Our staff is carefully selected to create a professional, positive, and nurturing experience for each girl. Many staff are in residence at the Choir School throughout the course and participate in all aspects of the course (except rehearsals) with the girls, including meals and outings. We strive to build a sense of community among one another, create a high-level musical experience and encourage an environment of kindness.
2022 Course Staff
Katherine Dienes-Williams, Music Director
We are thrilled to welcome back Katherine Dienes-Williams, in 2022 as Music Director. Ms. Dienes-Williams, MA, BMus, LTCL, FRCO, Hon ARSCM, Hon GCM was appointed Organist and Master of the Choristers at Guildford Cathedral in January 2008 following six years as Director of Music at the Collegiate Church of St Mary, Warwick. She was the first-ever female member to be elected to the Cathedral Organists’ Association, and on her appointment to Guildford, became the first ever woman to hold such a post in the Church of England. She is also the Musical Director of the Winchester-based chamber choir, Southern Voices.
Katherine was born and educated in Wellington, New Zealand and studied for a BA in Modern Languages and a BMus at Victoria University, Wellington. Katherine was Organ Scholar at Wellington Cathedral from 1988 to 1991 when she was appointed Assistant Organist there.
Katherine came to England in 1991 to take up the post of Organ Scholar at Winchester Cathedral and Assistant Organist at WinchesterCollege. She has also held posts as Organist and Assistant Director of Music at the Metropolitan Cathedral of Christ the King, Liverpool, Assistant Organist and Director of the Cathedral Girls’ Choir at Norwich Cathedral prior to moving to Warwick as Director of Music at the Collegiate Church of St. Mary.
She is a Council member of the Royal College of Organists and a trustee of the Organists’ Charitable trust and is regularly asked to be a guest choral workshop leader for the Royal School of Church Music in the UK, South Africa, the USA, Canada and Australia. Katherine has given several organ recitals in the United Kingdom, New Zealand, Germany, U.S.A., Bermuda, the Netherlands, South Africa, Australia, Spain and Singapore. She has performed as organ soloist with the Royal Liverpool Philharmonic Orchestra, the Hallé, the City of London Sinfonia and the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra and has taught a masterclass at the Curtis Institute of Music, Philadelphia, USA. She is also active as a composer, having received several commissions both in the UK, the USA and New Zealand.
Katherine holds a Master of Arts in Music and Liturgy from Leeds University. She features both as organist and choral conductor on several recordings. She is in demand as a choral workshop leader in the UK, the USA and several other European countries. In January 2016, she directed the RSCM Australia/NZ summer school in Canberra, Australia. In 2017 she has directed the St. Thomas’ girl choristers’ course at St. Thomas’ Church Fifth Avenue, New York, USA and the RSCM Lincoln Cathedral summer girl choristers’ course. She has recently been elected into her secondary school’s ‘Hall of Fame’ as an outstanding alumnus (Samuel Marsden Collegiate School, Wellington, New Zealand).
Other interests include languages (her BA is in French and German), travel, reading and fitness. She is a Knight of the Grand Order of Vitéz and a Knight of the Order of St. Ladislau (Hungary).
Katherine is married to Patrick Williams, and they have a daughter, Hannah, who is currently studying Music at Cambridge University.
Jacqueline Horner-Kwiatek, Vocal Coach
Dr. Jacqueline Horner-Kwiatek, mezzo-soprano, was a member of the world-renowned vocal quartet Anonymous 4 from 2000-2016. She recorded twelve award-winning CDs with the group, including American Angels which twice topped Billboard’s classical music charts, and The Cherry Tree, one of the top selling classical CDs of 2010. Anonymous 4′s performance of the Irish lament “Caoineadh” on Christopher Tin’s album Calling All Dawns, with Jacqueline as featured soloist, led to a Grammy for Best Classical Music Crossover Album. She is the Founder and Artistic Director of ModernMedieval, an organization created to promote performance and education in early and new music. It includes ModernMedieval Voices, a female vocal ensemble which fosters collaborative projects featuring early music in conjunction with music from later periods and newly commissioned works.
She has a reputation as a versatile and accomplished soloist, specializing in early and new music on both the concert and operatic stage. She has collaborated with many composers including Judith Weir, Karlheinz Stockhausen, Luciano Berio, Orlando Gough, Richard Einhorn, Andrew Toovey, Andrew Lovett, Louis Conti, Daniel Thomas Davis, Gregory Spears, Phil Kline and David Lang, singing with such distinguished new music ensembles such as Ensemble Modern Frankfurt, Ensemble Intercontemporain Paris, Singcircle, Continuum, Washington Square Contemporary Music Society, Ixion, Dogs of Desire, Ekmeles, S.E.M. Ensemble and the Locrian Chamber Ensemble.
She has appeared as a guest soloist with many early music ensembles both in Europe and the U.S., including The Washington Bach Consort DC, The Sixteen, The Bach Sinfonia, Carmel Bach Festival, St. Thomas Church NYC, Bach Vespers at Holy Trinity Lutheran NYC, Baltimore Consort, Bach Festival of Philadelphia, Armonia Nova, The Folger Consort, Parthenia, Sonnambula, Abendmusik, Hudson Chorale, and Fairfax Choral Society. Repertoire includes the mezzo/alto solos in Bach Magnificat, St Matthew and St John Passions, B Minor Mass and many cantatas, Vivaldi’s Gloria, Handel’s Messiah and Dixit Dominus, Durufle and Faure Requiem, Paine Mass in D and songs from the Elizabethan era for Parthenia’s acclaimed program When Music and Sweet Poetry Agree. She is a frequent soloist with Distinguished Concerts International New York, performing Calling All Dawns at Carnegie Hall and David Geffen Hall.
Jacqueline is also a voice teacher. She is a member of the Performance Faculty at Princeton University where she teaches voice, directs the Early Music Princeton Singers, and is Associate Director of the Certificate program in Consort Singing.. She gives residencies and vocal masterclasses at universities all over the US and offers seminars on vocal pedagogy to student composers, collaborating with them to develop and perform new pieces for the voice. She also lectures on vocal pedagogy and gives Ensemble Technique workshops with groups ranging from trios to choirs with 100+ members. She holds degrees from Queens University Belfast, Teacher’s College Columbia University and has a D.M.A. from The Juilliard School.
Rebecca Kellerman-Filsell, Co-Director
Rebecca Kellerman-Filsell joins the Saint Thomas Girl Chorister Course after spending the previous 20+ years singing and teaching music in the Washington, DC metro area. She is the Music Associate for Children and Youth at Saint Thomas Church where she directs their new parish children’s choir, the Noble Singers, which includes boy and girl choristers ages 6-12. This new choir sings and leads worship at the 9am Mass.
Whilst in Washington, DC, Rebecca frequently appeared as soloist and chorister with The Washington Bach Consort, Opera Lafayette, The Washington National Cathedral and various other choral groups in the DC metro area and beyond. An avid choral singer, Rebecca served as section leader and Music Associate at Saint Alban’s Church, Washington, DC, where she reignited their children’s music ministry with a RSCM chorister program. She also served as vocal coach for the chorister program at Saint Paul’s K St. from 2014-2019. Her private studio includes students of all ages and abilities, but she specializes in teaching young singers. Rebecca holds both a Bachelor’s and a Master’s degree in Music from Shenandoah University, where she studied voice performance/pedagogy and music education. Rebecca lives in the heart of Manhattan with her husband, two sons and a spotted gecko.
Margaret White, Co-Director
During the school year Margaret is a full-time member of Saint Thomas Choir School’s residential faculty, teaching Latin to grades 6-8 and English to grade 5. A lifelong New Yorker, Margaret attended the all-girls’ Brearley School for thirteen years and then Princeton University, where she earned her A.B. in English with minors in Theater and American Studies.
She began her career as a substitute teacher in all grades and several subjects at independent schools across Manhattan. After three years teaching middle school Latin and English at Marymount School of New York, she temporarily relocated to Massachusetts to earn her Ed.M. in Learning and Teaching at Harvard University. As a Choir School faculty member, a product of all-girls’ education, and a trained vocal musician herself, she is uniquely positioned to help oversee the next stage of the Girl Chorister Course.
Outside of the classroom, Margaret enjoys reading and writing stories for young people (she also holds an MFA in Writing for Children and Young Adults) and spending time with her dog, Blaze. Her other interests include musical theater, baking, board games, and learning new languages.
Jeremy Filsell, Course Organist
Jeremy Filsell is the current Organist and Director of Music at Saint Thomas Church Fifth Avenue. As a U.S. Citizen and a British Citizen, he is uniquely placed to lead the Saint Thomas Choir of Men and Boys, which owes much of its existence to the great English choral tradition since T. Tertius Noble was invited to found the Saint Thomas Choir School in 1919.
Jeremy Filsell has been hailed as one of only a few virtuoso performers as both pianist and organist. He has appeared as a solo pianist in Russia, Scandinavia, New Zealand and throughout the USA and UK. His concerto repertoire encompasses Bach, Mozart and Beethoven through to Shostakovich, John Ireland and Rachmaninov. He has recorded the solo piano music of Herbert Howells, Bernard Stevens, Eugene Goossens and Johann Eschmann and recently released were discs of Litaize’s organ music, Rachmaninov’s first and second piano concertos and two of French Mélodies accompanying Michael Bundy (baritone). Jeremy is on the international roster of Steinway Piano Artists and has recorded for BBC Radio 3, USA, and Scandinavian radio networks in solo and concerto roles.
His discography comprises more than 35 solo recordings. Gramophone magazine commented on the series of 12 CDs comprising the première recordings of Marcel Dupré’s complete organ works for Guild that it was ‘one of the greatest achievements in organ recording’. In 2005, Signum released a 3-disc set of the six organ symphonies of Louis Vierne, recorded on the 1890 Cavaillé-Coll organ in St. Ouen, Rouen, BBC Radio 3’s Discs of the Week.
He has taught at universities, summer schools, and conventions in both the UK and USA and has served on international competition juries in England and Switzerland. Recent solo engagements have taken him across the USA and UK and to Germany, France, Finland, Sweden, Norway, Australia and New Zealand. In North America, he concertizes under the auspices of Philip Truckenbrod Concert Artists.
Brought up as a chorister in Coventry, England, Jeremy Filsell was charged with the direction of a men & boys choir there while still a High School student. Studying with Nicolas Kynaston and Daniel Roth, he read for a first degree as Organ Scholar of Keble College, Oxford University before completing graduate studies in piano at the Royal College of Music in London. He was awarded a Ph.D. in Musicology at Birmingham Conservatoire/BCU for research on aesthetic and interpretative issues in the music of Marcel Dupré.
A former Assistant Organist of Ely Cathedral and Director of Music at St. Luke’s Chelsea in London, before moving to the USA in 2008, Jeremy held Academic and Performance lectureships at the Royal Academy of Music in London and the Royal Northern College of Music in Manchester, and was a lay clerk in the Queen’s choir at St. George’s Chapel, Windsor Castle. You can read more about Jeremy at his website: www.jeremyfilsell.com.
