Cowal Music Club present Gordon Cree & Cheryl Forbes

Mezzo-soprano Cheryl Forbes accompanied on the piano by Gordon Cree.

Gordon Cree was born in Ayrshire and was classically trained in piano and singing at the RSAMD (now the RCS).  In a career that has entered its fourth decade, he has established a formidable reputation as both a solo artiste and as a pianist/musical director, as well as being in demand as an arranger, orchestrator and conductor for orchestras such as the BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra, The BBC Concert Orchestra, The Halle Orchestra, The Scottish Festival Orchestra, The Scottish Concert Orchestra, The National Youth Orchestra of Scotland, The Auckland Sinfonia (New Zealand), The Adelaide Symphony Orchestra (Australia), L’Orchestre de l’Opera de Lyon (France) and the Pacific Symphony Orchestra (California).  He has also worked extensively as personal musical director to several well-known artistes, including Ken Dodd, Roy Hudd, Moira Anderson, Kenneth McKellar, Anita Harris and Paul Daniels.

As a solo artiste, he has appeared in concert, cabaret, pantomime and summer season, including three seasons at the Nevele Grande Stardust Room (New York), two summer seasons at Blackpool Winter Gardens, appearances in the The Good Old Days at Leeds’ world-famous City Varieties Music Hall, and is a popular guest entertainer aboard cruise liners.

In 1990 he was awarded Scottish Young Organist of the Year; in 1997 he won the Sir Hugh S. Roberton Prize for Scots Song; in 2009 he was admitted to the British Ring of the International Brotherhood of Magicians; in 2012 he was elected a Fellow of the Guild of Musicians and Singers; and in April 2019 he received the Lifetime Achievement Award from the Scottish Music Hall and Variety Theatre Society, which has been awarded to several legends of Scottish entertainment, including Jack Milroy, Johnny Beattie and Jimmy Logan. 

He is currently the president of the Scottish Showbusiness Benevolent Fund and a custodial trustee of the Pollokshaws Wurlizer.

Cheryl Forbes was born in Falkirk and won scholarships to all five of the major UK music conservatoires at age 17, accepting those from The Guildhall School of Music and Drama, where she studied under Johanna Peters.  She later did postgraduate studies at the RSAMD, before studying under Marilyn Horne in New York.

Past engagements include Songlines at The Edinburgh International Festival, The Sloan’s Opera (Manageress/Wife) for NOISE Opera; Gianni Schicchi (Zita), Madama Butterfly (Suzuki), Eugene Onegin (Larina) and Suor Angelica (Mistress of the Novices) for Opera Bohemia; The Gondoliers (Inez) and covers in Le Nozze di Figaro (Marcellina), Flight (The Older Woman), Nixon in China (Third Secretary, The Gondoliers (Duchess), Utopia Limited (Lady Sophy) and Candide (The Old Lady) for Scottish Opera; Bartok’s Village Scenes for BBC Radio 3; Classics Unwrapped for BBC Radio Scotland; John Rutter’s Feel the Spirit, conducted by Rutter himself; Ravel’s Sheherazade with the Glasgow Sinfonia; Wagner’s Wesendonck Lieder with the Edinburgh Symphony Orchestra; the inaugural Songtellers concert of the St. Andrews Voices festival; Brahms’ Alto Rhapsody with The Edinburgh Singers; Verdi’s Requiem with the Orchestra of Scottish Opera; Verdi’s Requiem with The Edinburgh Singers; Mendelssohn’s Elijah (The Angel) with Dundee Choral Union; as well as concerts, oratorio, recitals, cruise appearances, galas and intimate cabarets across the UK and abroad, alongside television and radio broadcasts, the most recent of which being her surprise musical appearance on BBC 1’s A View from the Terrace, closing the Euros Cup Final episode, and the BBC4 broadcast of D’Oyly Carte and Scottish Opera’s joint production of The Gondoliers.

Cheryl’s hometown honoured her in 1992 with the Falkirk Scroll of Honour and again in 2016 with Falkirk Personality of the Year.  In 2023 she was inaugural winner of The Robert Presley Professional Development Award at the final at Covent Garden.