The Karl Daymond Bursary Fund
After the untimely death in 2017 of our founder Karl Daymond, all four of Karl’s Singing Clubs (as they then were): Usk, Chepstow Castle, Forest of Dean, and Duke’s Yard, decided to jointly collect money for an on-going bursary fund to help young musicians starting out on their careers. In addition to the bursary fund, money raised at concerts and events over the following years has been donated to charities close to Karl’s heart: Chepstow Mencap, St David’s Hospice, the Welsh Refugee Council, Kaleidoscope, the Usk Mayor’s Charities, and Community Music Chepstow (an initiative that supports music lessons for local children who otherwise might not be able to afford them).
Karl had initiated the bursary project himself, and the first recipient, in 2012, was one of Karl’s students, local boy Michael Lowe. Michael is now successfully carving out a career for himself as a professional singer.
The Bursary Fund today
After Karl’s passing, the Singing Club (now led by Karl’s old school friend Jayne Thomas) continued to raise money to put towards a bursary. To help us find a suitable recipient for the bursary we approached The Royal Welsh College of Music and Drama in Cardiff. In 2023 they found us not one but two amazingly talented young singers, Tomos Owen Jones and Maisie O’Shea, who were each awarded £1,000 from the Bursary Fund.
That was meant to be the end of the bursary, however members of the Singing Club were keen for Karl’s legacy to continue and so in February 2024 Jayne set up the Chepstow Coffee Concerts to continue the Karl Daymond Bursary. We are extremely grateful to all the performers who give of their time and talent to raise money to support the future generation of musicians. These monthly concerts also support the Friends of St Mary’s Priory.
Here is a link to the whole of the 2025 Bursary Concert in St Marys, Chepstow, featuring the Singing Club, Chepstow Chatelaines, Chepstow Male Voice Choir, Velha Bataria Samba Band, and bursary recipient Clara Greening. (1h 53m):
Recent Bursary Recipients:
Clara Greening (Bursary Recipient 2025)
Welsh soprano Clara Greening is recognised for her expressive artistry, with her singing described by the Western Telegraph as “beautifully rendered.” She will join the David Seligman Opera School at the Royal Welsh College of Music and Drama in 2025/26 as a RWCMD Scholar, studying under soprano Gail Pearson. She is supported by the Sybil Tutton Opera Award as well as the Karl Daymond Bursary Award.
Prior to this, Clara studied at the Royal Welsh College of Music and Drama for six years, completing both her undergraduate degree and a Master of Music in Vocal Performance, which she passed with distinction. A regular on the competition platform, Clara won the 2025 Dorothy Davies’ Ingram Prize, the 2025 Dorothy Watkins Prize, the 2024 Eileen Price Prize for Lieder Singing, and the 2022 Orpheus Voice Prize.
Her operatic roles and excerpts include Tonina (Prima la musica, poi le parole), Moth (cover) in A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Little Cupid in Venus and Adonis, Dew Fairy (cover) in Hänsel und Gretel with May Street Opera, and Gretel in Hänsel und Gretel (Schools Edition) with Farncombe Opera Company. Further roles in scenes include Miles (The Turn of the Screw), Fiordiligi (Così fan tutte), Jenny (The Rise and Fall of the City of Mahagonny), and Susanna (Le nozze di Figaro). As a concert soloist, Clara has performed with Sir Bryn Terfel in Pan Ddaw’r Nos, as soprano soloist with the National Youth Brass Band of Wales under Erik Janssen, and in A Concert to Remember Lord Rowe Beddoe. She has sung in many gala concerts across Wales and is passionate about supporting communities through music. She has performed to raise funds for charities such as Tenovus, Prostate Cymru, Help Musicians, and Parkinson’s UK.
Alongside her performing career, Clara works as a peripatetic singing teacher and volunteers / co-leads the Good Vibrations Parkinson’s Chorus.
Click below for biographies of previous Bursary recipients:
Tomos Owen Jones (2023)
Tomos is a tenor, composer and conductor from Llangattock in the Brecon Beacons. He has just finished a Masters Degree in composition and vocal studies at RWCMD, and will be continuing his studies there in September 2024 as part of the David Seligman Opera School.
Singing as a baritone until the Summer of 2022, Tomos discovered opera with the WNO Young Company, singing Gwydion the Magician in Stephen McNeff’s 2117/Hedd Wyn. Tomos has since performed with the company as Count Heinrich (Judith Weir’s The Black Spider), and Semyon Semyonovitch (Cherry Town, Moscow). Operatic roles at RWCMD include L’Aumonier (Dialogues of the Carmelites), Angel (Der Schauspieldirektor), cover Eisenstein/Falke (Die Fledermaus) and Antonio (Le Nozze di Figaro).Passionate about new music, Tomos has created roles including Y (Julia Plaut’s The Y Knot) at RWCMD, and Baritone (Richard Barnard’s Nonsensus) with Opera Sonic at the Tête-à-Tête Opera Festival London. In concert, Tomos has been a soloist in works including Vaughan-Williams’ Five Mystical Songs, Rossini’s Petite Messe Solenelle and Handel’s Messiah.
Tomos’ compositions have been performed by ensembles including Cardiff Polyphonic Choir and the BBC National Orchestra of Wales, and he won the WNO-RWCMD Composition Competition in 2021. As Musical Director of May Street opera, Tomos recently conducted Hansel and Gretel, and has just premiered his first chamber opera “The Egg” at Atmospheres Festival 2023 in Cardiff.
Maisie Rae O’Shea (2023)
Maisie is a soprano from the Brecon Beacons. Having recently gained a First Class BMus with Honours from RWCMD, generously supported by the Olwyn Phillips Memorial Scholarship, she is beginning her MMus with support from the Karl Daymond Bursary.
Maisie’s operatic roles include Mrs Ham Noye’s Fludde, Solange Not in Front of the Waiter, Josephine HMS Pinafore, Little Cupid Venus and Adonis, Mother (cover) Hansel and Gretel, and Chorus in The Choice of Hercules / Dialogues of the Carmelites, and Maisie recently created the role of God in Tomos Owen Jones’ The Egg.
Maisie’s passion for showcasing early, contemporary and lesser-known works can be seen in her recital and concert work, with recent performances including Bach’s B Minor Mass, Handel’s Messiah and Vivaldi’s Gloria, alongside regular performances in concerts of baroque and renaissance repertoire. Maisie has been able to share works from many forgotten female composers, including performing the soprano solo in BBC NOW’s recording of Johanna Müller Herman’s Im Garten des Serails and representing RWCMD in a collaboration with SWAP’ra where she performed and recorded Two Night Songs by Elaine Hugh Jones.
As a scholar with the BBC National Chorus of Wales, Maisie has performed as a soloist on Mealor’s album Wonders of the Celtic Deep, in the semi chorus of Williams’ A Sea Symphony at the BBC Proms, in a trio of Three Nymphs in Purcell’s King Arthur with Christian Curnyn, and has given a solo recital of newly published works by Holst in Gloucester Cathedral.
Maisie is co-founder of vocal ensemble Solstice, with recent engagements for the group including performing Brahms’ Neue Liebeslieder at The Sixteen’s Sounds Sublime Festival.
