All posts by Catherine Bass

June 30th 2024 at 4 pm

Riches of Renaissance & Romantic Music

The best of Renaissance and Romantic double choir works !

  • Victoria: Motet, Alma Redemptoris and Missa Alma Redemptoris
  • Rheinberger: Cantus Missae and Abendlied

TICKETS ON SALE NOW FROM TICKETSOURCE

The Church of St Mary – Kemptown – Brighton – BN2 1PR

The two halves of our programme in Brighton acknowledge the supreme talent of two composers, one from the late Renaissance period at the close of the sixteenth century, and the other of the deeply Romantic era of the nineteenth century.
Tomas Luis de Victoria (1548- 1611) was arguably the most inventive of the well known Renaissance composers. His output was almost exclusively liturgical and he enjoyed great high praise in his lifetime working in Spain and Italy.
Josef Gabriel Rheinberger (1839 – 1901) was principally a composer of organ music and also wrote an impressive number of liturgical and secular works. Born in Liechtenstein, he spent most of his adult life in Bavaria, which he rarely left. However, his reputation was such that he held the position of Court composer for many years and taught musicians who travelled across continents to benefit from his teaching.

The Bartholomew Consort came together in Oxford in 2001 as a project choir under the direction of Dutch conductor JanJoost van Elburg, comprising singers from all around the UK and western Europe. We perform most frequently in Oxford, but we do tour as well and this year we are delighted to be singing in Brighton.

BARTHOLOMEW CONSORT IN sUMMERTOWN, oXFORD 16 fEBRUARY 2020

Church of St Michael & All Angels, Summertown OX2 7ES at 8.00 pm. Please note NO entry to the church before 7.30 pm

PROGRAMME
J Pachelbel: Singet dem Herrn
Gott ist unser Zuversicht
J S Bach: Komm, Jesu, komm BWV 229
J L Krebs: Erforsche mich Gott
J P Kirnberger: Wende dich zu mir
G A Homilius: So gehst du nun
J S Bach: Fürchte dich nicht BWV228
Singet dem Herrn BWV225

Tickets at TicketsOxford from early September, full price £15, students, unwaged, jobseekers, disabled £9. Children under 12 free

Information for participants

Bartholomew Consort in Oxford November 3 at 4 PM

Martin/ Pizzetti Nov 2019

St Barnabas Church, Jericho OX2 6BG Sunday November 3 at 4 pm

Tickets at TicketsOxford from early September, full price £15, students, unwaged, jobseekers, disabled £9. Children under 12 free

Programme

Frank Martin (1890 -1974) Mass for Double Choir

Ildebrando Pizzetti  (1880-1968)  Missa di Requiem

James MacMillan (b.1959)  Lux Aeterna

Musical Director JanJoost van Elburg

In this programme for unaccompanied voices , the two larger works, share some points of details:  both were composed in 1922 and both were the only unaccompanied choral works of their composers on liturgical texts.

For Martin, his Mass for Double Choir was a deeply felt and personal work, which he did not release for performance for forty years. His background was in the Calvinist church, his father being a minister, and this coloured his entire life and the characteristic of his creative work. The Mass was written and put away, protected for decades by Martin’s fervently held belief was that it was almost a blasphemy to perform such an intimate and private dialogue between God and himself.  His work is entirely his own, embracing the innovative ideas of the early twentieth century.

Pizzetti’s Requiem, on the other hand, is soundly based on the ideas of Gregorian chant and the fifteenth and sixteenth century Italian masters of polyphony. He introduces some vernacular flourishes by frequently changing the number of voice parts within a section, echoing the improvised folk-singing of his native north Italy.  It is not certain that Pizzetti held as strong a faith as that of Martin, but the spiritual intensity is just as strong.

The third, shorter, work in this programme is a communion motet by the prolific and hugely admired James MacMillan, published just ten years ago, Lux Aeterna.

Songs of Saints

St Giles’ Church OX2 6HT

3 March at 8pm

Tickets available from TicketsOxford from February 1

£12 full price,£8 students and under 12s free

Come and hear this stunning collection of choral music drawn principally from the C16 and C20 performed by the Bartholomew Consort under distinguished Director JanJoost van Elburg.

Music by Crequillon, Palestrina, Guerrero, Lassus, Britten, Part, Moore and Miskinis

Loud Praises Sound at Heaven’s High Gate

Choral music from C.19 and C.20
Sunday 24th June 2018 8pm

St. Michael and All Angels, Summertown, Oxford, OX2 7ES
For members: music and practical information

JanJoost van Elburg will direct the Bartholomew Consort in a choral tour of C19 & C20 liturgical music, ranging from the romantic era inhabited by Felix Mendelssohn (b.1809) through to the self taught Francis Poulenc (d.1963), who wrote from an equally emotional view point. Between these composers were others who embraced similar ideals; we shall include the child prodigy Joseph Rheinberger (church organist at the age of 7), the prolific composer and teacher Charles Villiers Stanford and Max Reger, whose music displayed some Baroque influences, even into the early C20.

Entry is free, but your donations towards the costs of the concert will be most welcome.

How to get there

Address: Church of St. Michael and All Angels, Summertown,  Oxford, OX2 7ES

Map/directions

Bartholomew Consort return to Buckfast Abbey

Buckfast Abbey, Buckfastleigh, Devon, TQ11 0EE

Sunday February 4th 2018  at 4 pm

Quomodo cantabimus…. how may we sing the Lord’s Song in a strange land…..

JanJoost van Elburg directs the Bartholomew Consort in music by  Byrd, De Monte, Gibbons, Tomkins and Verdelot.

Entry is free, donations are welcome. After costs are met a donation will be made to Shelterbox, a charity providing practical assistance to people made homeless by conflict and disaster.