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About Us The Summertown Choral Society (est.1961) is a well-established mixed voice amateur choir with a membership of between 60 and 100. Although based in North Oxford, its members are drawn from all over the city, and surrounding areas. We aim to encourage a friendly atmosphere in which everyone enjoys singing. There is no audition and we perform twice a year, in January and May. The Society has been directed by Duncan Saunderson since 1996. Much of his insight has been gained as a singing teacher as well as by having sung professionally under some of the finest choral conductors in the country.
Since 1961, we have performed almost 100 different works from the standard choral repertoire, from Monteverdi and Purcell to Britten and Stravinsky. We have also performed a number of unusual works. Few could forget the powerful and mesmerising effect of the African drumming in Guido Haazen’s “Missa Luba”, a piece that helped create the success of the classic 1968 film “If”. In that same concert in 1999, we gave the UK premiere of “Messe Solennelle en L’honneur de St. Claire” a fascinating piece composed by a monk in a monastery in Casablanca. We have also sung an arrangement by its present conductor of one of Schubert’s most beautiful piano Impromptus and an arrangement of the wonderful Adagio from Mozart’s Wind Serenade in B flat that was used to mark the beginning of the end for the jealous Salieri in the film “Amadeus”… In 2001 we were one of the first choirs to perform Andrew Gant’s “Hymn for the Golden Jubilee” with words by the Poet Laureate Andrew Motion. Dr. Gant, Master of Music at St. James’s Chapel Royal and resident of Summertown attended the concert and commended the Choir on its excellent performance. In January 2007, 25 years after our first concert, we performed two Masses, the Haydn Maria Theresa Mass and the Beethoven Mass in C. Our last concert took place in May 2007 with a thrilling programme covering three centuries of church music. "An exceptionally well-drilled choir, their crisp entries were faultless, their intonation spot on.......the orchestra played with energy and brilliance throughout. There was some thrilling work from the four soloists, whose voices blended exceptionally well." Oxford Times 2.2.2007 Click here to view the Constitution of the Summertown Choral Society. |
