Director of Music - Dr Joseph Fort

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Joseph Fort is College Organist & Director of the Chapel Choir, and Senior Lecturer in Music at King’s College London, where he directs the Choir of King’s College London in the Chapel services, broadcasts, recordings, concerts and international tours.

The Choir’s performances under his direction have been recognised as ‘English choral singing at its best’ (Choir & Organ) and ‘a performance of astonishing intensity and musicality’ (Gramophone).

Recent orchestral conducting includes performances with Britten Sinfonia, the English Chamber Orchestra, the Hanover Band and the London Mozart Players.

Festival conducting appearances across the world include the Festival de México, the White Nights Festival of St. Petersburg, the Montreal Organ Festival, the London Handel Festival, the St Albans International Organ Festival, and the conventions of the American Guild of Organists and the Royal Canadian College of Organists.

Joseph is known for his innovative and creative programming, and his track record of eclectic commissions ranges from new Canticle settings to large-scale works for choir and electric guitar. His expansive discography with Delphian Records has received considerable critical acclaim, including Editor’s Choice and the ‘best new classical albums’ selections in Gramophone. 2023 saw three new releases—Rachmaninoff’s All-Night Vigil, to mark the composer’s 150th anniversary, the premiere recording of Kerensa Briggs’s new Requiem, and a complete disc of Samuel Coleridge-Taylor’s partsongs, many of which were previously unpublished and unrecorded. He broadcasts regularly on BBC Radio 3, and conducts the annual King’s Foundation Carol Concert for Classic FM.

Joseph is also known for his expertise as an arranger and editor, and his chamber arrangement of The Cloud Messenger by Gustav Holst is credited with causing a recent resurgence of performances of that work, both in the UK and overseas. He will conduct the English Chamber Orchestra in the premiere of his new arrangement of The Choral Symphony as part of the #Holst150 celebrations in 2024.

Joseph holds a PhD from Harvard University, and his academic research focuses on eighteenth-century music and dance. His monograph Haydn’s Minuets and Eighteenth-Century Dance will be published by Cambridge University Press in late 2024. He has published in the Eighteenth-Century Music and Die Tonkunst journals, and has chapters in books with Cambridge University Press and Leipzig University Press. Prior to Harvard, he studied at Emmanuel College, Cambridge, where he was the organ scholar, and at the Royal Academy of Music, who in 2017 elected him to their Associateship. In 2021 he was also appointed Director of Music at St Paul’s, Knightsbridge, where he conducts the acclaimed professional choir.