Declan Costello is a tenor with Ex Cathedra. His adult singing career started at St John’s College, Cambridge, where he was a countertenor. As time has gone on, he has dropped the “counter” to become merely a tenor. His first undergraduate degree (at St John’s) was in music, and after graduating he went on to study medicine at Imperial College. He undertook specialist training in ear, nose and throat (ENT) surgery. He was appointed as a consultant at the Queen Elizabeth Hospital in Birmingham in 2010, and worked there for eight years before moving to Wexham Park in Slough. In his work life, he has published a number of books, research papers and chapters, and he lectures regularly around the UK and overseas.
As well as singing with Ex Cathedra, he is a regular member of the Holst Singers, and he does some deputising in his home city of Oxford.
During the pandemic, he was involved with a large scale research project that evaluated how much aerosol was emitted during singing, speaking and other tasks. The results of the research were fed back to the government; it was largely as a result of this work that performing was able to restart, just a few months after singing in public had been forbidden.
1. How long have you been a member of Ex Cathedra and why did you join?
I first joined the group in in 2017. I was working in Birmingham at the time and was keen to do some singing… Ex Cath’s reputation was obviously superb, and I was delighted when Jeffrey said I could join the group. I have had some fabulous experiences with the choir, and the atmosphere is wonderful.
2. What does a typical day look like for you?
In my day job I am an ear, nose and throat surgeon – I sub-specialise in voice problems, so I spend much of my time looking after singers. My days are separated into either working in clinic (seeing outpatients, looking at patients’ vocal cords, and working out what’s wrong) or working in the operating theatre (performing operations on vocal cords).
It’s a great honour to be able to help singers when they run into trouble: when they are having vocal difficulties, I think singers like to be able to see a clinician who understands the nuances of singing and repertoire, and who has an appreciation of the pressures of performing.
And away from the singers, some of the most rewarding cases are when we restore the voices of people who are receiving palliative care – people with certain types of cancer can sometimes become “aphonic” (with no voice whatsoever), and we are able to perform a procedure in clinic that can rapidly give someone their voice back. Helping someone to be able to communicate for the last few weeks of their life is incredibly satisfying.
3. If you could choose to perform any piece you have performed with Ex Cathedra again, what would it be, and why?
Actually, it would be the Rachmaninoff Vespers – tonight’s piece! Jeffrey has a wonderful way of shaping the music, and the interpolation of the bells makes it supremely atmospheric.
Until a few months ago, I hadn’t done one of the “Christmas Music by Candlelight” concerts, so it was great to travel to Wolverhampton in December 2025 for one of those gigs. The setting was fabulous, the lighting gave the whole event a really intimate feeling. The most stressful bit is the fact that the group is constantly moving around the church!
4. What’s your musical guilty secret?
I don’t know about a “guilty” secret, but I’m slightly obsessed with Joby Talbot’s Path of Miracles, which was commissioned by Tenebrae. I have seen it performed a few times, and it’s equally mesmerising and moving each time. I also have a bit of a soft spot for Eric Whitacre – the Polyphony disc from the 1990s (Cloudburst) was a real revelation – it was a whole new sound world at the time, and has obviously paved the way for many similar pieces since then.
In my spare time, I like to clear my head by running. I try to get out a few times a week. When I don’t do enough exercise, I sleep badly and get very grumpy – so my wife frequently sends me out into the country lanes, perhaps more for her benefit more than mine!