Thereafter they began to reach a wider American audience, appearing frequently on The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson in the United States.
In 1987, they were prominently featured as guests on the Emmy Award-winning ABC television special Julie Andrews: The Sound of Christmas.
Today the ensemble travels worldwide for its performances, appearing in around 125 concerts each year, mostly in Europe, the US and East Asia, having recently added the People's Republic of China to their list of touring territories.
The first stable incarnation of the group, from late 1969 until 1978, comprised: The current ensemble is composed of (starting year in parentheses): Former members of the King's Singers also include Jeremy Jackman, Bob Chilcott,[1] Nigel Short, Bill Ives, Bruce Russell, Colin Mason, Gabriel Crouch, Stephen Connolly, Robin Tyson, Philip Lawson, Paul Phoenix, David Hurley, Christopher Gabbitas and Timothy Wayne-Wright.
Around the year 2000, the King's Singers briefly called themselves king'singers (with a lower case k and a single s), as can be seen on the cover of Fire-Water[2] and several song sheets.
Later in 1968, Martin Lane developed a brain tumour and had to withdraw from the group; Felicity Palmer stood in during 1969 until Nigel Perrin graduated that summer.
Other singers who served as short-term group members were Eleanor Capp, Caryl Newnham and, on one occasion, James Bowman, all of whom took the first countertenor (soprano) role in 1969 when Felicity Palmer was unavailable.
It was this serene and precise sound, with vibrato used only as a colour rather than a default setting, that was expanded by the early King's Singers to be used on all genres of music, from Renaissance church repertoire such as they had performed as part of the daily chapel services at the university, to pop, jazz, folk and spiritual arrangements that were soon added to their concert programmes.
Often it consists of lighter fare, including music of The Beatles, Billy Joel, Queen, George Gershwin, Harold Arlen or Irving Berlin, many of which have been arranged for the group by composers such as Richard Rodney Bennett, Jeremy Lubbock, Bob Chilcott, Philip Lawson and John Rutter.
Examples of this latter art include "Sacred Bridges", a programme of Jewish, Islamic and Christian settings of Psalms, performed with Vladimir Ivanoff and his ensemble "Saraband".
Starting with "Timepiece", commissioned by the Camden Festival in 1972 from composer Paul Patterson (and still regularly performed today), they have continued by commissioning pieces from (amongst others) Sally Beamish, Bob Chilcott, Sir Peter Maxwell Davies, Howard Goodall, Daron Hagen, Jackson Hill, Graham Lack, Libby Larsen, György Ligeti, John McCabe, Ivan Moody, Jocelyn Pook, Geoffrey Poole, Francis Pott, Ned Rorem, Joby Talbot, Sir John Tavener and Malcolm Williamson.
In 2008 they performed a piece commissioned jointly for them and the National Youth Choirs of Great Britain written by Eric Whitacre.
In February 2009, the King's Singers' CD, Simple Gifts, won a Grammy Award for Best Classical Crossover Album.
Every two years they hold a residency at the Schleswig-Holstein Music Festival in Lübeck, Germany, at which up to 12 a cappella groups from all over the world are taught over a period of four days, culminating in a public performance.
The group also leads around a dozen additional one-off masterclasses throughout the year, normally in conjunction with concert performances and often as part of their twice-yearly US tours.
The group established The King's Singers Summer School in 2013 taking place on campus at Royal Holloway, University of London.
The Summer School took place for a second time in 2015 and saw composer and conductor Eric Whitacre and Eton Choirbook expert Dr. Stephen Darlington as special guests.
The group's most successful recent CD is the 2008 Simple Gifts, a selection of 16 pop ballads, spirituals, and folk songs.