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Film Soundtracks and the English Renaissance – the 'Hardest Challenge'
Join us for this Workshop led by David Swinson on Saturday 8th March from 10 am to 5pm at St James' Church, Abinger Common.
Workshop outline
Film soundtracks and the English Renaissance - may not be an obvious combination, but the skills required to sing on a professional film soundtrack and to sing Renaissance choral music are very similar: excellent vocal control. On a soundtrack a vocal ‘colour’ is often added to the instrumental mix and singers are required to sing unwavering long notes and phrases where the vowel sound, pitch and breath control are closely examined. The hardest challenge is often to start and finish notes with complete control and poise. These techniques are equally valuable when singing unaccompanied polyphony from the English Renaissance where each melodic line is important and must present the same degree of control, colour, and shape.
Structure
The workshop will begin with technical work based on vocal control and original film music cues which David has worked on will be used. Some of the finest British choral music was composed during the Elizabethan period and the aim of the second part of the workshop will be to work on two contrasting pieces: a madrigal and a motet, one intended for domestic performance and one for liturgical.
Workshop Leader – David Swinson
David’s musical journey began as a choirboy at Magdalen College, Oxford. He started directing choirs as soon as his voice changed at the age of fourteen and has since conducted choirs of adults and children, both professional and amateur. From 2001 to 2024 he was Director of Trinity Boys Choir, arguably the busiest professional boys’ choir in the UK. Under his directorship the choir performed in fourteen BBC Proms concerts, recorded over thirty major film soundtracks, and toured the US, China, Japan and throughout Europe. In the world of opera, the choir appeared regularly at Glyndebourne, the Royal Opera House, English National Opera, and abroad at such prestigious venues as the Aix-en-Provence Festival and the Teatro alla Scala, Milan. The choir’s recordings were acclaimed Critics’ Choice for the American Record Review and Recording of the Month in both MusicWeb International and Organists’ Review.
David has worked with artists as diverse as Michael Bublé, Florence + The Machine, James Blunt, Cliff Richard, Andrea Bocelli, Jacob Collier and Nick Cave. TV work includes The Royal Variety Performance, the Strictly Come Dancing Christmas Special and Children in Need. He also worked with Paul McCreesh on a BBC documentary of Handel’s ‘Messiah’ and has enjoyed particularly fruitful collaborations with the conductors John Eliot Gardiner, Ivan Fischer and Mirga Grazinyte-Tyla. Most recently he has worked on C4’s ‘The Great’, Netflix’s ‘All the Light We Cannot See’ and Amazon Prime’s ‘The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power’.
Our Summer Concert, on 5th July:
R. Vaughan Williams - English Folk Songs
Cecilia McDowall - A Fancy of Folk Songs
Marten Jansson - Missa Popularis
At St Pauls, Dorking
Our Autumn Concert, on 16th November:
Haydn - Nelson Mass
The Missa in angustiis (Mass for troubled times), is a Mass setting by the Austrian composer Joseph Haydn. It is one of the six masses written near the end of his life that are seen as a culmination of his composition of liturgical music.
At St Martins, Dorking
As we prepare for our celebration of St. Cecilia, there’s a unique historical link to Dorking worth sharing. William Mullins, a prominent figure who joined the Mayflower voyage to New England, lived just a short distance from where our concert will take place. While we commemorate St. Cecilia, patron saint of music, we can also reflect on Mullins' journey and Dorking’s place in history.
Cecilia McDowall’s Good News from New England feels particularly fitting, as it echoes the spirit of exploration and hope that Mullins and the Pilgrims embodied. With West Street reopening around the time of our concert, this is a wonderful opportunity to celebrate both our town’s musical heritage and its historical significance.
Conducted by Daniel Mahoney
Accompanied by The Bridge Sinfonia, with soloists
Music by:
CECILIA MCDOWALL Good News from New England
PURCELL Three Odes for St. Cecilia's Day
G.F. HANDEL Ode for St. Cecilia's Day
Saturday 23rd November 6.30pm
St Martin’s Church, Church Street , Dorking, RH4 1UT
Tickets: £18
On a sunlit summer evening on 1 July, 2023 an attentive audience were treated to an innovative
concert by the Dorking Choral Society at St Paul’s Church, Dorking. The first half of the concert was
devoted to a celebration of part-songs by four 20 th century composers, and the second half to the
mid-world wars work Dona nobis pacem by the choir’s own eminent founder, Ralph Vaughan
Williams. The choir were conducted by their musical director, Daniel Mahoney, and accompanied at
the piano by the distinguished pianist and choral director, Mark Shepherd, and by the rising young
soloists, the soprano, Emily Beech, and baritone, William Harmer.
The concert began with a setting by Gerald Finzi of four poems by Robert Bridges, in which the choir
captured both the life and lyricism of My spirit sang all day with the contrasting smooth and
soothing comfort of Clear and gentle stream. Their sensitive performance would have pleased the
(thankfully saved!) BBC Singers who gave the first performance of these songs. The remaining three
songs, composed by Piers Maxim, Stephen Paulus and Jake Runsted respectively, each presented
particular emotional challenges to the choir especially as the first and third were composed in
memory of the deaths of individuals well known to the composers (in the case of Our revels now are
ended, a former member of the Dorking Choral Society), and required a controlled combination by
the choir of grief, hope and celebration. They were, however, able to relax a little in a warm and
nostalgic rendering of the near spiritual song, The road home, by Stephen Paulus.
The second half of the concert was devoted to the major work, Dona nobis pacem, by Vaughan
Williams. Although this is normally scored for a large orchestra, this was a more intimate
performance supported by Mark Shepherd’s sensitive and accomplished piano accompaniment.
Combining the war poetry of Walt Whitman, words from the Bible and Vaughan Williams’ own
experience of the horrors of the first world war, it required the choir to portray both the despair and
cruelty of war, the need for reconciliation and restrained hope for peace and better times in the
future. They rose superbly to the occasion, aided in no small measure by William Harmer’s moving
and mellifluous rendering of The angel of death has been abroad, and the sweet and gently
persistent prayer of Agnus dei by Emily Beech at both the beginning and end of the work. Although
the emotional power of this piece perhaps overtook the memory of the lyricism and colour of the
part songs in the first half of the programme the choir’s sensitive and controlled performance
reminded the audience of the war in Ukraine and the many other problems we face in our
contemporary world.
Brian Unwin
Dorking Choral Society welcomed two Tonmeister students to come and record a choral rehearsal on Wednesday 22nd March 2023. The students, who were from the University of Surrey, were given a tour of the society's rehearsal room and were then able to record the rehearsal of the society's upcoming repertoire for the Leith Hill Music Festival. The students were very impressed with the standard of the singing and were grateful for the opportunity to record the rehearsal. The society is looking forward to hearing the finished recording and is grateful to the students for their time and effort.
The students, Josh and Alex, who are at different stages of their study, were very excited to be given the opportunity to record a choral rehearsal. They will be studying Tonmeister, which is the art of recording and producing music, for three years and were keen to put their skills to the test.
The rehearsal was for the Society's upcoming performance at Dorking Halls on 15th April. The students were impressed with the standard of the singing and were able to capture the beauty of the music perfectly.
The society is very grateful to the students for their time and effort. The recording will be used to promote the society's upcoming performance and will also be used for educational purposes.
