Week ending Saturday
Ma
D08
NTERTAINMENT
Chorus of approval for annlversary concert
THE Vivace Chorus, previously
known
as
the
Guildford
Philharmonic Choir, celebrates
its 60th anniversary with a concert on Saturday, May 17 in
Guildford Cathedral.
.
Britten’s Te Deum opens the
concert. This workis most often
heard
in
organ accompaniment, but here
the Vivace Chorus gives it a rare
outing in the version for choir,
harp and strings.
The choir will also sing the
Cantique de Jean Racine by Fauré.
One of Elgar’s most popular
pieces is Nimrod from the
igr
tions. At the cathe-
dral, it can be heard in an
arrangement for choir alone,
using an extract from the Latin
requiem,
Lux
aeterna.
The
orchestra will play two popular
pieces for strings - Samuel
Barber’s Adagio for strings and
the Adagietto from the Symphony
no.5 by Gustav Mahler.
Neil Martin, 63, has been
singing with the choir for 28
years, and says: “From the very
first rehearsal 1 attended it was
obvious this was a friendly and
stimulating choir. I have sung
with a number of large choirs
with fine reputations, but have
never come. across such a won-
derful combination of musical
director (Jeremy Backhouse) and
accompanist (Jeremy Filsell).
“Each has an extraordinary talent, ensuring standards reached
by the choir are very high and
always improving. Not only is the
standard of concerts — usually
accompanied by top London*
orchestra,
The
Brandenburg
Sinfonia - excellent, but the
range of our repertoire is huge.”
Tickets for the concert on
Saturday, May 17 can be bought
from
Michael
Taylor
on
tickets@vivacechorus.org. or see
the choir’s. website for more
details: www.vivacechorus.org.