Graham Ross is a composer and conductor of a wide range of repertoire.  He has worked with specialised ensembles and orchestras alike in music from Buxtehude to MacMillan.  He is one of today's youngest published composers, and has had works performed throughout the UK and beyond.  A passionate believer in the unveiling of both unjustly-neglected and newly-penned works, he has given numerous first performances as both a pianist and conductor of a very broad spectrum of composers.

Born in Farnham, Surrey in 1985, he studied at Clare College, Cambridge and at the Royal College of Music, firstly as a Junior Exhibitioner and later as the only student on the postgraduate orchestral conducting course under Peter Stark and Robin O'Neill.  Generously supported by an H.R. Taylor Trust Award for Conducting, he has received tuition from and prepared orchestras for, amongst others, George Hurst, Bernard Haitink, Vladimir Ashkenazy, Roger Norrington, Leif Segerstam, Neil Thomson and the late János Fürst.  At the RCMJD he studied piano with James Lisney and Thalia Myers, alongside lessons in organ and composition, winning four of the RCM prizes, including one for outstanding all-round musicianship.  At Cambridge he worked with many of the major University ensembles, conducting both the University Symphony Orchestra and the University Musical Society, and graduating with the Royalton Kisch Prize for the highest academic grade in College.  He is Principal Conductor of The Dmitri Ensemble; a group which he co-founded in 2004 based around the central core of a string ensemble, in order to explore in particular both rarely performed and newly-composed works.  The Ensemble has been praised for its highly acclaimed performances, including works by Giles Swayne and James MacMillan in the presence of the composers.  At Easter 2008 the Ensemble gave performances in Norwich Cathedral, St. John's, Smith Square and St. Paul's Cathedral as part of a major project, the Passiontide Tour 2008.

In addition to his work with The Dmitri Ensemble he guest conducts numerous ensembles and orchestras, most recently British Police Symphony Orchestra, Aldworth Philharmonic Orchestra, Ealing Symphony Orchestra, New Perspectives Ensemble, Hertfordshire Schools Symphony Orchestra, and the Sinfonia of Cambridge.  At Easter 2007 he made his opera debut conducting the Choir and Orchestra of London in The Magic Flute in Jerusalem, the first ever fully-staged operatic production on the West Bank.  In 2008 he made his debut at the Innsbrucker Festwochen der Alte Musik, and worked as chorus master to Ivor Bolton and the Mozarteum Orchester Salzburg.  He holds a conducting scholarship with the London Symphony Chorus, and in addition he is also Musical Director of both Kingston Choral Society and Concordia Chamber Choir.  He is passionately committed to music education and outreach projects, and works regularly in this capacity for the Wigmore Hall, RCM Junior Department, Aurora Orchestra and Children's Music Workshops (English Pocket Opera Company).

As a composer he studied principally with Giles Swayne, and with David Sutton-Anderson and Timothy Salter.  He has had works performed at numerous concerts and festivals in both live and broadcast performances, including as far afield as Slovenia, Kuwait, Israel and Lebanon.  He has had performances given by, amongst others, the National Youth Choir of Great Britain, Aurora Orchestra, Westminster Choir College (Princeton, USA), The Place Contemporary Dance School, Sounds Positive, O Duo, The Knack Singers, organist James McVinnie, Phantasmagoria Vocal Ensemble, Choir of Clare College, Royal College of Music JD Chamber Choir, English Voices, Aquilo Wind Ensemble, St Pancras Parish Church, St Stephen's Gloucester Road, The Syred Consort, Choir of London and The Dmitri Ensemble.  In 2006 he won the National Youth Choir of Great Britain’s inaugural composition competition, and was subsequently published by Novello & Co whilst still an undergraduate.  In 2008 he featured in a podcast hosted by The Times in connection with the BBC Proms.  He has forthcoming publications for Oxford University Press, Associated Board of the Royal Schools of Music and Gonzaga Music Publishers.  He is an spnm (Society for the Promotion of New Music) shortlisted composer, and his works are housed in the British Music Information Centre (BMIC).

At Easter 2008 he conducted The Dmitri Ensemble in a recording of a disc of works by James MacMillan for the Naxos label, due for release in 2009.  Other forthcoming conducting engagements include projects with the Sinfonia of Cambridge, Tallis Chamber Orchestra and the Aalborg Symfoniorkester, Denmark.   New commissions include a clarinet concerto for Aldworth Philharmonic Orchestra (Reading Town Hall, January 2009), Farnham Youth Choir (Farnham Festival, March 2009), a string quartet for The Solstice Quartet (May 2009), and a major 20-minute orchestral work for the BBC Concert Orchestra and Indian instrumentalists (Royal Festival Hall, May 2009).

Graham is generously supported by a BBC Performing Arts Bursary, as one of four recipients of this prize in 2006.