Alice Pratley	violin	Michael Goldthorpe	tenor	Aleksander Szram	piano

THE BOLD BALLADIERS is a varied group of professional musicians founded in 1995 by Michael Goldthorpe to keep alive the best of Victorian and Edwardian popular music through live performances, recordings and broadcasts. Their community outreach programme also takes them throughout mainland Britain visiting schools, hospitals, residential and nursing homes.

Alice Pratley was born in London. Whilst at Haberdasher Askes School for Girls, she studied at the Royal Academy of Music Junior Department, and later at the Royal College of Music, London. She has since played as a soloist and with many orchestras and ensembles including the BBC Concert Orchestra, Beethoven Philharmonic, Brunel Ensemble, Graffiti Classics, and London Soloists. She plays in a wide variety of styles from Classical to Pop and has appeared on television, in films and recordings. This is reflected in her recent work with English Heritage Orchestra, Top of the Pops, Bridget Jones Diary and a recording of the album Casanova with Divine Comedy.

Aleksander Szram has just graduated at Trinity College of Music, London where he studied with Douglas Finch, following two years with Anthony Green. Aleksander entered Trinity on a Wilner Scholarship, in his first year winning the Leonard Smith duo prize for strings and piano. Since then, he has won prizes in competitions for piano, chamber music, vocal accompaniment and composition, and given World Premieres of works by Dai Fujikura, Harris Kittos, Anthony Green and Danny Ledesma. In 1998, Aleks came second in the inaugural PACA Piano Competition. He has performed at many major venues in the UK, as well as across Europe and in Taiwan.

Michael Goldthorpe was born in York and studied at Trinity College Cambridge, King's College London, and The Guildhall School of Music and Drama London. He has made many records and has appeared on radio and television throughout Western Europe, America and the Far East. He made his debut with The Royal Opera Company Covent Garden in 1980 in Donizetti's Lucrezia Borgia, a televised performance later released on video. He has also sung much French Baroque repertoire live and on recordings for The English Bach Festival. Following a life-long interest in light music, he was in 1994 awarded a Wingate Scholarship to research, catalogue, record and perform 19th century popular ballads. This led to the formation of The Bold Balladiers.