Royal Tunbridge Wells Choral Society and the Southbank Sinfonia
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Royal Tunbridge Wells Choral Society and the Southbank Sinfonia Conducted by Rebecca Miller Miriam Allan - Soprano | Kate Symonds-Joy - Mezzo Soprano Ben Thapa - Tenor | James Cleverton - Bass Generously supported by Tigyal Tunbridge TVells Burfields House Wealth Management Ltd CHORAL www.burfieldshouse.co.uk SOCIETY w w w .r t w c s . o r g . u k Hotel RTWCS Is a Registered Charity, number 27331 duVIn & Bistro @RTWChoralSoc Programme £2.50 ROYAL TUNBRIDGE WELLS CHORAL SOCIETY President: Guy Huntrods, CBE Vice Presidents: Derek Watmough MBE, Roy Dunstall Gold Patrons Silver Patrons Friends Mrs E Gall Mr M Hudson Mrs J Finch Mrs P Maxwell Mr G Grant Mr G Huntrods CBE Mr & Mrs L Grover Mrs L McCarthy Mr W Rutherford Mr R Thatcher Mrs A M Hone Mr L Morris Mr I Hughes Mr P Rosling More culture at a lower cost Support the Society and enjoy preferential treatment by becoming a Friend or Patron. The majority of arts based charities depend on voluntary financial support. Our singing members pay an annual subscription which roughly covers our overheads but the income from the sale of tickets is rarely enough to cover the cost of hiring the concert hall and paying for the orchestra and soloists. Becoming a Friend or Patron helps us to close the gap and at the same time guarantees a preferential choice of a “best seat in the house” for our concerts. Friends and Patrons also receive periodic Newsletters, are invited to attend choir members’ social events. Friends. Friends are currently asked to pay a minimum of £70 pa and receive all the benefits listed above. This amounts to only a few pounds more than the cost of the best seat price for all four concerts but in most cases also allows the Society to claim a Gift Aid refund from HM Revenue and Customs. Patrons. Patrons are those supporters who feel they would like to donate a little more than the basic Friends subscription. Silver Patrons are those who make a contribution between £100 and £200, whilst those contributing over £200 are classed as Gold Patrons. Gold Patrons receive two free tickets per concert rather than one. Unless they ask not to be included, the names of Friends and Patrons are listed in our concert programmes in recognition of their support. Applications to become a Friend or Patron can be accepted at any time by contacting: Gerald Chew: Telephone: 01892 527958 or e-mail: [email protected] We do hope that anyone who regularly attends the Society’s concerts and values the contribution the Society makes to music in Tunbridge Wells, will consider becoming a Friend or Patron, or by simply making a donation. The Society is a registered charity (no: 27331) and donations can be treated as “gift aid”. W e focus solely on providing face-to-face advice and oiler a dedicated, personal wealth management service to build long-term, trusted relationships with our clients. Together, we would look to create a working plan, providing you with a clear direction towards meeting your financial goals. This includes clarifying your objectives and researching all of the options available to you. We have die experience to help you successfully secure and enhance your financial future by offering specialist advice in a wide range, of areas including: ■ Investments • Retirement planning • Tax and estate planning • l ong term care planning For further information, or to request your complimentary guide to wealth management please contact us quoting RTWCS. BURFIELDS HOUSE WEALTH MANAGEMENT LTD r Principal Partner Practice o f St.Jam es's Place Wealth Management IdSSS' 1 4VKUiosioi;v*iK«i» CtrvorioNocN ST. JAMES’S PLACE ■ 11 m ul'iin 1 1 WEALTH MANAGEMENT mis 1* Burfields House, Goudhurst TN I7 1AE T e l: 01580 211 211 PARTNERS IN MANAGING YOUR WEALTH Email: [email protected] Web: www.burfieldshouse.co.uk An investment with St. James’s Place will be directly linked to the performance of the funds selected and may fall as well as rise.You may get back less than the amount invested. The Partner Practice represent* only St. James’* Plain: Wealth Management pic (which U authumed and regulated by the Finn tidal Conduct Authority) lor the pwrjx>*c of advising vilely on the Group's wealth management products and services, more details uf which arc set out on the Group's website ivinv sjp.ro.uL/products. The title 'Partner Practice' is the marketing term used to describe Si. James's Place representatives. PROGRAMME I: Missa 1. Kyrie (Choir) 2. Christe (Soprano 1&2) 3. Kyrie (Choir) 4. a. Gloria (Choir) b. Et in terra pax (Choir) 5. Laudamus te (Soprano) 6. Gratias agimus tibi (Choir) 7. a. Domine Deus (Soprano & Tenor) b. Qui tollis (Choir) 8. Qui sedes (Mezzo) 9. a. Quoniam tu solus sanctus (Bass) b. Cum Sancto Spiritu (Choir) INTERVAL II. Symbolum Nicenum 10. Credo in unum Deum (Choir) 11. Patrem omnipotentem (Choir) 12. Et in unum Dominum (Soprano & Mezzo) 13. Et incarnates est (Choir) 14. Crucifixus (Choir) 15. Et resurrexit (Choir) 16. Et in Spritium sanctum (Bass) 17. a. Confiteor (Choir) b. Et expect (Choir) III. Sanctus 18. a. Sanctus (Choir) b. Pleni sunt coeli (Choir) IV. Osanna, Benedictus, Agnus Dei et Dona nobis pacem 19. Osanna in excelsis (Choir) 20. Benedictus (Tenor) 21. Osanna repetatur (Choir) 22. Agnus Dei (Mezzo) 23. Dona nobis pacem (Choir) PROGRAMME NOTES regard the resulting composition as a performable work? Musicologists continue to speculate on the answers. In attempting a description of the mass and its origins, we take as our starting point the year 1733. Bach had been in the prosperous Saxon town of Leipzig for ten years, serving as Musical Director of the chief churches of St. Thomas and St. Nicholas and as cantor of St. Thomas’s School. His creative genius had already produced Johann Sebastian Bach: many of the great works by which his Mass in B Minor, BWV 232 fame has since been assured. That first decade at Leipzig alone had seen Bach’s Mass in B minor stands at the the composition of five complete very pinnacle of achievement in the cycles of church cantatas appropriate composition of sacred choral music. to all the feasts of the Christian year; It is a work of monumental scale, quite his two great Passion settings, the impractical in a liturgical context; yet St. John and St. Matthew: and many its sheer vastness is surely a reflection instrumental works and orchestral of the depth of its spiritual devotion. pieces. In 1729, he had added to a heavy workload of musical The B Minor Mass is such an supervision, performance, recital established part of the choral repertoire work, and teaching by taking over that the listener may not always realise direction of the Collegium Musicum, that it is also an enigmatic work. Its an orchestra of professional town history is one of development rather musicians and university students than straightforward composition, and that gave concerts at a local coffee even the new chronology of Bach’s house. But busy musician though he musical output, established by Alfred was, Bach was frequently at odds Durr and other researchers, has failed with his colleagues and employers to assign a complete series of precise at St. Thomas’s School and with the dates to the various stages of its elders of the town council. Often coming to birth. And at the heart of the there were disputes concerning fees, enigma lie two questions: first, at what which were so vital to Bach, with a point did Bach, a Lutheran Protestant, large family to support. By 1733, there plan to write a full Roman Catholic is some evidence to suggest that he Mass and second, did he himself really was feeling unappreciated at Leipzig. Early in 1733, there came a period give him some measure of security of enforced inactivity. On 1 February from what he considered to be the Augustus II, King of Poland and insulting treatment meted out to him Elector of Saxony, died. This event by the Leipzig authorities. The petition was followed by five months of failed, although the Missa may well mourning, during which all public have received a performance in music-making was temporarily Dresden that year. Bach did, however, suspended. Relieved of the eventually get his title: he was made composition and supervision of court composer to Augustus in 1736. music for the Lenten services, Bach found himself with time to devote At exactly what point Bach decided to personal projects. It is believed to expand the Missa into a full that he used the opportunity to work blown setting of the Catholic Mass on the composition of a Missa, a is a matter of conjecture. Modern portion of the liturgy sung in Latin researchers in general believe that and common to both the Lutheran the “Symbolum Nicenum” (Bach’s and Roman Catholic rites. The Missa term for the Credo) was composed comprised settings of the Kyrie and between 1742 and 1745, but there Gloria from the ordinary of the Mass. are those that think it predates the Its ecumenical qualities undoubtedly Missa and was first heard in 1732. stimulated Bach to make a musical The Sanctus, (a reworking of a setting that he, a Lutheran, could setting of the same text that was duly dedicate to his new sovereign already two decades old), the Augustus III, a Catholic. In the early Benedictus, the Agnus Dei, and the months of 1733, Bach’s eldest Dona Nobis Pacem were all added son, Wilhelm Friedemann, secured in the late 1740s.