A singer from Bristol Grammar School has been crowned Young Singer of the Year.

Josephine Goddard, 17, from Churchill, North Somerset, won the first national competition of its kind organised by the Rotary International in Great Britain and Ireland (RIBI).

At Chelmsford Cathedral on Saturday, she impressed so much with her three songs – Mozart's In Uomini In Soleati, Fuare's Apres Un Reve and It was a Lover, By Dring – that Ian Thomson, president of RIBI, also presented her with the runner-up award for the overall Young Musician Competition.

Delighted Josephine said: "I was really honoured, especially to come second in the young musician category as well, because I thought it would have only been for instrumentalists."

Josephine has been singing since she was eight, when she used to sing along as her mum, music teacher Rachel Packer, was giving lessons. For the last six years she has been with Miriam Bowen, vocal tutor at the Royal Welsh College of Music and Drama.

On Friday, June 12, at 7.30pm, she is giving a solo concert at Barrow Gurney Festival. She will also perform in Bristol Cabot Choir's Come and Sing event on July 11, at 6pm, at St Alban's Church, Coldharbour Road, Bristol.