|
PRESS RELEASES
|
|
JUBILATION FOR ST GEORGE'S SINGERS
|
An all-British concert of choral music can be heard next Sunday, 13 November at 7.30pm at the Royal Northern College of Music, featuring St George's Singers and many of the North West's most exciting musicians. The concert - entitled Jubilation! - launches a busy and exciting Golden Jubilee season for St George's Singers as they celebrate their 50th anniversary in 2006.
'Jubilation!' offers something for everyone to enjoy, from great choral classics by Elgar and Parry to less well-known and more modern works by Jonathan Dove. The Singers are delighted to be joined by some of the best young musicians in the Manchester area. Chetham's School of Music Brass Ensemble will be playing music from the 17th and the 21st century as well accompanying the choir in the enormously exciting Gloria by John Rutter.
A Chetham's 'old boy', Marcus Farnsworth, who graduated with first-class honours from Manchester University this summer, will be conducting the Singers in their first performance of Gustav Holst's sublime Choral Hymns from the Rig Veda, a sequence of songs translated from the Sanskrit by Holst himself. Marcus, the Choir's Assistant Conductor, is active as a choral director throughout the UK, and is the conductor of the Manchester University Chorus. He has extensive experience as a singer and vocal teacher and has been a soloist with the choir on a number of occasions. The harpist for this performance, Louise Thompson, studied at the RNCM where she is currently doing a post-graduate course. She has given recitals round the country, has performed for the BBC and in 2003 won first place in the harp finals at the Royal National Eisteddfod of Wales.
Jeffrey Makinson, sub-Organist at Manchester Cathedral, Organ Tutor at both Royal Northern College of Music and Chethams School of Music, and the Singers' regular Accompanist, is the soloist in Judith Weir's Ettrick Banks. The concert is conducted by the Choir's dynamic and energetic Musical Director, Stephen Williams, whose ten years in charge at St George's has seen the Choir's reputation for enterprise, innovation and exhilarating music-making grow.
Jubilation! is just the first of a busy Golden Jubilee season of concerts for St George's Singers, which also features Bach's St Matthew Passion and the New Year's Eve Opera concert with the Manchester Camerata, both at The Bridgewater Hall; Duke Ellington's Sacred Concert at Manchester Cathedral; a Mozart Anniversary Singing Day, and much more.
St George's Singers were formed in October 1956 by nineteen choral enthusiasts from Poynton in Cheshire, with the aim of building a choir of around 40 voices, drawn from the village and surrounding neighbourhood. Today, the Choir has well over 100 members of all ages coming from a wide area of East Cheshire, North Derbyshire and Manchester. They perform an astonishingly varied repertoire in venues throughout Greater Manchester, Cheshire and beyond, regularly tour in the UK and Europe, and have a growing reputation for innovation, enterprise, the quality of their singing, and above all, communicating their joy of music to audiences everywhere.
Tickets for Jubilation! are £11 (£8 concessions, £1 students). Email dfrancis@supanet.com or contact the Choir website at www.st-georges-singers.org.uk.
NOTES FOR EDITORS
1) St George's Singers are one of the North West's leading choirs. The Singers put on at least four major concerts each year, plus special events and open days to which the general public are invited to come and 'sing along', and have established a reputation for innovative and ambitious performances of works by both classical and modern choral composers. Stockport-born broadcaster and media personality Joan Bakewell, recently appointed Chairperson of the National Campaign for the Arts, is the Choir's President. Vice-Presidents include Stephen Threlfall (Chethams), Sue Roper (RNCM) and Mark Rowlinson (Singer and former Senior Music Producer, Radio 3).
2) In recent years, the Choir has been on tour to Amsterdam, Krakow, Helsinki and Tallinn, and in 2005 undertook a critically acclaimed tour of Suffolk, where they performed St Nicolas in Aldeburgh Church, and Mozart's Requiem to a packed audience at Blythburgh Church. In 2004 they performed Elijah with Sir Willard White, Mark Padmore, Mary Plazas and Sara Fulgoni at The Bridgewater Hall. They are enthusiastic supporters of young composers through commissions of new choral works. www.st-georges-singers.org.uk
3) Musical Director of St George's Singers, Stephen Williams, is one of the most exciting choral trainers in the country. Stephen has conducted a wide variety of Choirs, including chamber, male voice - he was conductor of Skelmanthorpe Male Voice Choir when they won the National Male Voice Championships in 1991 - youth Choirs and symphonic choruses. In addition to St George's Singers, Stephen directs the Chapter House Choir at York Minster, and the Royal Scottish National Orchestra Chorus in Glasgow. As assistant chorus master and vocal coach, he works with the Hallé Choir, the Huddersfield Choral Society, Chester Festival Chorus and St Endellion Festival Chorus. In 2002 he won a prestigious Winston Churchill Fellowship to study contemporary choral repertoire in Estonia, Russia, Finland and Sweden.
|
|
|
CHOIR'S GOLDEN JUBILEE
|
St George's Singers, one of the North West's leading choirs, celebrate their 50th Anniversary in 2006, and have planned a fantastic year of music making for their Golden Jubilee Season.
The Choir was formed in 1956 by Rev. Eric Chapman, vicar, and Geoffrey Verney, organist and choirmaster at St George's Church, Poynton, where the Singers still rehearse every Tuesday. The minutes of October 16th state “ a meeting was held at St George's Hall to discuss the formation of a mixed choir, membership of which would be open to the village generally and to the surrounding neighbourhood”. The first rehearsal on Tuesday 23 October 1956 attracted 35 singers, “comprising 17 sopranos, 7 contraltos, 3 tenors, 8 basses”. The joining fee was set at 2/6d (12.5p), and the first evening was enthusiastically hailed as “ a good rehearsal”! The choir gave its first concert - the Christmas music from Handel's 'Messiah' - on 30 December in the church.
The choir grew in strength and numbers and was soon performing major works under Geoffrey Verney and his successor Duncan Eyres, who with Tim Hill, accompanist, served the choir for over 20 years. Ray Lomax, principle timpanist with the BBC Philharmonic Orchestra, directed the choir from 1987 to 1996 expanding the choir's repertoire and starting the tradition of choir tours, taking them to Germany in 1989 and Belgium in 1991. When Stephen Williams, the choir's current musical director, took over in 1996 he continued and developed the expansion of the Choir's repertoire, including contemporary compositions and commissions.
Today the Choir has well over 100 members from a wide area of East Cheshire, North Derbyshire, and Manchester. They perform an astonishingly varied repertoire in venues throughout Greater Manchester, Cheshire and beyond, regularly tour in the UK and Europe, and have a growing reputation for innovation, enterprise, the quality of their singing and, above all, communicating their joy of music to audiences everywhere.
Membership fees have increased somewhat since the 1950s, but Choir Chairman, Geoff Taylor, says “we still enthusiastically enjoy a good rehearsal on Tuesday evenings - as well as the opportunity to sing fantastic music for audiences in Manchester and beyond.”
Jubilation! is just the first of a busy Golden Jubilee season of Concerts for St George's Singers, which also features Bach's St Matthew Passion and the New Year's Eve Opera concert with the Manchester Camerata, both at the Bridgewater Hall; Duke Ellington's Sacred Concert at Manchester Cathedral; a Mozart Anniversary Singing Day; a Christmas concert, and much more.
Tickets for Jubilation! (£11, £8 concessions, £1 students) available from Dave Francis or from the RNCM box office tel 0161 907 5555. More information from www.st-georges-singers.org.uk
NOTES FOR EDITORS
1) St George's Singers are one of the North West's leading choirs. The Singers put on at least four major concerts each year, plus special events and open days to which the general public are invited to come and 'sing along', and have established a reputation for innovative and ambitious performances of works by both classical and modern choral composers. Stockport-born broadcaster and media personality Joan Bakewell, recently appointed Chairperson of the National Campaign for the Arts, is the Choir's President. Vice-Presidents include Stephen Threlfall (Chethams), Sue Roper (RNCM) and Mark Rowlinson (Singer and former Senior Music Producer, Radio 3).
2) In recent years, the Choir has been on tour to Amsterdam, Krakow, Helsinki and Tallinn, and in 2005 undertook a critically acclaimed tour of Suffolk, where they performed St Nicolas in Aldeburgh Church, and Mozart's Requiem to a packed audience at Blythburgh Church. In 2004 they performed Elijah with Sir Willard White, Mark Padmore, Mary Plazas and Sara Fulgoni at The Bridgewater Hall. They are enthusiastic supporters of young composers through commissions of new choral works.
3) Musical Director of St George's Singers, Stephen Williams, is one of the most exciting choral trainers in the country. Stephen has conducted a wide variety of Choirs, including chamber, male voice - he was conductor of Skelmanthorpe Male Voice Choir when they won the National Male Voice Championships in 1991 - youth Choirs and symphonic choruses. In addition to St George's Singers, Stephen directs the Chapter House Choir at York Minster, and the Royal Scottish National Orchestra Chorus in Glasgow. As assistant chorus master and vocal coach, he works with the Hallé Choir, the Huddersfield Choral Society, Chester Festival Chorus and St Endellion Festival Chorus. In 2002 he won a prestigious Winston Churchill Fellowship to study contemporary choral repertoire in Estonia, Russia, Finland and Sweden.
|
|
|
CHOIR PAYS HOMAGE TO BRITTEN
|
One of the North West's leading amateur choirs, St George's Singers, will be joining forces with local children and musicians from Suffolk in a series of concerts as part of their 2005 tour of East Anglia. On Saturday 28 May, the Singers perform Britten's St Nicolas in Aldeburgh Church, followed on Sunday 29 May with a performance of Mozart's Requiem at Blythburgh Church, before leaving for Lincoln Cathedral on Monday 30 May.
In recent years, St George's Singers have been on tour to Amsterdam, Krakow, Helsinki, and Tallinn (Estonia), but this year have come to Suffolk to pay homage to one of the world's greatest composers - Benjamin Britten.
St George's Singers' Musical Director, Stephen Williams, believes this is the most exciting of all the tours he has undertaken with the choir. "To perform one of Britten's works in the church he himself knew so well is not just thrilling for the Choir, but is our way of paying homage to one of the musical giants of the 20th century."
St George's Singers, from Poynton in Cheshire, whose President is Joan Bakewell, recently appointed Chairperson of the National Campaign for the Arts, have established a reputation in the North West for the excellence of their choral singing in an astonishingly varied repertoire as well as their innovative and ambitious approach to choral music.
In November last year, the Singers had a critical and popular triumph with Mendelssohn's Elijah, performing with Sir Willard White to a sell-out audience at Manchester's 2,200-seater Bridgewater Hall. In March they gave the Manchester premiere of the Vespers by Gretchaninov, a little-known composer whose music was recently sung at the wedding of the Prince of Wales, and organised the inaugural Manchester Sings! choral festival.
Both concerts at Aldeburgh and Blythburgh are given in aid of church fund appeals. Tickets, available on the door, are £5. For information about St George's Singers, please visit their website at www.st-georges-singers.org.uk |
|
|
COSTA RICA'S MUSICAL AMBASSADORS ARRIVE IN MANCHESTER
|
The passion of Latin American music comes to Manchester in May with the arrival of Costa Rica's internationally-renowned choir, El Café Chorale - the only choir in the world to be nominated official Ambassadors for their country.
The choir, who are visiting the UK for the first time, will be giving two concerts at Emmanuel Church, Didsbury on Friday 20 May, and at St George's Church, Poynton on Saturday 21 May.
El Café Chorale has won numerous gold medals and awards at prestigious international choir festivals in Latin America, North America and Europe. In addition to traditional Costa Rican folk music and modern Latin American choral music, El Café Chorale have won acclaim for their performances of European renaissance, romantic and modern works. In 2003 El Café Chorale won for the second time the Costa Rica National Prize for Music - the country's highest honour in the arts.
They chose Manchester for their UK debut following an invitation from St George's Singers of Poynton, who will join El Café Chorale in concert on 21 May before hosting a farewell party for the visitors.
Christian Fröhlich of St George's Singers first heard El Café Chorale at a choral festival in his native Germany, and was so impressed he persuaded them to come to England. Christian said, "El Café are a fantastic choir. While I have been in England it has been a great pleasure to sing with St George's Singers - another wonderful choir. So to bring the two choirs together to make music and build new friendships has been a very exciting project."
Costa Rica is probably better known for its coffee than its choirs, so it is not surprising that El Café Chorale takes its name from the country's largest export - coffee - and from the choir's first sponsors, one of Costa Rica's biggest coffee companies.
El Café Chorale's visit to the UK comes at the end of another European tour in which the choir will take part in the Limburg international choir competition in Germany before giving a series of concerts in Germany and Holland.
Stephen Williams, St George's Musical Director said, "We are delighted to host this visit from El Café Chorale, and to be able to sing with such a wonderful choir. We go on tour every year, this year to Suffolk and next year to Hungary. Costa Rica could well be on the itinerary in the future!"
Tickets for both concerts are obtainable from St George's Singers, Tel: 01663 764012. For more information, visit the website www.st-georges-singers.org.uk.
NOTES FOR EDITORS
1) St George's Singers are one of the North West's leading amateur choirs. Formed in 1956 at the parish church of that name in Poynton, Cheshire, today the Choir has well over 100 members of all ages coming from a wide area of East Cheshire, North Derbyshire and Manchester. The Singers perform an astonishingly varied repertoire, put on at least four major concerts each year, plus special events and open days to which the general public are invited to come and 'sing along', and have established a reputation for innovative and ambitious performances of works by both classical and modern choral composers. Stockport-born broadcaster and media personality Joan Bakewell, recently appointed Chairperson of the National Campaign for the Arts, is the Choir's President. In recent years, the Choir has been on tour to Amsterdam, Krakow, Helsinki and Tallinn, and are enthusiastic supporters of young composers through commissions of new choral works.
2) Other well-known 'Coffee' music, classical and popular! - 'Coffee Cantata' by J S Bach - 'Woody Allen's Coffee Music' by Lev Zhurbin - 'The Coffee Song' by Bob Hillard and Dick Miles
|
|
|
|