In addition to the evening major concerts, there are lectures, recitals and other daytime activities at the Three Choirs Festival.
Sunday I went to a voice recital by James Gilchrist, who has a gorgeous tenor voice, accompanied by an outstanding pianist, Anna Tilbrook. He started his working career as a medical doctor but changed to music — thank goodness he did!
The theme was “The Solitary Pilgrim,” songs of loneliness and solitude. He sang songs by Henry Purcell, Clara Schumann, Schubert and Vaughan Williams but what I enjoyed most were seven songs, “Under alter’d skies,” written by Jonathan Dove and dedicated to James Gilchrist. The songs are based on the poetry of Tennyson following the sudden death at age 22 of Arthur Henry Hallam, Tennyson’s closest friend at Cambridge. Under alter’d skies follows the poet’s journey through grief and coupled with Dove’s unique harmonic language made me want to hear this set of songs again.
Joan Ishibashi joined me in Hereford on Monday afternoon and the two of us went to an intense concert by the vocal ensemble Tenebrae. The Tenebrae Choir is a London-based professional vocal ensemble founded and directed by former King’s Singer Nigel Short. Co-founded by Short and Barbara Pollock in 2001, its repertoire covers works from the 16th to the 21st Century.
The “a cappella” group of 20 singers, directed by Nigel Short, started off in the back of the church with a haunting rendition of Elgar’s They are at rest, followed by the men singing the Requiem plainchant in procession. John Tavener’s Song for Athena followed, and I thought it the most starkly beautiful rendition that I ever heard. You know, it was the piece that was sung at Princess Diana’s funeral, and it never fails to cause a shiver in me.
Their program was one of the most difficult but excellently executed vocal concerts I’ve ever heard. The program also included music by Ivor Gurney, Torsten Rasch, Judith Bingham, Herbert Howells, Hubert Parry and Arnold Schoenberg.
The last piece by Schoenberg, Friede auf Erden, started out so innocently, got wild in the middle, then ended quietly as before. What a piece, sung so impressively!
Hey! I just found a review of Saturday night’s Mass in D by Ethel Smyth as well as Monday night was a performance of Edward Elgar’s King Olaf. It says everything I wanted to say and much, much more. Check out the Arts Desk review here.
Joan Ishibashi and I also saw an exhibition of chamber organs displayed by Britsh organbuilders, and of course, I had to try them out!