Powick Community Choir

THE PEOPLE

Tom Wells

... is the choir's Musical Director: he was born and brought up locally. As a boy, he won a choral scholarship to sing in Worcester Cathedral Choir and to study at King’s School, Worcester. At the age of just sixteen he was church organist and choir master at St Mary’s Church in Malvern.

Following university, he was appointed Director of Music at Hillstone School, Malvern. Under his inspirational leadership the school quickly attracted an enviable reputation for its music. In 1990 the school reached the finals of the Barclays Youth Musical Awards and performed in the Queen Elizabeth Hall on the Southbank, London. The following year the school won the BBC Television ‘Song for Christmas’ competition.

In 1992, Tom left Hillstone School to set up his own successful music teaching business, ‘Young Music Makers’.

Tom has written two musicals, ‘Children of the Night’ and ‘City Kids’. The latter performed at Malvern Theatre in 2008. He continues to write and Powick Community Choir regularly showcases his compositions. Tom was one of the founder members of Powick Community Choir and has been its Director of Music since it was established in 2010.

Charles Pavey

One of Powick Community Choir's regular accompanists since 2012, Charles studied at Trinity College of Music in London and Homerton College, Cambridge. He first lived in Malvern in the late nineteen-eighties when he taught at Dyson Perrins CE High School and was organist at The Church of the Ascension. After teaching for seven years in Plymouth he returned to Malvern and is still here.

He now teaches piano, organ and keyboard in the area and is Organist and Choirmaster at Holy Trinity Church in Malvern. He very recently set up Young Chorale, a choir for younger voices, which rehearses in the same place.

He has conducted Malvern Male Voice Choir since 2004, having previously been involved with the conducting or accompanying of Malvern Light Opera Society and Worcester Gilbert & Sullivan Society. He was also the founder conductor of The St Richards Hospice Singers. Beyond teaching, conducting and accompanying, his passions are for rail travel, a little reading and, in the summer, finding the weather and time to enjoy his garden.

Ruth Melhuish

... Is a pianist, flautist and singer who trained as a music therapist in London in 1991. Ruth is Deputy Director of Music Therapy for Mindsong, a Gloucestershire-based charity which specialises in supporting people with dementia through music. She is an experienced piano accompanist and chamber musician who has worked with community choirs in Worcestershire and London. She is a member of Serenata, an eight-voice a cappella group which regularly performs in the Malvern area.