Chris O’Neal

Chris O’Neal has been established as a leading freelance Principal Oboe for over 25 years. He currently holds Principal Oboe positions in the Orchestra of St Johns, the London Mozart Players and the New Queens Hall Orchestra. Previous positions have included the Mercury Ensemble of Ballet Rambert, Kent Opera under Roger Norrington and Ivan Fischer, and the English Sinfonia with whom he recorded Mozart’s Sinfonia Concertante with Sir Charles Groves. He now appears as guest Principal Oboe in symphony and chamber orchestras all over the country and with many other smaller ensembles such as Endymion, the Composers Ensemble and the Albion Ensemble.

He played in the National Youth Orchestra for two years, and studied at the Royal College of Music with Terence MacDonagh. He then won Countess of Munster, Vaughan Williams Trust and Martin Musical Scholarships to continue his studies in London and in Germany with Heinz Holliger. Chris is well known for his expertise in the performance of contemporary and experimental music, and has been oboist in the ground-breaking ensemble Capricorn since 1977. He now plays in the internationally renowned ensemble The Fibonacci Sequence, with whom he is shortly to make a CD of oboe chamber music. He has performed and broadcast as a soloist since 1976, being described by Paul Griffiths in the Financial Times as “an outstanding musician, one who seems to exist within his instrument, rapt in concentration” at his Purcell Room debut recital.

Chris plays on a Howarth XL oboe