Rebecca Ledgard, Director of Education and Participation at Ex Cathedra has recently been celebrated for her work, receiving an Honorary Fellowship of Royal Birmingham Conservatoire.

Each year, Royal Birmingham Conservatoire confers honorary awards to individuals who have provided outstanding service to the Conservatoire or distinction in the music and acting profession. The honorary awards fall into two categories: Honorary Fellowships and Honorary Memberships and Rebecca has been awarded an Honorary Fellowship.

Over 25 years with Ex Cathedra, she has designed and delivered projects and collaborations that bring the joy and the very many benefits of singing to tens of thousands of people every year – with innovative projects for school pupils, children in hospital and much, much more. Huge congratulations Rebecca – the team at Ex Cathedra are very proud of you and the work you do and are all very honoured to work with you!

Rebecca said:

“I am delighted and honoured to be have been awarded an Honorary Fellowship of Royal Birmingham Conservatoire in recognition of my work as Director of Education and Participation for Ex Cathedra. I’ve been leading our projects for 25 years and I love working in Birmingham. I get to work with a wonderful team of people – on our schools projects, Singing Playgrounds, SingMaker, Singing Connections and ChoirMaker, on Singing Medicine our very special project for children and adults in hospital, and with our Academy of Vocal Music. This team is very special, made of wonderful people, who work hard and give of themselves to make a difference to people’s lives through our art form of choral music, and I have thanked them all. We have huge amounts of fun as we work! Long may it continue.

“Singing with others can be life-changing, life-affirming, joyous and fun. Sometimes it might be the only thing that distracts from or alleviates pain or makes us feel a little bit better. It can help us communicate in a range of ways. It connects us to each other and helps us to develop empathy. We need (much) more of it in our schools and communities.”