James Edward Petroc Trelawny was born in
Worcester and grew up in the
Meneage district of the
Lizard Peninsula in
Cornwall and attended
Helston School. He started his career with
BBC Radio Devon in 1989, aged 18, as a reporter and presenter. During the
First Gulf War, Trelawny was a newsreader for the
British Forces Broadcasting Service, and then joined the station as a presenter in
Hong Kong for a year. In 1992 Trelawny joined the new radio station
Classic FM, in London, as the first presenter of the afternoon show. In 1994 Trelawny joined
London News Radio where he hosted a daily three-hour news and talk show. In 1997 he co-presented the
BBC GMR Breakfast Show, broadcast from
Manchester, with
Victoria Derbyshire. In 1998 Trelawny joined BBC Radio 3 full-time. Trelawny presented
Breakfast, and subsequently
In Tune, and has introduced hundreds of broadcasts for the station, many from the
BBC Proms, as well as the
Cardiff Singer of the World and the
Leeds International Piano Competition. He had also broadcast for
RTE Lyric FM in
Ireland, where his major documentary series
Max and St Magnus – An Orkney Saga won an ESB Media Award. Trelawny is a regular television presenter of classical music programmes for
BBC Two,
BBC Four and
Sky Arts. As a writer Trelawny has regularly contributed to
The Spectator,
The Irish Times,
The Catholic Herald and
BBC Music Magazine. Trelawny is particularly fond of the operas of
Britten and
Mozart, the symphonies of
Shostakovich and
Beethoven's piano sonatas. He has also written blogs for the
Daily Telegraph and for the BBC Radio 3 website. In August 2018, Trelawny hosted the final of
Eurovision Young Musicians 2018 at the
Usher Hall in
Edinburgh alongside
Josie D'Arby. On 5 April 2019, it was announced that Trelawny would host the
Eurovision Choir of the Year 2019 alongside Swedish culture presenter at the
Partille Arena, in
Gothenburg, Sweden on 3 August. Trelawny has provided the commentary for the BBC broadcast of the
Vienna New Year's Concert since 2011. On 12 September 2022 he provided commentary for the address to HM The King of messages of condolence at Westminster Hall. His first book, Trelawny's Cornwall was published in August 2024. It is in part an autobiographical affirmation of his Cornish roots, and in part an exploration of the people and places that the author sees as distinguishing Cornwall as a nation in its own right. ==Personal life==