Biography

Caro Lesemann-Elliott is an Oxford-based early music specialist with a special interest in gender, sexuality, social hierarchies, and urban space in early modern Europe.

Born in Ann Arbor, Michigan, Caro originally trained as a violist before undertaking Bachelor’s in Music from the University of Edinburgh. They completed their master’s degree in Advanced Musical Studies at Royal Holloway University of London (RHUL) in August of 2019, and stayed for their doctoral studies. They achieved their PhD in Musicology in July of 2022, with a dissertation focusing on music cultures at exiled English convents over the 17th and 18th centuries. Following their PhD, they undertook a Bodleian Visiting Fellow in Music in autumn of 2023. They now hold a post-doctoral research assistant position on the Music, Heritage, and Place project, a collaboration between RHUL, Newcastle University, and county record offices across England, funded by the Arts & Humanities Research Council (AHRC) and led by Professor Stephen Rose (RHUL), Professor Kirsten Gibson and Nancy Kerr (Newcastle University). More information can be found here.

Beyond their musicological career, Caro is a keen music director and composer. Over their time as a Bachelor’s student, Caro studied conducting with Greg Batsleer and Russell Cowieson, and undertook a choral conducting internship with the Scottish Chamber Choir, under Iain McLarty. Caro has conducted the Information Services Group Choir, New College Choir at the University of Edinburgh, and the Royal Dick Veterinary School Orchestra. They also assisted as conductor with the Dalkeith Singers, the Edinburgh Practice Choir, the choir of Greyfriars Kirk, and the tour choir of the Edinburgh University Singers (alongside Dr. John Kitchen, MBE). In 2016, Caro started a mixed voice choir called Voces Inauditae, an ensemble dedicated to the integration of lesser known composers into the world of choral music, with an emphasis on gender equality. 

As a composer, Caro has previously studied primarily with Gareth Williams and Peter Nelson, as well as briefly with John Traill. Their compositions have been performed around the country, featuring performances by Christ Church Cathedral Choir, the choir of York Minster, the Scottish Chamber Orchestra, St. John’s Chapel (Oxford), Wolfson College Choir (Oxford), and more. During their Master’s degre, they were the student Composer-in-Residence at the Picture Gallery of Royal Holloway, in conjunction with the New Voices Consort. Their project focused on representations of motherhood, breastfeeding, and poverty in Victorian oil painting, portrayals in Victorian hymnody, and the reception of these portrayals in contemporary English society.

Caro has featured as a singer-scholar on multiple concert projects featuring her research at Christ Church Cathedral Oxford, such as The Life of St Frideswide (October 2019 in collaboration with Korrigan Consort and lutenist Liz Kenny) and ‘To Play King’: Baroque Music of Court and Cloister (August 2021 in collaboration with Sub Rosa). They have also co-led multiple projects at Oxford University, including The Gentlewomen (an opera collage exploring femicide, music, and the 16th century Ferrarese ensemble the Concerto delle Donne, funded by TORCH, February of 2020 ) and the mini-documentary Doors, Dwellings, and Devotion: Recreating an Anchoritic Rite of Enclosure (funded by the John Fell OUP fund in collaboration with the Oxford University Music Faculty, August 2021). They recently started an early music ensemble dedicated to exploring the lives of English Christian women religious: the Basilinda Consort.