Mark Wardell

Mark Wardell has been Assistant Organist at Chichester Cathedral since 1997, serving for five of those years as Director of Music at the Prebendal School, the Cathedral Choir's School. He had previously held positions at Royal Holloway College, University of London, St. George's Chapel, Windsor Castle & Christ's Hospital School, Horsham.

His work in Chichester involves him in numerous live BBC broadcasts and recordings, the Southern Cathedrals Festival and Chichester Festivities. The Cathedral Choir at Chichester is one of the widely respected in the country and it is the primary role of the Assistant Organist to accompany the choir in its opus dei - the singing of the daily choral liturgies.

Mark has featured as soloist and accompanist on numerous commercial recordings released through IMP Classics, Carlton, Pickwick, Lammas, Guild and Priory. He enjoys life as a recitalist and has a formidable reputation as one of the foremost British exponents of liturgical improvisation. He has performed throughout Europe, South America and South Africa and has given recitals in most of the major venues in England, including a début performance in St. John's Smith Square and Westminster Abbey.

Chichester's links to Bamberg and Chartres have enabled him to give recitals in both of those cathedrals; his programme in Chartres 2004 concluded with a 20-minute improvisation on the plainsong: Salve Regina.

Increasingly in demand as a choral conductor he is co-founder of the university based Chichester Chorale where he is also Organ Performance Tutor. Mark is a Fellow of the Royal College of Organists.

In his more fanciful moments, he dreams of playing jazz piano in a cocktail bar of a luxury ocean liner!