Giovanni Pierluigi da Palestrina (1525 – 1594) was an Italian composer of late Renaissance music. The central representative of the Roman School, with Orlande de Lassus and Tomás Luis de Victoria, Palestrina is considered the leading composer of late 16th-century Europe.
Sir Charles Hubert Hastings Parry, 1st Baronet (1848 – 1918), was an English composer, teacher and historian of music. As a composer he is best known for the choral song “Jerusalem”
“Ding Dong Merrily on High” is a Christmas carol. The words are by the English composer George Ratcliffe Woodward (1848–1934).
Ola Gjeilo is a Norwegian composer and pianist, living in the United States. He writes choral music, and has written for piano and wind symphony, publishing through Walton Music, Edition Peters, and Boosey and Hawkes.
“Silent Night” (German: “Stille Nacht, heilige Nacht”) is a popular Christmas carol, composed in 1818 by Franz Xaver Gruber to lyrics by Joseph Mohr in the small town of Oberndorf bei Salzburg, Austria. It was declared an intangible cultural heritage by UNESCO in 2011.
O magnum mysterium has an associated plainchant melody, and in this form has been sung since the middle ages. However, the text has appealed to many composers over the years. Many of the most notable composers of the renaissance made settings, including William Byrd, Jacob Clemens non Papa, Cristóbal de Morales, D. Pedro de Cristo, Palestrina (article on the setting) and Tomás Luis de Victoria. Victoria went on to publish a mass based on his motet in 1592.
“Bethlehem Down” is a Christmas carol composed in 1927 by British composer Peter Warlock. It is set to a poem written by journalist and poet Bruce Blunt.
The “Coventry Carol” is an English Christmas carol dating from the 16th century. The carol was traditionally performed in Coventry in England as part of a mystery play called The Pageant of the Shearmen and Tailors.
Joyful & tuneful spiritual alternating between solo phrase and choral response.
Sally Beamish OBE (b. 1956) is a British composer and violist. Her works include chamber, vocal, choral and orchestral music.
Rihards Dubra (born 1964) is a Latvian composer. Many of his works are religiously influenced.
A Spotless Rose is one of Howells’s most well-known and enduring works, a tender, if somewhat slight unaccompanied choral piece that encompasses much of Howells’s early choral writing and points towards the glories of Collegium Regale and beyond.
“Ubi caritas” is a hymn of the Western Church, long used as one of the antiphons for the washing of feet on Maundy Thursday.
Francis Jean Marcel Poulenc (1899 – 1963) was a French composer and pianist. His compositions include songs, solo piano works, chamber music, choral pieces, operas, ballets, and orchestral concert music. Among the best-known are the piano suite Trois mouvements perpétuels (1919), the ballet Les biches (1923), the Concert champêtre (1928) for harpsichord and orchestra, the Organ Concerto (1938), the opera Dialogues des Carmélites (1957), and the Gloria (1959) for soprano, choir, and orchestra.
The wise men came from the East.
This is a Christmas carol by the German composer Peter Cornelius. He set "Die Könige" for a vocal soloist, accompanied by Philip Nicolai's hymn "Wie schön leuchtet der Morgenstern" ("How Brightly Shines the Morning Star"), which he erroneously thought was an Epiphany hymn. In fact, it is an Advent hymn in which the morning star is an allegory for the arrival of Jesus, not the Star of Bethlehem.
Aylesbury Consort of Voices (Vocal ensemble)
Aylesbury Consort of Voices was originally founded by Charles Pope in the 1950s, initially as an evening class for the study and performance of Madrigals. Charles Pope was a former teacher at Aylesbury Grammar School and was actively involved in the Aylesbury music scene at that time, effectively establishing a whole variety of music groups including the Aylesbury Choral Society, and the Aylesbury Symphony Orchestra, which has enabled successive generations of musicians to enjoy his achievements and has greatly enriched the cultural life of the area. Aylesbury Consort of Voices has evolved into a performance choir of sixteen singers, performing music from the sixteenth century to the present day.
We are very fortunate to now have Edwin Pitt Mansfield as our Music Director. Ed is a Singing Teacher, Conductor, Baritone and Examiner – well known as an established teacher and educator, frequently leading workshops and seminars across the UK. Specialising in working with gifted teenagers and professional performers, he is Singing Teacher at Tring Park School for the Performing Arts, an examiner for Trinity College London, and former and past Chair of The Association of Teachers of Singing (2022 – 2024). He also teaches out of his studio in Watford and in central London and is a deputy vocal teacher at the Royal College of Music, Junior Department.
Piano
11 January 2024
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