Choir of Trinity College, Cambridge

The Choir of Trinity College, Cambridge is a mixed choir whose primary function is to sing choral services in the Tudor chapel of Trinity College, Cambridge. The choir has taken various forms since its foundation, and has existed in its present form since 1982 when, shortly after the admission of women to the college, female voices were used for the first time for the choir’s top lines.

Three regular services are sung per week in full University Term, and the choir sings Latin grace from the minstrels' gallery in the college’s Great Hall at a number of feasts.

In addition, the choir undertakes projects outside term-time such as recordings, concerts, radio broadcasts and tours.

The choir typically numbers between 25 and 35 members, most of whom are students in Trinity College.

In January 2011, Gramophone named the choir the fifth best choir in the world.

The director of music is Stephen Layton, who succeeded Richard Marlow in September 2006. By statute, the Director of Music is also a Category A fellow of the college.

Trinity College's choral associations date back to the establishment of King's Hall by Edward II in 1317 (Chaucer's "Solar Hall" in The Canterbury Tales). This College, incorporated by Edward III in 1337, was amalgamated with an adjacent early 14th century foundation, Michaelhouse, when Henry VIII created Trinity in 1546. From the time of Edward II, Chapel Royal choristers, on leaving the Court, customarily entered King's Hall to continue their academic studies, alongside other undergraduates training for service in the royal administration.

The constitution of the medieval chapel choir remains obscure, but the choral foundation which Mary Tudor established in 1553 (ten choristers, six lay clerks, four priests, an organist, and a schoolmaster) survived essentially unchanged for over 300 years. Among the musicians associated with the choir during this time were the Tudor composers Thomas Preston, Robert White and John Hilton the elder; Robert Ramsey was organist just before the English Commonwealth; the lutenist and writer Thomas Mace was a lay clerk for around 70 years from 1635; and Thomas Attwood Walmisley was organist in the early 19th century.

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