introduced girl choristers, taken the choir to sing in the USA, Canada, South Africa and Sweden, and made several CDs. In May 2019, he took the choristers to sing with the Berlin Philharmonic at the Philharmonie in Berlin. Adrian has been Conductor of the BBC National Chorus of Wales since 1999. Since then, he has prepared them for over a hundred concerts, (including two BBC Proms each year), many of which he has conducted himself. The chorus has made many CDs, two of which have been nominated for Grammy awards. The most recent, which Adrian conducted, is of Stanford’s previously-unperformed orchestral mass Via Victrix 1914–1918.

He has directed four Gloucester Three Choirs festivals, conducting the Philharmonia in many of the great choral classics, including Mahler’s Eighth and Beethoven’s Ninth symphonies, Berlioz’s La damnation de Faust, and Elgar’s oratorios. Adrian enjoys an active career as a guest conductor of orchestras. In recent years he has conducted the Philharmonia at the Royal Festival Hall, at St John’s Smith Square and elsewhere. He has conducted the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra in many venues over the years and will direct them in a series of concerts in 2022. Every year he conducts the BBC National Orchestra of Wales, and has conducted the Royal Northern Sinfonia, the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra, the Orchestra of Welsh National Opera and the Royal Flanders Philharmonic. Adrian was educated at King’s College, Cambridge, where he was organ scholar. He continues to be in demand as an organist; recent engagements include a concerto with the Moscow State Symphony Orchestra in 2019, and recitals in Japan in 2018. He was a soloist at the 2018 BBC Proms.