Zeb Soanes
© Charlie Ketchen
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Vice Chair
Zeb Soanes is the presenter of Relaxing Evenings on Classic FM, the UK’s most popular classical music station. For over 20 years he was an authoritative newsreader and reassuring voice of the Shipping Forecast to millions of listeners to BBC Radio 4. On television he launched BBC Four, where he presented the BBC Proms. He is patron of Young Sounds UK, supporting children from low-income families to realise their musical potential.
Born in Lowestoft, he studied Creative Writing and Drama at UEA and has written for The Observer, Country Life and The Literary Review. His best-selling first book for children, Gaspard the Fox, illustrated by James Mayhew, began a series of stories inspired by his remarkable encounters with a real urban fox, for which he was made the first patron of The Mammal Society. His latest books, Gaspard’s Foxtrot and Gaspard’s Christmas have been set to music by Jonathan Dove as narrated orchestral works for children in the tradition of Peter and the Wolf.
In 2013 he was invited to perform the role of ‘God’ in Britten’s opera Noye’s Fludde, with a menagerie of local children, to conclude the Britten Centenary at St Margaret’s Church, Lowestoft. Broadcast live on BBC Radio 3, it was hailed by the New York Times as a dazzling example of Britten’s intention to be “useful … to the living” — not the elite world of London professionals, but the more grounded one of his Suffolk neighbours.
In October 2023, Zeb was made an Honorary Doctor of the University of Suffolk in recognition of his ‘outstanding contribution to education, music, media and literature and very public endorsement and celebration of Suffolk.’
“This statue is as much about hope and aspiration, as it is a commemoration of the town’s great son. Depicting Britten as a boy, it will inspire fellow children to believe that, if they work hard, just over the horizon, anything is possible. When Britten was made a Freeman of Lowestoft he declared, “As an artist I want to serve the community.” I believe he would be delighted that, 70 years later, this image of his younger self will continue to do just that.”