Zeb Soanes

Zeb Soanes
Soanes in 2014
Born	(1976-06-24) 24 June 1976 Lowestoft, Suffolk, England
Education	Harris Middle School, Lowestoft Denes High School, Lowestoft
Alma mater	University of East Anglia
Occupation(s)	Journalist, news reader, radio presenter, author, actor
Employer	Global Radio
Agent	Curtis Brown
Notable credit(s)	BBC Radio 4 Gaspard the Fox books
Television	BBC Proms
Website	zebsoanes.com

Zebedee Soanes (born 24 June 1976) is a British radio presenter who hosts the weekday evening music show Relaxing Evenings with Zeb Soanes on Classic FM. He was previously a newsreader and continuity announcer on BBC Radio 4 and BBC Radio 4 Extra until June 2022. He presents live concerts, specialising in narrated orchestral works, and has published the children's book series Gaspard the Fox.

Early life and education

Soanes was born in Lowestoft, Suffolk, the son of a Methodist minister and one of three children. He went to Northfield St Nicholas Infants School, Harris Middle School and Denes High School, a state comprehensive school in the town, before reading Drama and Creative Writing at the University of East Anglia. He then taught drama and toured Britain as an actor.

Life and career

Early career and Shipping Forecast

An appearance on BBC Local Radio led to a job as a presentation announcer for the television channels BBC One and BBC Two. His voice launched BBC Four in 2002 and he was the channel's sole announcer for ten months. He left BBC television and took up a position with BBC Radio 4 on 9 February 2003. In 2001 he began reading the Shipping Forecast, a weather report for the seas around the British Isles, which is broadcast four times a day on BBC Radio 4. For the 2008 Beijing Olympics he was asked to read the shipping forecast to a worldwide audience of over a billion. Describing the forecast in 2012, Soanes said: "To the non-nautical, [it] is a nightly litany of the sea... It reinforces a sense of being islanders with a proud seafaring past. Whilst the listener is safely tucked-up in their bed, they can imagine small fishing-boats bobbing about at Plymouth or 170ft waves crashing against Rockall." Writing in the foreword to the 2020 The Shipping Forecast Puzzle Book, published by BBC Books, he expanded on the forecast's popularity: "The forecast gives the wind direction and force, atmospheric pressure, visibility and the state of the sea. It is a nightly litany with a rhythm and indefinable poetry that have made it popular with millions of people who never have cause to put to sea and have little idea what it actually means; a reminder that whilst you're tucked-up safely under the bedclothes, far out over the waves it’s a wilder and more dangerous picture, one that captures the imagination and leads it into uncharted waters whilst you sleep. Dependable, reassuring and never hurried, in these especially uncertain times The Shipping Forecast is a still small voice of calm across the airwaves." Over the years he has been engaged to record special forecasts for several TV dramas, including Sherlock, where he adds the new sea area of 'Sherrinford' (a secret facility located in secured waters) and he reads the forecast over the opening titles of the ITV detective series Grace. He also recorded the forecast for Sandi Toksvig's play Silver Lining, produced by English Touring Theatre and for the Royal National Theatre's 2023 production of Odysseus. Reviewing the production for The Arts Desk, Helen Hawkins wrote, "The shipping forecast, read out in the familiar tones of the BBC announcer Zeb Soanes, proved it really could be funny when names like Thebes and Troy were inserted into it."

Later radio career

Soanes has been a newsreader for Radio 4's Today, PM and the Six O’Clock News. He was a regular newsreader on The News Quiz, joining the programme under the chairmanship of Sandi Toksvig, then Miles Jupp and in 2013 accompanied the programme on its first visit to the Edinburgh Festival.

He acted with Toby Jones in the radio drama Beautiful Dreamers and has reported for BBC Radio's long-running series From Our Own Correspondent. He has also presented BBC Radio 3’s Saturday Classics, the first edition of which consisted of three hours of favourite sea-inspired music. In December 2010, Radio Times magazine placed Soanes in the list of the seven most recognisable voices in Britain. He voiced a series of documentaries for the Doctor Who 50th anniversary, the launch of Sherlock in the US and is in Mayday, a short film with Juliet Stevenson. Author Francesca Simon, creator of Horrid Henry, featured Soanes as the newsreader in The Lost Gods, her 2013 book for older children.

In a 2015 poll of favourite radio voices in The Sunday Times, Soanes was voted as the favourite male voice. His voice was described, by the paper's radio critic Paul Donovan, as smoother than that of the favourite female Jane Garvey and as "evoking an earlier, more formal BBC". In September 2015, he played a vintage radio announcer in the BBC Radio 4 drama Dead Girls Tell No Tales.

In 2016 Soanes played Derek Nimmo in the radio drama All Mouth and Trousers, by Mark Burgess, the story behind the making of the television comedy series All Gas and Gaiters. The reviews for the programme were generally positive with Paul Donovan saying "Zeb Soanes is terrific as its star, Derek Nimmo" and Gillian Reynolds of The Sunday Telegraph commenting "Zeb Soanes makes an ace Derek Nimmo." Also in 2016 he played the sinister librarian in a Doctor Who audio adventure called The Unbound Universe with David Warner as The Doctor. Interviewed in 2011, Soanes said he liked the possibilities offered through acting to assume personalities different to his own; "working on a character is the most rewarding because you get to put yourself in someone else’s mind."

At Christmas 2018 Soanes appeared as part of the team for the University of East Anglia on BBC's Christmas University Challenge. On Christmas Day, the team lost to University of Westminster by 100 points to 130.

In 2022, Soanes joined Classic FM to present Smooth Classics at Seven, a three-hour programme of classical music every weekday evening, from 7pm. In 2023 he created a series of interview concert programmes in which celebrated actors share the music that has marked and shaped their lives, beginning with Dame Judi's Classical Favourites, followed by Sir Simon Russell Beale's Life in Music.

The Proms and concert performances

Soanes returned to BBC Four television in August 2006 as a presenter for the BBC Proms. In 2017 he presented a television tribute to The Proms on the occasion of the First Night of The Proms, in sepia tone in the style of a vintage programme. The sequence included photographs, radio and TV footage from the history of the concerts, with Soanes partly presenting in Received Pronunciation, fitting the style of early BBC programmes.

In November 2013 he took the role of God in a production of Noye's Fludde for BBC Radio 3, as part of the station's celebration of Benjamin Britten's centenary. In November 2014 he appeared in a concert with the vocal ensemble Opus Anglicanum at Wells Cathedral, featuring the poetry of George Herbert and remained as their narrator at venues across England for the next ten years, finishing back at Wells Cathedral for a concert of Mediaeval Carols in December 2023. The ensemble toured an entire reading of Coleridge's The Rime of the Ancient Mariner, set to music by Lynne Plowman.

In 2016 Soanes was narrator for The Snowman by the Brandenburg Sinfonia at St Martin-in-the-Fields, with Andrew Earis conductor. In 2019 the church commissioned him to rewrite the libretto for Vaughan Williams' 1958 nativity pageant, The First Nowell, presented as a charity gala casting BBC colleagues Dame Jenni Murray as God and Evan Davis as a Wise Man. He narrated Peter and the Wolf and Little Red Riding Hood at the Wimbledon International Music Festival, with Leo Geyer conducting. The Daily Telegraph has described Soanes as "the go-to person for music narration, specialising in children's concerts". Andrew Baker, son of broadcaster Richard Baker, has said "It is unusual .... for newsreaders to come from a non-journalistic background, but this seems to have been Zeb's path, just as it was my father's, so the state school, university, actor, BBC trajectory is uncannily similar."

In March 2017 Soanes appeared, alongside Carole Boyd, in a new recording of Façade by William Walton and Edith Sitwell, produced by Andrew Keener. Christine Labroche, of concertoNet.com said of the recording: "These two celebrated voices chant the strange poems of Edith Sitwell with an infallible rhythm and a perfect, stretched or swift diction." Andrew Baker also praised Soanes for the way he had performed Façade: "My father regarded Façade as the pinnacle of the narrator's art, a hugely enjoyable challenge, and a celebration of clarity, breathing, projection and timing. Zeb has all of these attributes, and it's always a pleasure to hear him at work."

On Twelfth Night, 5 January 2021, he appeared in a YouTube video with The King's Singers performing John Julius Norwich's humorous correspondence The Twelve Days of Christmas surrounding the gifts given in the traditional carol.

Charitable work

Soanes is patron of a number of charities; Awards for Young Musicians, the British Association of Performing Arts Medicine, The Mammal Society and the Thaxted Festival.

During the 2020 coronavirus lockdown, Soanes created "celebriTEAS", a comedy podcast, impersonating theatrical heroes to raise money for the Equity Benevolent Fund and Acting for Others. It was endorsed by fellow broadcaster Stephen Fry In March 2021 he appeared on the Early Evening News on BBC London to promote World Book Day.

In 2022 Soanes launched Britten as a boy, a community project in his home town of Lowestoft to raise funds for a statue of Benjamin Britten by the sculptor Ian Rank-Broadley, to be located on the seafront opposite the composer's childhood home. He unveiled the maquette for the statue in the garden of Britten's birthplace at 21 Kirley Cliff Road. The maquette depicts Britten aged 14, when his talent was recognised and encouraged. Soanes hopes that this image of the young composer will inspire local children to achieve their own ambitions. In October 2023 Soanes hosted a fundraising gala at Wigmore Hall starring Thomas Allen, Janet Baker, Tasmin Little and Alistair McGowan which raised £20,000 towards the statue.

Inspired by J. M. Barrie's legacy of his Peter Pan royalties to Great Ormond Street Hospital, Soanes has gifted royalties from his book Gaspard's Christmas in perpetuity to support the work of St Martin-in-the-Fields. His book gently introduces children to the notion of homelessness and the importance of kindness, community and friendship.

Awards and honours

Soanes was awarded an honorary doctorate from the University of Suffolk in October 2023 for his "outstanding contribution to education, music, media, literature and very public endorsement and celebration of Suffolk."

Personal life

Soanes's family have lived in Lowestoft since the 18th century. He now lives in Islington, North London with his partner, Christophe. Formerly a resident of Highgate, he was made a Freeman of Highgate, by means of the ancient Swearing on the Horns ceremony, on 25 February 2015, at the Duke's Head public house. In March 2022 Soanes and his partner spoke of their plans to buy a home in Norwich and to live there and in London.

Soanes enjoys classical music and plays the piano. In Who's Who he is listed as being a member of The Garrick Club and the Southwold Sailors' Reading Room; his agent is Curtis Brown.

On 1 April 2021, at the age of 44, Soanes suffered a stroke. He has since worked with the Stroke Association to raise awareness of the condition.

Books

In 2018 independent Welsh publisher Graffeg issued, Gaspard the Fox, a collaboration with the illustrator James Mayhew. The book for children focused on an injured urban fox which had appeared at Soanes' home, and which he and his partner befriended. Mayhew's illustrations drew inspiration from Soanes and his partner; "It was also important for James and I to include a positive representation of a gay couple in a very matter-of-fact way, and so my real-life relationship with Christophe and the fox is depicted at the end." The second book, Gaspard: Best in Show was published in 2019 and the third, Gaspard's Foxtrot, was published in 2021.

Gaspard's Foxtrot has also been adapted as a concert work by the British composer Jonathan Dove in the tradition of Peter and the Wolf, which was filmed by the Royal Scottish National Orchestra as part of its National Schools Concert Programme 2021. It received its world premiere on 29 July 2021 at the Three Choirs Festival, with the Philharmonia Orchestra, conducted by Alice Farnham.

Dove and Soanes collaborated again on Gaspard's Christmas which was premiered at the Usher Hall, Edinburgh with the Royal Scottish National Orchestra on Friday 23rd December 2022. The recording by the Royal Scottish National Orchestra was first broadcast by Classic FM (UK) on Sunday 18th December 2022 It has since been performed by the The Hallé (December 2023) and will feature in the 2024 Christmas programme for the Royal Liverpool Philharmonic

During the 2020 coronavirus lockdown, Soanes created a video series, on his own YouTube channel, called Gaspard’s Den, exploring and explaining the changed world as a spin-off from his children's books. The videos drew viewers from all over the world whose pictures and letters were shared in each episode. Soanes' fourth book, Fred and the Fantastic Tub-Tub, illustrated by Anja Uhren, was published by Graffeg in March 2022.

Works

• Gaspard the Fox. Illustrated by James Mayhew. Graffeg Limited. May 2018. ISBN 978-1912213542.
• Gaspard: Best in Show. Illustrated by James Mayhew. Graffeg Limited. August 2019. ISBN 978-1912654673.
• Gaspard's Foxtrot. Illustrated by James Mayhew. Graffeg Limited. March 2021. ISBN 978-1913134808.
• Gaspard's Christmas. Illustrated by James Mayhew. Graffeg Limited. October 2022 ISBN 978-1913134846
• Fred and the Fantastic Tub-Tub. illustrated by Anja Uhren. Graffeg Limited. March 2022. ISBN 978-1802580808.
• Peter the Cat's Little Book of BIG Words. Illustrated by James Mayhew. Graffeg Limited. November 2023. ISBN 978-1802580242

Discography

• An English Music – Opus Anglicanum
• Mediaeval Carols III – Opus Anglicanum, 1999
• The Great and Wide Sea – Opus Anglicanum, 2010
• In Parenthesis – Opus Anglicanum, 2013
• Walton: Façade, Orchid Classics, 2017
• Frederick Delius: Hassan, Chandos Records, 2024

External links

• Official website
• Zeb Soanes at IMDb
• Zeb Soanes on Classic FM
• Gaspard the Fox at gaspardthefox.com
• "How one man befriended an urban fox" from BBC London
• Zebedee Soanes profile at bbc.co.uk
• "Ted 'Golden Pipes' Williams" from BBC Newsnight