Geraldine Connor

Geraldine Connor, PhD, MMus, LRSM, DipEd (22 March 1952 – 21 October 2011), was a British ethnomusicologist, theatre director, composer and performer, who spent significant periods of her life in Trinidad and Tobago, from where her parents had migrated to Britain in the 1940s. Her father was actor, singer and folklorist Edric Connor and her mother was theatrical agent and cultural activist Pearl Connor. Geraldine Connor is best known for having written, composed and directed Carnival Messiah, a spectacular work that "married the European classical tradition of oratorio with masquerade and musical inspiration from the African diaspora". For more than 20 years she lived in Skelmanthorpe in Yorkshire, where she went in 1990 as a lecturer at the University of Leeds.

Geraldine Roxanne Connor was born in Paddington, London, into a renowned artistic Trinidadian family and was the elder child of her parents Edric and Pearl Connor. Spending her early childhood with her grandparents, who were both teachers in Trinidad, Geraldine was schooled at Tranquillity Primary (1960–63) and Diego Martin Government Secondary (1963–68). Subsequently she attended Camden School for Girls in London, from 1968 to 1971. She went on to graduate from London's Royal College of Music in 1974, subsequently returning to Trinidad to continue her studies. She earned a diploma of education from Valsayn Teacher Training College (1979–81) and in 1981 became a licentiate of the Royal Schools of Music in classical voice, meanwhile teaching music from 1976 to 1984 at Queen's Royal College, and conducting extramural vocal classes at the University of the West Indies.

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