Matthew Best
English conductor, bass, composer, arranger, editor and teacher Matthew Best was born on 6 February 1957.
He was an opera singer for more than thirty-five years, with a repertoire of over a hundred bass, bass-baritone and baritone roles, singing at all the major UK opera houses.
He also conducted choral and orchestral music in the UK and Europe. He founded the Corydon Singers in 1973 and the Corydon Orchestra in 1991. He made more than thirty recordings for Hyperion Records, particularly of Bruckner, but also including Vaughan Williams' Serenade to Music, Rachmaninov's Vespers and more Bruckner - the Te Deum, Mass in D minor and Requiem.
Matthew Best was also a regular guest conductor of the English Chamber Orchestra, London Mozart Players, Northern Sinfonia, City of London Sinfonia and the BBC Singers. He was music director of the Academy Choir Wimbledon and he taught singing at the Royal Northern College of Music.
As an active composer and arranger, Matthew Best conducted the first performance of his operetta Alice (based on Lewis Carroll's Alice in Wonderland) in Cambridge in February 1979, directed by Nicholas Hytner; with further performances as part of the 1979 Aldeburgh Festival, with a guest appearance by Peter Pears. Matthew produced performing editions for a number of works, including of a rare Bruckner manuscript for inclusion in his Bruckner cycle for Hyperion Records.
Matthew Best (1957-2025). Photo © 2010 Chris Gloag
In his final performance with the Academy Choir on 8 March 2025, he conducted the London Mozart Players in a performance of Brahms' Requiem and Richard Strauss' Metamorphosen.
Matthew Best died on 11 May 2025, aged sixty eight.
Julia Maynard, vocal and opera director at the Intermusica classical music agency, said 'Matthew was one of the finest basses of his generation and an intuitive musician and interpreter of many of the major roles in the bass repertoire. He was a warm, funny, utterly engaging artist, teacher, friend, and a much loved parent, grandfather and husband. Our thoughts are with his most treasured family.'
A selection of articles about Matthew Best
Ensemble. A Grand Sea Symphony? - Giuseppe Pennisi was at a concert performance in Rome of Britten's 'Peter Grimes'
Ensemble. Contemporary Resonance - Grange Park Opera's 'Capriccio', enjoyed by Robert Hugill
Ensemble. Coherently Brilliant - Robert Hugill was at the opening performance of English National Opera's 'Peter Grimes'
CD Spotlight. Striking Beauty - Rachmaninov's Vespers, enjoyed by Howard Smith. '... marvellous tonal exactitude, pellucid control, superb diction ...'