Author Archives: vhk10

When our families are broken, when our homes are full of strife

Posted on May 9, 2014 by vhk10

The above text has just been added to the list of inappropriate/tasteless things I’ve sung at weddings (most singers I know have such a list). It was the first line of a verse of a hymn we sang during the … Continue reading →

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Dedicating the Dobson organ

Posted on April 30, 2014 by vhk10

It’s not every day you get to go to a 750th birthday event. I attended the dedication evensong for the new organ in Merton College Chapel in Oxford, at which one of my friends and contemporaries was preaching. The choral … Continue reading →

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Good Friday and Easter 2014

Posted on April 29, 2014 by vhk10

This was actually my first Good Friday singing in the church choir (I’d been away the last two years), and this year the service took the form of Stations of the Cross with musical interludes. There were some new pieces … Continue reading →

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Performing the Glagolitic Mass

Posted on April 28, 2014 by vhk10

@bristolchoral We gave two performances of the Mass on successive nights, the first in Colston Hall, the second in the Royal Festival Hall. This marked my Royal Festival Hall début! I have a principle of not evaluating here concerts that … Continue reading →

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Learning the Glagolitic Mass

Posted on April 21, 2014 by vhk10

Our two performances of the Janáček’s Glagolitic Mass were sufficiently remarkable that they merit two posts. I’ll begin by considering the problems I encountered in learning the Mass. The obvious one is the language. It ought to be no harder … Continue reading →

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The Messiah in India

Posted on April 17, 2014 by vhk10

The South West Festival Chorus believes in travelling the world and followed taking Gerontius to China a few years ago with performances of the Messiah in India. We were not quite trail blazing as we were following in the footsteps … Continue reading →

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quick on the draw in Wells

Posted on March 21, 2014 by vhk10

Just a quick note of an evensong I went to in Wells Cathedral, sung by the men and boys. A mixture of periods, with the Byrd responses, Howells in B minor and Wesley’s Wash me throughly. The Howells in particular … Continue reading →

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scanning the Bath Festival programme

Posted on March 16, 2014 by vhk10

We’ve just received the Bath Festival programme for 2014’s festival, and I looked through to see which concerts I might want to go to. But I was struck by three things: the shortness of the programme, the relative absence of … Continue reading →

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a local première of the Glagolitic Mass?

Posted on March 11, 2014 by vhk10

@bristolchoral I’ve been going round saying that our forthcoming Glagolitic Mass is the first in the Bath/Bristol area for at least 20 years. Then I started to wonder whether it was in fact the first ever. Unless you have a … Continue reading →

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The Great Chorus

Posted on March 5, 2014 by vhk10

The children’s school is putting on one of its occasional concerts in which they invite parents and others associated with the school to boost the school choirs in a concert. I sang in the last of these; unfortunately I will … Continue reading →

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a Bath Camerata workshop

Posted on March 4, 2014 by vhk10

I didn’t attend the workshop which invited others to join the Bath Camerata to rehearse and perform a short programme, but came along to the concert at the end. Partly because it was local, but also to meet Camerata members … Continue reading →

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Martin and Tallis in the Victoria Rooms

Posted on March 4, 2014 by vhk10

After my awful experience with the toaster last time, I made sure that the programme for the Bristol University Singers’ concert was unaccompanied. They interleaved Frank Martin’s Mass for double choir with Tallis’ Lamentations of Jeremiah, in a demanding programme … Continue reading →

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