Karl Jenkins

Join Welsh multi-instrumentalist and composer, Sir Karl Jenkins, as he celebrates his 80th birthday with a performance of his record-breaking mass The Armed Man, along with a selection of his other works.

Raised in Penclawdd and educated at Gowerton Grammar School, he read music at Cardiff University and the Royal Academy of Music, London, before starting his early career as a jazz-rock musician, joining progressive rock band Soft Machine in 1972.

As a composer, his breakthrough came in 1995 with the global "cross-genre" phenomenon Adiemus, paving the way for his best-known work, The Armed Man: A Mass for Peace - which has seen over 3,000 performances since its millennium premiere - his recording has the unique status of having been in the UK Classical charts for 18 years.

Resisting categorisation, his style and integrity has transcended musical boundaries over the years: recording sessions with Elton John, George Harrison & Andrew Lloyd Webber; jazz at Ronnie Scott’s Club; jazz-rock-fusion with Soft Machine; award-winning ad soundtracks (Levis, Boots No7, Audi); scoring a Kiefer Sutherland movie; cast-away on the iconic BBC "Desert Island Discs"; featured by Melvyn Bragg on the seminal ITV South Bank Show; and awarded the Freedom of the Cities of London and Swansea.