Delma Tomlin is the Director of the National Centre for Early Music (NCEM) on Walmgate, York. A musician (singer), she came to York in 1982 to be the Administrator of York Festival & Mystery Plays, and then became the secretary of the Festival Trust which ran the Early Music Festival.

She has made a significant difference to the musical education scene here in York; she was a central figure in the effort to restore and convert St Margaret’s Church with Arts Council Lottery Funds to the Early Music Centre. It opened as a Centre for the Arts in 2000.

She was Chief Executive of the Millennium Mystery Plays in York Minster and with money raised from the plays and the Lottery funds, she set up a database and website for the Mystery Play archive in 2002.

She received an Honorary Doctorate at the University of York in 2000, was awarded an MBE for Services to the Arts in Yorkshire & Humberside in 2007 and will be the first female Governor of the York Merchant Adventurers in 2022.  

Source: Margaret Scott (information) and NCEM website