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Three Choirs Festival 2010: A preview from John Quinn (JQ)


The Three Choirs Festival, which can trace its origins back to the early eighteenth century, may well be the oldest musical festival in the world and the 2010 Festival will be the 283rd meeting of the Three Choirs. Each summer the festival rotates between the cathedral cities of Gloucester, Hereford and Worcester. This year it’s the turn of Gloucester to host the Festival, which runs from 7 to 15 August. The Festival will be directed by Adrian Partington, the Director of Music at Gloucester Cathedral.

This is the first Three Choirs Festival that Mr Partington has directed and he’s set his stall out with a wonderfully enticing programme. The programme includes events to mark two major anniversaries: the 150^th anniversary of the birth of Mahler and the Robert Schumann bicentenary – Mark Bebbington will play Schumann’s Piano Concerto at a concert in Cheltenham Town Hall (12 August, 14:30). There’s also the most substantial festival commission that I can remember for quite a few years. John Joubert, who will be Composer in Residence at the festival, has written An English Requiem for soloists, chorus and orchestra, which will be premièred in Gloucester Cathedral on 9 August (19.45). Alongside it Partington has placed one of the truly great symphonies, Beethoven’s Fifth. There’ll be other opportunities to hear music by Joubert during the week but An English Requiem is keenly awaited.

Planning a festival such as this must be a huge challenge but it also presents the festival director with opportunities to showcase favourite pieces and I’m delighted that Adrian Partington intends to treat festival audiences to several of his favourites. In fact I was hugely biased in his favour when I read, in the preliminary festival schedule some months ago his statement that “I began the planning of the programme by inking in my favourite large choral work by Elgar, The Kingdom.” That’s a view I share completely and the prospect of hearing this wonderful work at the first major evening concert is really enticing. Anticipation is heightened because Susan Gritton (soprano) will be on hand to sing the glorious aria, ‘The sun goeth down’ and the crucial role of St Peter is entrusted to that fine baritone, Roderick Williams (7 August, 19.45).

The following night there’s another mighty work – and another Partington favourite – in the shape of Mahler’s ‘Resurrection’ Symphony. For this an eminent guest conductor, Jac van Steen, has been engaged to conduct the Philharmonia Orchestra, which will be in residence throughout the festival (8 August 19.45).

It’s not just composer anniversaries that will be marked. 2010 sees the centenary of two great English orchestral works. Gloucester can’t quite claim the première of the Elgar Violin Concerto, which was given in London. However, a few weeks earlier, at the 1910 Three Choirs, there was a private run-through with piano accompaniment. The work can be heard in its full orchestral glory in Gloucester Cathedral at a concert conducted by Sir Roger Norrington (10 August, 19.45). The soloist will be Philippe Graffin, who has already made a very good recording of the concerto (see review). But one work that Gloucester can claim as its own in Vaughan Williams’s ‘Tallis’ Fantasia, which was heard for the first time in at a Three Choirs Festival concert in Gloucester Cathedral on 6 September 1910. The opportunity to hear it in the very building in which this masterpiece was unveiled to the world is not to be missed.

There’s plenty more English music – as is only right and proper at Three Choirs. There’s Finzi’s Intimations of Immortality, which was first performed at the Gloucester Three Choirs of 1950 (13 August, 19.45). It will be good to hear this sadly underrated work performed live and the same concert also offers Elgar’s Sea Pictures. There are two exceptional soloists in this concert; Sarah Connolly (Elgar) and James Gilchrist (Finzi). Completing the feast of English choral music, the closing concert offer Holst’s blazingly original Hymn of Jesus and two pieces by Parry; his well-known I was Glad and his unfairly neglected Ode on the Nativity. Having had the good fortune to sing in performances of all three works over the years I find the prospect of all three on one programme irresistible (14 August, 19.45).

It’s not all English music, though. In addition to the major works by Beethoven and Mahler, there’s an evening of Mozart – his ‘Prague’ Symphony and Mass in C minor (11 August, 19.45). The very next evening brings an unusual event in the shape of a semi-staged operatic performance in the Cathedral. The work is Monteverdi’s Orfeo and the performance will be by the New London Consort and Philip Picket. Incidentally, the production they’ll be bringing is by Jonathan Miller. (12 August, 19.45)

Away from the main Cathedral concerts there’s a whole host of events that, while no less interesting, are on a slightly smaller scale. These include talks, recitals, some choral conducting master classes by ex-King’s Singer, Simon Carrington and, of course, Choral Evensong in the Cathedral nearly every evening. The current members of The King’s Singers are in recital in Tewkesbury Abbey (7 August, 14.30) and the same glorious surroundings will see the debut of a new ensemble, the Three Choirs Youth Choir. Adrian Partington will conduct them in a programme of Bach’s Magnificat and pieces by Handel (13 August, 14.30).

Among the recitals, two stand out in particular. One is an organ recital in the cathedral by Simon Preston (13 August, 11.00). The following morning Roderick Williams can be heard in a recital of English songs – a speciality of his – including songs by Butterworth, Finzi, Gurney, Moeran and Ian Venables (14 August, St. Mary de Lode Church, 11.00).

Running to seventy-two events in all, this year’s Three Choirs Festival looks a most enticing prospect. Full details of the Festival are available at the Festival website Bookings can be made either online or by contacting the Box Office at 7c, College Green, Gloucester, GL1 2LX United Kingdom. Telephone bookings, from 1 June, are on 0845 652 1823

John Quinn