Month: January 2025

A poor weather forecast again this year resulted in a relocation of our Summer Concert to St John the Evangelist Church as our wet weather alternative – the church rather than the church hall, as our date coincided with that of the church’s Summer Fête. This proved to be a mutually beneficial arrangement and we hope to build this into our planning for next Summer.

The concert began with two folksongs, Afton Water and the Sailor and the young Nancy.  This was followed by two pieces by C V Stanford, Shall we go Dance and the much loved Bluebird.

There was then a set performed by a quintet of singers organised by Stephen Barton and a solo by Matthew our Musical Director.  There was also a solo item by our accompanist for the day, Andrew Kirk.

The choir then sang two spirituals, Deep River and Were you there? followed by Dream a little dream of me and Hallelujah (Leonard Cohen arr. Judge).  Finally we sang an amusing Richard Stilgoe song, arranged by Matthew for SATB, called Mrs Beamish.

The afternoon was judged a great success by all concerned.

This Shining Night – Our Spring Concert on 4 May 2024 took its title from the song, Sure on this Shining Night by Samuel Barber, which was one of the pieces which we performed, but the main works in the programme were the Birth of Venus by Gabriel Fauré and Sea Pictures by Edward Elgar. 

Fauré’s death occurred in 1924 and the centenary was commemorated by the inclusion of seven works by him in the programme, the other six being the Cantique de Jean Racine, Tantum Ergo, En Prière, Les Berceaux, Le Secret by our baritone soloist, Lucas Maunder, and Le Papillon et La Fleur by our soprano soloist, Charlotte Hardy. The Birth of Venus gave our extremely talented accompanist, Richard Lennox, an opportunity to display his amazing talent on the St John’s splendid grand piano and also for Charlotte and Lucas to enchant us with their wonderful voices.  We sang the work in English translation, as it was performed (albeit in a different translation) in Leeds in 1898, when the chorus of some 400 voices was conducted by Fauré himself.

The Birth of Venus came at the end of the first half of the programme, which opened with the Gloria from the Messe Solennelle by Louis Vierne.  This was followed by the much-loved  and well known Cantique, and then Panis Angelicus by César Franck, the Tantum Ergo (with Charlotte as the soloist), and Charlotte and Lucas’s Fauré solos already mentioned.  An arrangement for SATB of Fauré’s En Prière by our conductor, Matthew Clark, then brought us to the Birth of Venus.

The second half began with the Turtle Dove by Ralph Vaughan Williams, featuring Lucas as the soloist. We then sang Sure on this Shining Night, and two pieces by Camille Saint-Saëns, Calme des Nuits and Les Fleurs et Les Arbres.  After Charlotte’s solo we sang another arrangement by Matthew of a song by Fauré, Les Berceaux.  This features a superb translation into English by Matthew’s wife, Kay Westoby.  Finally, we sang Sea Pictures.  In this work Elgar set to music five poems about the sea, all by different poets, including by his wife Caroline.  The piece was originally composed for a solo voice but has been arranged for four parts by Donald Frazer.  It was very enjoyable to sing.

The evening was well received by a good-sized audience.