Baritone Tom Mole wins the 2021 Gold Medal at Guildhall School of Music and Drama

Rossini: La cenerentola - Thomas Mole
British Youth Opera 2019 (Photo Robert Workman)

Congratulations to baritone Tom Mole who won the Guildhall School of Music and Drama's 2021 Gold Medal last week. The prize is awarded to singers and instrumentalists in alternate years, and 2021 was the turn of the singers, with the final taking place on Thursday 6 May and being broadcast on Guildhall School’s website on Saturday 8 May (and available on-line for two weeks).

The final featured Tom Mole, tenor Thando Mjandana, soprano Laura Lolita Perešivana and soprano Olivia Boen, and each singer performed a group of songs (accompanied by Inês Costa, Josh Ridley and Toby Hession) and a group of arias (accompanied by the Guildhall Symphony Orchestra, conductor Natalie Murray Beale).

Tom Mole's winning programme consisted of songs by Rachmaninov, Wolf and Finizi plus Moss' The Floral Dance, and then arias from Stravinsky's The Rake's Progress, Bizet's Carmen (the Toreador's Song),  and Verdi's Macbeth. The judging panel consisted of Jonathan Vaughan (Guildhall School's Vice Principal and Director of Music), Huw Humphries (Head of Music at the Barbican), Gweneth Ann Rand (soprano and alumna of Guildhall School), Jordan de Souza (conductor) and Natalie Murray Beale (the evening's conductor).

We have caught Mole on a number of occasions. Last year he featured in the Guildhall School's on-line performances including as Aeneas in Purcell's Dido and Aeneas,  and in 2019 we saw him as Alidoro in British Youth Opera's production of Rossini's La Cenerentola [see my review] and as Horn in Opera Holland Park's Young Artist performance of Verdi's Un ballo in maschera [see my review]. And we look forward to seeing him in plenty of future performances.

Mole is a Jerwood Young Artist at Glyndebourne where he will be making his festival debut this Summer as Kuligin in Janacek's Kát’a Kabanová.