The Breath of Life
Music of Consolation and Celebration
Music of Consolation and Celebration
Saturday 10 July 2021
St Augustine's Kilburn Church Esther Jones: Guest Musical director It starts with just three inconspicuous notes - gentle, low, quiet. Another voice joins, then others and all stretch, both lower and higher, until, like the sun breaking from behind a cloud, a yearning chord in six parts fills the air. Whatever our beliefs or unbeliefs, this is what heaven sounds like. It’s the Requiem of 1603 by Tomás Luis de Victoria, written for the funeral of his patron, the Empress Maria, sister of King Phillip II of Spain. Its contemplative beauty is extraordinarily consoling, as Requiems should be, and, after 18 months without an audience, it allows the Fourth Choir to lift up our voices once again and reflect on the pain and losses of the pandemic. Interspersed with the movements of the Requiem are pieces by contemporary composers: Songs of Sorrow by Sheena Phillips, a lament for the war in Syria; Jessica Curry’s Home, a setting of a poem by Warsan Shire that became famous during the refugee crisis (“No one leaves home unless home is the mouth of a shark”); and, bringing the first half of the concert to a close, a setting for double choir by William H. Harris, organist at St George’s Windsor, of John Donne’s sublime prayer-poem: "Bring us, O Lord God, at our last awakening into the house and gate of heaven... where there shall be no darkness nor dazzling, but one equal light; no noise nor silence, but one equal music... no ends nor beginnings, but one equal eternity”. The rest of the concert consists of songs of hope by James MacMillan, Joanna Marsh, Eric Whitacre, Ēriks Ešenvalds and, opening the second half, Cecila McDowall’s Regina Caeli with its thrilling opening exultation of “Alleluia”. |
The concert will take place in St Augustine’s Kilburn, known as ‘the Cathedral of North London’, with its lavishly beautiful interior, and - even more importantly from our point of view - a famous acoustic that draws many professional vocal groups to record there.
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Dates for your diary
A Meeting Place
Saturday 30 October, Milton Court A collaborative performance project between The Fourth Choir and an ensemble of Deaf professional musicians and performers, led by Dr Paul Whittaker OBE. The concert aims to create a fully bilingual and bicultural programme that explores how to marry sung and signed performance and create a musical "meeting place" between the Deaf and hearing world. We will premiere an innovative new choral commission by Kate Whitley, that uses an original British Sign Language poem by DL Williams as its source text. Nic Chalmers: Guest Musical Director Supported by The National Lottery Community Fund and D'Oyly Carte Charitable Trust Tickets will go on sale on in September 2018. |