Southwark Cathedral has announced Helen Smee as its new Director of Music after the sudden passing of former director Ian Keatley last year. She will take up her new position later on this year.

Smee is currently the Director of Frideswide Voices, the girls' choir of Christ Church Cathedral, Oxford. She has been recognised as a committed campaigner for the role of women and girls in church music and in 2018 won the Action for Children’s Arts Members’ Award for her outreach work with young people. She has been an Associate of the Royal Academy of Music since 2022.

Speaking on the appointment of Smee, the cathedral’s precentor Canon Kathryn Fleming mentions the significance: ‘I’m especially excited that she joins us as our first woman Director of Music in the year we celebrate the 25th anniversary of our Girls’ Choir. I’m confident that there will be much joy in our music making in the months to come.’

The Dean of Southwark Dr Mark Oakley says of Smee: 'I am so delighted that Helen is joining us at Southwark Cathedral. She brings a very strong set of gifts with which to develop the profound ministry of our Choirs as they enrich our daily worship and perform widely to various audiences. Music is in the heart of the Cathedral, and we are delighted that Helen is full of energy and experience to direct the Choirs’ amazing skills that serve both our liturgy and our locality.’

Before taking up her role at Christ Church Cathedral, Smee spent a decade in London as a freelance choral director working with music organisations across the UK, including the National Youth Choirs of Great Britain and the Royal School of Church Music. A graduate of the University of Cambridge and the Royal Academy of Music, she was also Director of Music at St Mary the Virgin, Merton Park for 11 years, and co-founded the Voices of London Festival in 2014.

Smee grew up in East London and Southwark Cathedral holds a special significance for her: ‘As the first cathedral into which I ever stepped, it has long been a place which has inspired me, and I look forward with anticipation to making a contribution to its rich and vibrant communal life. I will be following in the footsteps of a great many distinguished and hard-working predecessors, and will strive to build on Southwark's rich musical history and forward-thinking outlook.’

On leaving her current post in Oxford, Smee says: ‘It will be deeply sad to leave