Innholdsfortegnelse for November 2022 i Choir & Organ

Anyone who followed the progress of Queen Elizabeth II’s final journey from Balmoral to Windsor will have been struck by the quality of the music that accompanied it. I was by no means able to watch it by the hour, but of what I did see – whether at various services of thanksgiving, or during the funeral service at Westminster Abbey or the committal at St George’s Chapel, Windsor Castle – the music was sublime: poised, subtle, expressive, and spiritually uplifting, articulating in its unique way so much more than words alone could do. I would defy anyone, whatever their religious beliefs or views on the monarchy, not to have been captivated by its beauty. It comes, therefore, as something of a wake-up call to learn that a recent report…

THE MUSASHINO-TOKYO ORGAN COMPETITION has announced that the 9th edition will be held from 6-20 September 2023. Organists born on or after 1 January 1988 are invited to submit video recordings of both J.S. Bach’s Allein Gott in der Höh sei Ehr, BWV 676 and the fourth of Robert Schumann’s Six Studies in Canonic Form, op.56. Fifteen contestants will then be selected to take part in the first round (9-10 September 2023), to perform works by Bach – either BWV 541 or BWV 550 – one of two chosen movements from Brahms’s 11 Chorale Preludes op.122, and the third movement, ‘Transports de joie’, from Olivier Messiaen’s L’Ascension. The second round (13-14 September) features set repertoire by Sweelinck or Scheidemann, Froberger, Muffat and J.S. Bach. For the finals (17 September), contestants…

Lera Auerbach: Symphony no.6 ‘Vessels of Light’ Kaunas State Choir, City Symphony Orchestra, Kristina Reiko Cooper (vc)/Orbelian 5 Nov, Kaunas, Lithuania Frank Horvat: Memories of Self-Isolation Vancouver Bach Choir/Dala 12 Nov, St Andrew’s-Wesley United Church, Vancouver, Canada Cecilia McDowall: Bird of Time Ealing Choral Society/Asprey 12 Nov, St Barnabas Church, Ealing, UK Jörg Widmann: ARCHE [RP] Groot Omroepkoor Nationaal Kinderkoor, Radio Filharmonisch Orkest/Canellakis 12 Nov, Concertgebouw, Amsterdam, Netherlands Sally Beamish: A Knock at the Door Alec Roth: The Peace of the Night Ex Cathedra/Skidmore 13 Nov, Town Hall, Birmingham, UK Paul Moravec and Mark Campbell: A Nation of Others Oratorio Society of New York/Tritle 15 Nov, Stern Auditorium, Carnegie Hall, New York City, US Michael Gordon: Travel Guide to Nicaragua The Crossing/Nally 16 Nov, Congregation Rodeph Shalom, Philadelphia, US Phillip…

David Hill: Favourite beverage? Anna Lapwood: I love really, really good coffee. I’m a massive coffee drinker and a good oat flat white is my favourite. DH: What about later in the day, or do you drink coffee in the evening? AL: Well, no! I probably wouldn’t drink coffee in the evening unless I had to practise very late. In the evening I’ve really got into non-alcoholic gin – it feels like a treat but without being alcohol. DH: Favourite cuisine? AL: I love tapas! It’s a bit like my musical life; I just love the variety. I get bored wtih just one flavour quite quickly, so I love trying different things. I’m also obsessed with cheese. Tapas is a good excuse to base an entire meal around cheese. DH:…

CD LUX AETERNA The Gesualdo Six / Owain Park (dir) Hyperion CDA68388 [67:36] ★★★★★ ‘Flawlessly performed’ (see review, p.69) Through a programme of liturgical music spanning from the Renaissance to the present day, The Gesualdo Six present ‘a thoughtful exploration of grief and remembrance’. Park’s own setting of a first world war poem provides the centrepiece, flanked by works by Purcell and Guest, and including composers from Morales and Tallis to Howard Skempton and Eleanor Daley. Courtesy of Hyperion Records, we have 5 copies to give away; quote code ‘LUX’. CD MARTINI: COMPLETE ORGAN MUSIC Manuel Tomadin, various organs Brilliant Classics 96182 (box-set of 9CDs) ★★★★★ ‘Highly recommended’ (see review, p.67) Though a famous musician and composer in the 19th century, Martini’s music is little-known today. Manuel Tomadin has ‘done…

AUF WIEDERSEHEN, BERLIN In the final instalment of his series documenting historic organs of the German capital, Henry Fairs looks to the future. J.S. BACH Forty years ago, Joshua Rifkin recorded Bach’s B minor Mass with one voice to a part. Conductors share their views on the topic. WALL STREET JOURNAL Jonathan Ambrosino gives an insider’s view of progress to Trinity Church’s ambitious Glatter-Götz/Rosales organ project. LAURENCE EQUILBEY The founder of the chamber choir Accentus talks to David Hill about post-pandemic concert life in France. WILLIAM HILL A restored 1858 instrument by the English builder was the first of 40 organs his firm exported to Australia. Plus… International news and previews, specialist reviews, regular columns, and a supplement of Competitions.…

INTRODUCING MUSICALS MAGAZINE Musicals magazine is the new publication from the Mark Allen Group celebrating the world of Musical Theatre, from the West End to Broadway and beyond. Our launch issue will include: • West End and Broadway sensation Marisha Wallace discusses her starring roles in Dreamgirls, Waitress and Oklahoma! with Edward Seckerson • Official biographer David Benedict explores Stephen Sondheim’s lasting legacy, focusing on three of his hit musicals: Company, Sweeney Todd and Assassins • Live show and recording reviews including Bugsy Malone, South Pacific, A Strange Loop, 42nd Street, 13 and MJ The Musical ON SALE 21ST £9.99 OCTOBER Order your copy for just £9.99 Visit: magsubscriptions.com/musicals-magazine Call: 0800 137201 (UK) or +44 (0)1722 716997 (Overseas) Order your copy for just £9.99 The launch issue of Musicals will…

Thea Musgrave has been made an Honorary Member of the Royal Philharmonic Society (RPS) in recognition of her ‘remarkable career and outstanding services to music’. The award was presented to Musgrave on behalf of the RPS by Vanessa Reed, president and CEO of New Music USA. royalphilharmonicsociety.org.uk Harpsichordist Bridget Cunningham has received an award from the Royal Philharmonic Society (RPS) Enterprise Fund in association with Harriet’s Trust. The RPS has supported Cunningham in her opera work, and also in recording the complete and previously unrecorded works of Irish Baroque composer Thomas Roseingrave. bridgetcunningham.org.uk The Cathedral Music Trust has appointed Anna Lapwood (see feature, p.16) as a new ambassador to promote the Trust’s work in preserving and developing UK cathedral music’s heritage and to nurture the next generation of organists and…

NATHAN JAMES DEARDEN (C&O New Music commissions, 2017 and 2021) has won Making Music’s ‘best music creator for leisure-time music group’ award for his 2021 National Youth Choirs of Great Britain commission i breathe. Dearden (pictured left) told C&O: ‘It is an absolute thrill to receive this award … Collaborating with the National Youth Choirs of Great Britain in recent years has been a real privilege, and it has been overwhelming to see how vital creating new music is for communities of young people such as these. Their “open-eyed” approach to music-making is so refreshing, and this partnership has really pushed what both music creator and singer thought they could do.’ Other recipients of the Making Music awards included Michael Betteridge, named ‘best arranger for leisure-time music group’ in recognition…

13 Messiah from Scratch The Really Big Chorus, English Festival Orchestra / Brian Kay (dir) 7pm, Royal Albert Hall, London; tickets: bit.ly/3JN82YM 25 From Darkness to Light Salisbury Cathedral Choir and Plainsong Choir, John Challenger (org) /David Halls (dir) 7pm, Salisbury Cathedral; tickets: salisburycathedral.org.uk 26 Advent Carol Service Choir of St John’s College, Cambridge / Andrew Nethsingha (dir) 6pm, St John’s College, Cambridge; bit.ly/3SW7qUN From Darkness to Light Salisbury Cathedral Choir and Plainsong Choir, John Challenger (org) /David Halls (dir) 7pm, Salisbury Cathedral; tickets: salisburycathedral.org.uk 27 Advent Service Carlisle Cathedral Choir 3pm, Carlisle Cathedral; carlislecathedral.org.uk Advent Carol Service Choir of St John’s College, Cambridge / Andrew Nethsingha (dir) 3pm, St John’s College, Cambridge; bit.ly/3SW7qUN From Darkness to Light Salisbury Cathedral Choir and Plainsong Choir, John Challenger (org) /David Halls (dir)…

THE UK’S SACRED MUSIC TRADITION faces a sustainability crisis, according to a major report by the More Partnership, released on 2 October. The report was commissioned by the Cathedral Music Trust to help the Trust to allocate its resources to best avail. The More Partnership drew its evidence from a number of sources, including workshops, literature, review of practices in cathedral music and interviews with clergy, directors of music, choir school heads, and representatives of grant-making bodies. Factors affecting cathedral music include changes in leadership and governance in the last quarter century; and pressure to maintain musical traditions and the financial cost of doing so. One significant issue identified was that of lack of diversity, with 81 per cent of those taking part in the research saying that widening access…

We all know those jokes along the lines of ‘paddle-boarders do it standing up’ and ‘rugby players do it with odd-shaped balls’ and one might add ‘bagpipers do it striding about…’. Of course, bagpipes are in a sense a wearable organ: you use your lungs to fill a bellows; you use your arm to pressurise the reservoir; a continuous flow of air supplies the drones; you use your hands to finger notes on the chanter; and if you’re in a band you often have to do this while marching up and down. As someone who gets out of breath if conducting vigorously and singing at the same time, I doff my cap in admiration of those who are proficient at bagpiping. These thoughts are prompted by one of the many…

Venice is like malaria: once in your blood it will erupt from time to time, filling you with a feverish longing to revisit the most beautiful, improbable, frustrating, fascinating and vastly expensive (although there are plenty of free attractions) fantasy city. For musicians, walking in the footsteps of Salamone Rossi, Barbara Strozzi, Claudio Monteverdi, Baldassare Galuppi, Antonio Vivaldi et al is tantalising, but don’t rely on Google Maps – you may be invited to walk on water, turn right/left when it should be left/right, and be offered unrecognisably garbled street names. ‘La Serenissima’, once a centre for music publishing, beguiles, bewitches and distracts: one 16th-century composer, Biagio Pesciolini (a canon from Prato), was sacked from his maestro di cappella job for excessive lingering there while getting his secular works published.…

I was fortunate that my music teacher [at Francis Holland School, Clarence Gate, London] was Elisabeth Rolfe Johnson. She led a spectacular music department with a heavy choral focus. I didn’t take up the organ until halfway through my final year when she commented that it was a shame I didn’t play, as it might have really suited me. This was like a red rag to a bull. I attended organ trials post-A level and miraculously got a scholarship to Peterhouse, a Cambridge college that I’d neither heard of nor visited. I spent my gap year learning to play – I had never attended Evensong until a college choir tour just before my first year, so I was very green. As I had been to an all-girls’ school, I had…

TERRY EDWARDS (1939-2022) The choral conductor and founder of London Voices, Terry Edwards, has died aged 83. Edwards was born in north London. He studied at Trinity College of Music and then taught music at Rickmansworth Grammar School from 1961-64. He played basketball – he was 6'9" – for Great Britain at the 1964 Olympics. He was manager of the John Alldis Choir, then the Linden Singers, and subsequently Roger Norrington’s Schütz Choir of London. In 1973, he founded London Voices – directing them until April 2021 – and also became the first manager and sound engineer of Swingle II. In 1977 he founded the pioneering vocal consort Electric Phoenix, which specialised in avant-garde repertoire. It was with the Swingles and Electric Phoenix that his long-standing association with Luciano Berio…

On 19 Nov, St Mary Redcliffe Church, Bristol hosts a celebration of the life and music of renowned composer Eric Wetherell. Performers include local choir Miscellany and members of Bristol G&S Operatic Society, which Wetherell conducted for many years. All profits plus a retiring collection will go to St Peter’s Hospice, where Wetherell spent some of his last months. bit.ly/wetherell On 17 Nov, the Bach Choir celebrates the 150th anniversary of its former music director Ralph Vaughan Williams. The programme includes A Sea Symphony, of which the Bach Choir gave the London premiere in 1913. Soloists Elizabeth Watts and Roderick Williams appear with the Philharmonia Orchestra under the direction of David Hill. thebachchoir.org.uk Gerdi Troskie leads Understanding Harmony, an RCO event in five online classes on Tuesday evenings in Nov.…

DCD3462 In the Stillness: A Merton Christmas The Girl Choristers of Merton College, Oxford Benjamin Nicholas director In the stillness of a midnight stable, a babe is born … In the stillness of an Oxford chapel on a winter’s afternoon, a girl’s voice sings. The newest star in Oxford’s – and Delphian’s – choral firmament, the girl choristers of Merton College have been singing services under the directorship of Benjamin Nicholas for less than five years: in their debut album recording, supported by the lower voices of the Chapel Choir, they tell once more in music from across the centuries the timeless Christmas story of light, hope and joy for a troubled world. DCD34238 Presto Music Editor’s Choice Christmas in Puebla Siglo de Oro | Patrick Allies Siglo de Oro’s…

THE LIBRARY OF THE LATE PROFESSOR PETER WILLIAMS is to be transferred to the Royal Academy of Music (RAM), London. Professor Williams held international renown as an organ historian, Bach scholar, harpsichordist and organist, organologist, editor and pedagogue. RAM organ professor Dr David Ponsford described Williams’s library as ‘valuable collection of historical sources, books and music [which] comprised the research material used for the writing of Williams’s wide range of books. The library will be available as a research facility not only for organ students at the RAM, but for the scholarly community elsewhere, both nationally and internationally.’ The RAM’s principal, Professor Jonathan Freeman-Attwood CBE, commented: ‘Over our 200-year history, the Academy has assembled all kinds of valuable collections but we take special interest in sources which have a direct…

Salisbury Cathedral’s assistant director of music John Challenger and singer Toyah Willcox will form an unexpected alliance when they come together to perform Sergei Prokofiev’s Peter and the Wolf on 5 November as part of the cathedral’s ongoing 2022 Organ Festival. Working from Prokofiev’s own arrangement for piano, Challenger (pictured right) will need to find each animal’s voice within the cathedral’s 140-year-old Father Willis organ to fulfil Prokofiev’s exacting orchestral requirements for the piece. Challenger told C&O: ‘Of course, I don’t have an orchestra to hand, but instead a pipe organ. Some of Prokofiev’s sounds are still easily found – I will use our beautiful Clarinet stop to depict the cat, as Prokofiev’s original score specifies, and I can also use the Oboe stop to depict the duck. For the…

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The medium of virtual performance has evolved in recent years, becoming more prevalent through social media, and more accessible to performers and listeners alike. This has been especially significant since Covid-19, and more musicians are choosing to broadcast their performances to an online audience. While it may appear costly and difficult to achieve a high-quality result, I’ve found that with a few key techniques it’s easy to create excellent video recordings using minimal equipment, all for under £100. This is my guide to creating and uploading your own virtual performances. Microphone: Look no further than the Zoom H1N. For just £75, this microphone gives incredible results, and is very easy to use. You can also insert a microSD card, allowing the microphone to store up to 32GB of audio files…

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