Helen Ostafew (20th century) is a female British composer, singer, pianist and conductor. Her compositions combine influences from classical, folk, world music as well as film music.
Her works include Ave Maria, which was recorded by the World Choir for Peace for a Sony Classical album, released in September 2020. Her two movement work Endymion was recorded by La Colombe in February 2020 and will be released later this year. Her longest choral work, Requiem for Humanity, brings together world views on life and death with texts from Buddhism, Daoism, Judaism alongside parts of the latin mass and quotes from inspirational leaders like Gandhi. It was released by Dutch chamber choir La Colombe in 2015 and has been performed throughout Europe and on numerous BBC radio 3 shows, including being chosen for BBC Introducing.
She is a soprano in the World Choir for Peace, conducted by Nicol Matt, a new choir with 24 professional singers from around the world. She also sings in the Chamber Choir of Europe doing project tours, workshops and concerts throughout Europe. Recent tours include Austria and Germany with John Rutter for his European Church Music prize and workshops and a Germany tour with Morten Lauridsen, for the Light Eternal CD release. In 2018 she also joined them on a tour to Verona with the Italian Philharmonic Orchestra performing Mozart’s Requiem.
She started on violin and piano aged four studying with Brendan Ashe. Later she graduated with a BMus (Hons) from the University of Leeds, majoring in Classical Singing and minors in Piano and Composition (studying with Philip Wilby). This course included a year at Enschede Music Conservatory in the Netherlands where she studied composition with David Roland.
She later moved to Holland for nine years and during this time she sang with numerous professional project choirs, including Consensus Vocalis and La Colombe, and performed as a soprano soloist. Whilst singing in Consensus Vocalis she performed Mozart’s Die Zauberflöte and Bach’s Matthew Passion at the Amsterdam Concertgebouw and Beethoven’s 9th at the Open Air Festival in Munster, Germany. Prior to that she sang with The Orlando Singers and toured in France and Prague and performed with The Royal Philharmonic and ELO.