Haydn's The Seasons, first performed in 1810, has a libretto based on a poem by the Scottish poet James Thomson. Composed at the age of seventy, the wonderfully exuberant and humorous music is Haydn at his best. A ploughman whistling the famous theme from Haydn's 'Surprise' Symphony, a calling quail, chirping crickets and croaking frogs are all part of a beautiful outdoor musical tapestry describing two of the loveliest seasons.
'Lobet den Herrn' ('Praise the Lord, all ye nations') is one of Bach's famous set of six motets and represents four-part choral writing at its best. Completing the programme was 'Ad ubera portabimini' from Buxtehude's extraordinary collection of cantatas Membra Jesu nostri ('The limbs of our Jesus'). Bach walked 260 miles from Arnstadt to Lobeck to meet the Danish-German Buxtehude and to hear him play; we were delighted that many journeyed from all around to enjoy our performance of these two composers' wonderful music.
For our summer concert in 2017, Summertown Choral Society was joined by some of the finest young soloists in the country for an evening of music by operatic composers - an opportunity for the audience to close their eyes and think of La Scala, Milan, the Staatskapelle, Weimar, the Salle Herz, Paris, Salzburg Cathedral, or the valleys of Wales, and ponder Mozart's line from a letter of 1782: 'Opera to me comes before anything else.'
Mozart’s words are no better demonstrated than in Handel’s magnificent oratorio Israel in Egypt. It soon stood alongside Messiah as one of England’s favourite choral treasures. Choruses and solos of frogs, pestilence, hailstones, darkness, insects, fire and violent smiting contain some of his greatest writing.
Parry: five part songs Home of my heart O love, they wrong thee much Come pretty wag and sing In praise of song Since thou, O fondest Walter Parratt: Tears for the good and true Parry: Put off, O Jerusalem, the garment of thy mourning (final chorus from /Judith Vaughan Williams: Te Deum in G Stanford: If...
"A wonderful sound from both orchestra and choir, and the soloists' voices blended beautifully."
"It was awe-inspiring to hear the Vespers sung by such a huge choir."
"The most spectacularly successful SCS event I've been to."
One Morning in Spring – Three Folksongs from Oxfordshire
Arrangement Grayston Ives (world premiere)
Isis Chamber Orchestra
Louise Wayman, soprano
Stephen Burrows, counter-tenor
Edward Woodhouse, tenor
Jack Granby, tenor
Julian Littlewood, piano
The Mass in B minor is Bach's only complete setting of the Mass and, though we hear it now as one unified work standing in its own right, Bach did not write it as such. Only towards the end of his life, probably around 1748-9, did he bring together earlier compositions into the one complete work.
Download the concert programme by clicking here Messiah Handel Saturday 29 January 2022 with Instruments of Time and Truth Conductor: Duncan Saunderson Elspeth Piggott (soprano), Mercè Bruguera Abelló (mezzo soprano), Tom Kelly (tenor), Daniel Tate (Bass) Since its first performance in Dublin in 1741, Handel’s Messiah has remained incredibly popular, with performances and recordings all...
A. concert of French romantic music featuring works by Saint-Saëns, Gounod, Vierne, Fauré and Franck.
A. concert of Hayden's Nelson Mass and Handel's Coronation Anthems, accompanied by the Instruments of Time and Truth.
Works by composers hailing from central and Eastern Europe, ranging from Liszt’s magnificent mass and Tchaikovsky’s very moving liturgy, to light and joyful Moravian songs by Dvořák.
