This Is London 25 October 2019

8
Brighton Festival Chorus.
FAURÉ REQUIEM & TAVENER
INVOCATIONS AND LAST WORD
Brighton Festival Chorus is to present
a Sunday afternoon concert on
3 November (15.00) in the wonderful
baroque surroundings of St John’s Smith
Square. Now in its 304th year, this
majestic building is one of London’s
thriving concert halls and continues to
resound with beautiful music in a serene
city setting.
BFC Music Director, James Morgan,
says: ‘Our two headline pieces are
separated by a century but share a
common theme of calm, meditative
spirituality. Fauré’s Requiem needs little
introduction, while we bring to London
for the first time Sir John Tavener’s
Invocations and Last Word, which
received its UK premiere earlier this
summer when we performed it in
Brighton. This work utilises massive
choral forces positioned in the four
corners of the building to create an
overwhelming ‘surround’ sound and
epitomises Tavener’s rare ability to make
music accessible to all.’
These two magnificent pieces are
complemented by motets by Messiaen,
Villette, Fauré and Coulais’s beautiful work
Caresse sur l’ocean from the Oscar
nominated film ‘Les Choristes for which
the Chorus are joined by the Brighton
Festival Youth Choir.
Known for its versatility, BFC performs
not only the standard choral repertoire but
also new works, commissions and
collaborations with popular music artists.
2019 has seen the Chorus record an
opera created by rock legend Pete
Townshend with the Royal Philharmonic
Orchestra at Abbey Road Studios, join
together with the Brighton Festival Youth
Choir for a performance of Britten’s
St. Nicolas and close the Brighton Festival
with a moving performance of Tippett’s
A Child of our Time. Upcoming
performances include two Christmas
Concerts in the Royal Festival Hall and
Brighton Dome and Great Choral Classics
in the Royal Albert Hall in April 2020.
The Music Director will be James
Morgan, with the music provided by the
London Concert Orchestra. The baritone
part will be sung by Jonathan Brown. The
concert will be performed by both the
Brighton Festival Chorus and the Brighton
Festival Youth Choir.
Tickets are available at sjss.org.uk, or
telephoning 020 7222 1061.
LONDON CONCERT CHOIR
PERFORMS PURCELL
On Thursday 7 November at Cadogan
Hall, London Concert Choir (celebrating its
60th anniversary this season) and
conductor Mark Forkgen are to present a
concert performance of King Arthur, the
dramatic masterpiece by Henry Purcell, one
of the greatest English composers. His
colourful ‘semi-opera’ about the conflict
between King Arthur’s Britons and the
heathen Saxon invaders was composed in
1691 to a text by the poet John Dryden.
In this performance of the music from
the opera, soloists and chorus will take on
the roles of good and evil magicians,
mythical and supernatural beings, as well
as soldiers, amorous shepherds, drunken
peasants and the inhabitants of a frozen
land. The complete work included a play,
but this will be replaced by two narrators.
They will outline the plot, which bears no
relation to the legends of Camelot but
mainly concerns King Arthur's attempts to
rescue his fiancée, the blind Cornish
Princess Emmeline, from the clutches of
his arch-enemy, the Saxon King Oswald
of Kent. Purcell’s glorious music
eloquently conveys the full range of
emotions and the work ends in celebration
of a united country and the triumph of
love, honour and peace.
Tickets are available from the box office
on 020 7730 4500 and also online at
www.cadoganhall.com
Henry Purcell.
t h i s i s l o n d o n m a g a z i n e • t h i s i s l o n d o n o n l i n e