Sydney Chamber Choir Explores Themes Of ‘Time And Place’
Sydney Chamber Choir’s final concert of the year, Time and Place, explores themes of identity, human connection and place through a scintillating collection of choral works spanning the last century. A highlight of the concert is A West Irish Ballad, written by Australian composer and former SCC chorister Clare Maclean which was commissioned by the choir for its first performance in 1989. Natalie Shea, who still sings with the choir, was at this premiere and it’s clear that the music hasn’t lost its power in our own time and place.
She says “Singing the music of your own country is a very special thing, and Sydney Chamber Choir has made it a core part of its mission to sing and to commission new Australian works…Singing in the premiere of A West Irish Ballad in 1989 took me far from my own country, to the other side of the world: to Ireland. And not just to a name on a map, but to real places: a marshland with a snipe calling in the night, a hillside where the sheep are flocked, and a little country church where two young lovers share their love in secret glances, while pretending to read the Bible…”
Sydney Chamber Choir performs this beautiful work of Clare’s alongside Ella Macens’ Stāvi Stīvi, Ozoliņ, Paul Stanhope’s I Have Not Your Dreaming and works by Healey Willan, René Clausen, Morten Lauridsen, David Conte and Jonathan Dove in this breathtaking concert.
Conductor – Sam Allchurch / Sydney Chamber Choir
The programme: Jonathan Dove -The Passing of the Year/ Healey Willan – Fair in Face/ Healey Willan -I Beheld Her, Beautiful as a Dove/ Healey Willan -Rise Up, My Love, My Fair One/ Paul Stanhope -I Have Not Your Dreaming/ Ella Macens – Stāvi Stīvi, Ozoliņ
(Stand Strong, Oak Tree)/ Clare Maclean -A West Irish Ballad/ René Clausen -Tonight Eternity Alone/ Morten Lauridsen -Nocturnes/ David Conte -Invocation and Dance
