Each year I work with the wonderful Somerset Voices choir (a kind of scratch choral society) to plan and conduct the music for the Sing for Somerset carol service in Wells Cathedral. The service, which this year takes place on Saturday 15th December, benefits the work of the Somerset Community Foundation (you read all about their …
An anniversary year for an Exeter Choir and its conductor
Exeter Choral Society is celebrating its 75th anniversary year in 2018, but it's also a landmark year in my association with the choir as it's Musical Director. In 1943 a singing group was founded in Whipton, on the outskirts of Exeter. The Whipton Choral Society (as it became known) was renamed the Exeter Choral Society …
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Resources for Mendelssohn Elijah
Introduction The Exeter Choral Society is performing Mendelssohn's oratorio "Elijah" in 2018. Here are a few handy resources for this term. Note-learning aids Choraline is a popular starting-point for singers looking for note-learning aids. You buy the recording for your voice part (with an option to download). There are spoken cues, an orchestra playing the …
Whose Messiah is it anyway?
There are few choral works that reach as many audiences as Handel's "Messiah". I find it curious that it still has to be identified as Handel's, as if there were some other great work of the same title with which we might confuse it! I can't be sure (and a cursory Google search can neither confirm …
Supporting the Somerset Community Foundation
Later this year I’ll once again be masterminding the musical forces for the Somerset Community Foundation’s annual Sing for Somerset event on Saturday 16th December 2017 in Wells Cathedral. It’s a wonderful occasion, with a massed choir (‘Somerset Voices’) joining together with the Mid Somerset Orchestra to provide the music for a Lessons and Carols …
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