Chepstow Choral Society presented their annual pre-Easter concert to an enthusiastic and large audience in St Mary’s Priory Church. Whilst the weather was absolutely atrocious – torrential rain occurred in the afternoon and early evening, drenching everyone involved, including all the audience as they arrived, the wonderful music more than compensated and left everyone at the end of the concert feeling uplifted and with any difficulties encountered in arriving at the church being more than compensated by the quality of the occasion.
The programme was an ambitious one, involving full orchestra, soloists and choir. Dvorak’s Te Deum, which opened the programme, is a sparkling item which commences with fanfare-like orchestra and choir, proceeds with some beautiful solo soprano and baritone singing, and concludes with rousing chorus work and an orchestral finale. This was followed by the Society’s tribute to one of the greatest of all British composers, Ralph Vaughan Williams in the 50th anniversary year of his death, with a performance of his highly acclaimed Benedicite. Written for choir, solo soprano and orchestra, this work is a challenge for any choral society, and it is to the credit of Chepstow Choral Society that they were able to include this intricate work in this programme. The work involves a superb mixture of difficult choral singing, some magnificent orchestral writing and an outstanding solo soprano line, all of which was achieved with full commitment by everyone involved. The final choral work for the evening was the well-known Requiem by Gabriel Faure, a piece which the Society has performed before, but this was the first time it had sung the work in its orchestrated version. Always well-received, the sheer beauty of the writing and the musical composition meant that the evening concluded with a complete choral contrast to the previous two works, and which was very appropriate for the period before Easter.
Yet again, the Society was delighted with the overall response to this ambitious programme. Charlotte Ives (soprano) and Neil Bellingham (bass) both sing professionally and are based in London, and it was a privilege for everyone present to hear them. Charlotte’s magnificent singing resonated throughout the church, and her soaring conclusion to the Benedicite stunned and thrilled everyone present, along with her interpretation of the famous ‘Pie Jesu’ from the Requiem. Neil was making his first appearance in Chepstow, and his high quality singing will surely ensure that he will be invited to return.
The orchestra for the evening was very ably led by Rolette Montet Guerin, and the Society is proud to be able to sing with so many fine instrumentalists. It is a great achievement for a relatively small choral society to be able to attract such a fine group of players, who so obviously enjoy working with the Society, and have now become established as part of the Society’s “team”. Some of the orchestra were young players joining for the first time, and acquitted themselves quite brilliantly, alongside the excellent professional players who are now regulars when the Society’s programme involves orchestral input. The choir sang this difficult programme with full commitment and enthusiasm, and it is to their very great credit that the end result was so successful, particularly given that rehearsal time was shorter than normal, Easter being so very early this year.
The evening was directed by Graham Bull, the Society’s Musical Director, and yet again he must be congratulated for his vision and commitment in bringing together a programme of music for Chepstow which was exciting, ambitious and a fine presentation for music lovers in our area.
The Society was particularly pleased to welcome Marlene Harker to this concert, the Welsh Amateur Music Federation representative. Marlene was fulsome in her enthusiastic praise for the work that the Society is doing in keeping full choral music alive in Chepstow and surrounding areas, and the Society continues to be grateful for all the support given to them by WAMF.
The choir continues to grow in strength and depth. To be able to perform a programme such as this demands much commitment, hard work and preparation and enthusiasm, and over recent times the Society has been greatly heartened by the number of new recruits joining the choir. There are always openings for new singing members, particularly sopranos, tenors and basses, and anyone interested should contact assistant musical director Marjorie Duerden (tel. 01291 623310) about the musical schedule and singing membership details. The Society was also delighted at some response to its programme information relating to patrons, and anyone interested in becoming a patron should contact Jean Parkes (tel. 01291 620414) about patrons membership. A society such as Chepstow is dependent upon the support it receives throughout the community – concerts such as the one reported here do not materialise out of thin air, and as with many other organisations, funding is an on-going problem. Chepstow Choral Society raises the money necessary for all concerts purely by its own efforts, and is not in receipt of any government grants or official money – and sadly, the Society’s deep commitment to providing quality music for Chepstow can not be fulfilled without a financial factor.
The final concert of the 2007/2008 season will take place at Chepstow Leisure Centre on Saturday July 12th , 7.30pm. and will be part of the Chepstow Festival programme. The Society will present Carl Orff’s highly exciting Carmina Burana and Johannes Brahms Liebeslieder. Both these works will be performed in the versions written for two pianos (along with percussion as well for Carmina Burana). Soloists for the concerts will be Marjorie Duerden and Rosalind Taylor (pianos), Hannah Grove Atherton (soprano), Sebastian Field (counter-tenor) and Henry Neill (baritone). Further details/information will be published shortly.
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