2012 Paralympic Games composer appointed as Master of the King’s Music

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Andrew Feinberg

White House Correspondent

The King has appointed a composer of the London 2012 Paralympic Games as Master of the King’s Music.

Errollyn Wallen CBE was also commissioned to compose pieces marking the Golden and Diamond Jubilees of Charles’s mother, Queen Elizabeth II.

The Belize-born 66-year-old, who is also a pianist and singer-songwriter, was the first woman to receive an Ivor Novello Award for classical music and the first black woman to have a work featured in the Proms.

Last year she ranked among the top 20 most performed living classical composers.

Created in the reign of King Charles I, the Master of the King’s Music is an appointment made by the Sovereign and granted to a musician of distinction who has added to the musical life of the United Kingdom and the Commonwealth.

While there are no set duties in the honorary role, the Master will often compose pieces for special royal occasions such as royal weddings, jubilees and coronations if they wish to.

Ms Wallen said: “I am thrilled to accept this royal appointment.

“It will be a privilege and a great honour to serve His Majesty The King, the United Kingdom and the Commonwealth.

“I look forward to championing music and music-making for all.”

Ms Wallen was born in Belize and moved to London aged two, before studying music and composition at Goldsmiths, King’s College London and King’s College, Cambridge.

She was made an MBE by Charles, then the Prince of Wales, in 2007 and subsequently a CBE by the Princess Royal in 2021, both for her services to music.

Ms Wallen succeeds Dame Judith Weir, the first woman to hold the role, who served her fixed term of 10 years having been appointed by Queen Elizabeth II in July 2014.

Speaking to BBC Radio 4’s Desert Island Discs in July, Ms Wallen said she received hundreds of “very abusive” messages after creating a new version of Jerusalem for the Proms.

She said: “The work is dedicated to the Windrush generation and also the fact that it’s little understood that in the colonies, de facto, we live with the music of England.

“And so in Belize, all these hymns are our hymns, and so I’ve also put a little, added an extra sentence, mentioned that we Commonwealth people, we sing with you.”