Founded in 2024 by artistic director, violinist & composer Paula Muldoon, the Cambridge Chamber Collective is made of up some of Cambridge’s finest chamber musicians. Together, we have performed trios to octets in many venues in Cambridgeshire, including Great St Mary’s, Ely Cathedral, All Saints Jesus Lane, and St Clement’s. As of 2025, we are delighted to announce concert series in St Andrew’s Church, Girton and St Peter and St Paul’s Church, Dry Drayton.

Further information about our upcoming concerts is at https://paulamuldoon.com/concerts/.

Members include

Paula Muldoon, Vicky Jolliffe, Alice Ruffle, Kate Clow violins

Penny Veryard, Tom Taylor violas

Joshua Lynch, Jon Fistein, Xanthe Cross, cellos

Paula Muldoon is a violinist and composer based in Cambridge, UK. The leader of the Cambridge Philharmonic Orchestra from 2017 – 2025, her performance career has taken her around the world with ensembles such as the Orchestre Révolutionnaire et Romantique, the London Symphony Orchestra, the Philharmonia Orchestra, and the Orchestra of the Age of the Enlightenment with conductors such as Andris Nelsons, Sir Simon Rattle, Marin Alsop, and Esa-Pekka Salonen. 

Upcoming projects for the 2025-26 season include guest leading the Norwich Baroque Orchestra, the premiere of her second string quartet as well as chamber music concerts throughout Cambridgeshire with the Cambridge Chamber Collective.

You can hear Paula play her own piece, Get Outside, on Spotify and iTunes and you can purchase her sheet music at her Etsy shop, MusicByPaula.  Details of upcoming performances are available on her website. She is a graduate of the Guildhall School of Music & Drama (MMus 2012) and the University of Michigan (B.M. 2010), studying with Detlef Hahn and Aaron Berofsky.

***

Vicky Jolliffe studied at King’s College, Cambridge and the Guildhall School of Music and Drama. She is thrilled with her contemporary Cremonese violin by Donatella Rampini and when not working as a Consultant Dermatologist and Educator she is happiest playing chamber music with friends or walking the dog by the Cam.

***

Kate Clow is a talented local musician and leader of the Ely Sinfonia and co-leader of the Cambridge Philharmonic Orchestra. She was born in Winnipeg, Canada, but moved to the UK when she was very young an started the piano and violin at the age of 6.  After school, she spent a gap year working for her LRAM before starting nursing training at Addenbrookes, during which time she joined the CUMS orchestra.  She has been in Cambridge ever since.  As well as Ely Sinfonia, she also leads Steve Bingham’s Ad Hoc Sinfonia, the K239 Orchestra and the Montague String Quartet, as well as working as a part-time nurse for a GP’s practice.  She recently took part in Grade-one-a-thons and is very proud to have passed both flute and snare drum with distinction.

***

Penny Veryard studied viola at the Royal College of Music with Jaroslav Vanecek. She then went on to play, tour and record with most of the London based chamber and period instrument orchestras under notable conductors including the legendary Harry Blech, Sir Simon Rattle and Sir John Eliot Gardiner. Locally, Penny is known as a viola and violin teacher and as the director of the Quartet Club of Cambridge which over the last 25 years has given young people and adults the opportunity to play in coached string quartets and string ensembles.

***

Tom Taylor studied the viola with Mark Knight at the Guildhall and at the Royal Northern College of Music, where he also led the viola section in several orchestras, including at the Montepulciano Cantiere Festival, at the Wigmore Hall and under Gianandrea Noseda. He performs regularly in chamber ensembles and orchestras in Cambridge and elsewhere.

***

Recipient of the Freda Dinn and Ida Marbett Award, St James Chamber Music Prize and Prix de Musique de Chambre Festival Ravel, Joshua Lynch is a passionate devotee of chamber music and has already enjoyed a diverse and creative career. Joshua studied with Emma Ferrand and Gillian Thoday at the Royal Northern College of Music and then continued his studies with Ursula Smith at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama. He also enjoyed mentoring by Peter Cropper, Oliver Wille, and Simon Rowland-Jones.

Joshua is the cellist of the Cambridge String Quartet, who are ‘Quartet in Residence’ at Hughes Hall, Cambridge University. He has enjoyed several European tours as part of the ‘Le Dimore del Quartetto’ network and has performed at Wigmore Hall, The Crucible (Music in the Round), and St Martin-in-the-Fields. His festival appearances include Grassington, Festival Ravel, Salisbury International Arts Festival, and Swaledale. In addition to his chamber music work, Joshua has also performed with Britten Sinfonia and the London Symphony Orchestra.

Beyond the concert platform, Joshua is a dedicated and experienced teacher. He holds teaching positions at the Stephen Perse Foundation and St John’s College School in Cambridge, and maintains a thriving studio of private students. He is a regular tutor at the Aboyne Cello Festival, Cambridge Camerata Academy, NLMS Summer School, and ProCorda. Joshua also serves as Instrumental Lead for the Cambridge Community Music Festival and is a member of the Advisory Council for the British Cello Society.

***

Jon Fistein (cello) read medicine at Jesus College, Cambridge, where he was awarded an Instrumental Exhibition. He then held an Imperial Scholarship to the Royal College of Music. As well as giving numerous recitals he is in demand as a session musician and can be heard playing (sometimes several times at once!) in pop songs, films, cinema ads and computer games. For more information about Jon visit www.jonfisteincellist.com

***

Xanthe Cross’s first experiences as a cellist began with free lessons and a free instrument from the London Borough of Haringey. Their support continued with a seven-year scholarship to the Royal College of Music Junior Department. At eighteen, she decided to follow a different career path yet continued studying the cello, winning a bursary for lessons at The Guildhall School of Music and Drama.

A busy working life paused formal cello studies, but she has recently reignited her passion for playing, returning to an active performance schedule.

Solo recitals in 2025 have included venues in Norfolk, Hertfordshire and her home county of Suffolk. She also plays with several chamber ensembles giving concerts in Cambridge and Ely. She leads the cello sections of a number of amateur orchestras and has performed with the European Doctors Orchestra at Cadogan Hall and the newly formed Barbican Sinfonietta at Sinfonia Smith Square in London.

Xanthe is enthusiastic about sharing her music and volunteered with Suffolk Refugee Support providing weekly music sessions at an asylum-seekers’ hotel until it was closed in 2024. She gives workshops in primary schools in Suffolk leading to offers of free lessons for some of the children she inspires.