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ROCHESTER CHORAL SOCIETY 150th ANNIVERSARY COMMISSION

Founded in 1873, Rochester Choral Society is celebrating its 150th anniversary in March 2023 with a newly-commissioned choral work, Regards from Rochester, by award-winning British composer, and Rochester resident, Thomas Hewitt-Jones. The work receives its premiere on 18 March 2023 in Rochester Cathedral.

Rochester itself is drenched in history. Regards from Rochester celebrates the rich history of the Medway Towns, exploring themes and valuable human stories while relating them to contemporary society. From the first Saxon settlement through to historic stronghold, from pillar of British naval history through to industrial centre and inspiration for Charles Dickens, composer Thomas Hewitt Jones hopes that this “postcard from Rochester” will celebrate and exude compassion for our planet, social conscience, humanity and kindness – values that are incredibly important to our world in 2023.

Director of Music, John Mountford, says: “Rochester Choral Society has passed some significant milestones recently, with 2022 marking the 100th anniversary of our first performance in Rochester Cathedral. We wanted to commission a piece which reflected the diversity of this area’s rich and turbulent history, with a historically accurate, humorous and engaging new piece. We wanted to find somebody with a connection and passion for the Medway Towns and who wanted to help raise awareness of the cultural and social heritage of the area.”

Composer Thomas Hewitt Jones says: “I was delighted when John Mountford approached me to commission this work for Rochester Choral Society’s very exciting 150th anniversary. Quite early on in our discussions, we decided that the richness of Medway’s history was conducive to a new text, so the result is a 10-movement oratorio which we hope tells the story of the area with sweeping melody and angularity where appropriate. I have written it to be as both engaging and as musically interesting as possible. The final movement of the work brings us to the present day, with the audience joining together to sing with one voice.” 

 John Mountford believes that choral societies are an essential part of national music-making after the COVID era. “Music is central to the lives of so many people; it binds community and enhances wellbeing for singers and audiences alike.

For Thomas Hewitt Jones, writing Regards from Rochester has been an extremely fulfilling and wholesome commission, not only given the richness of local history, but also due to the strength of the musical heritage of Rochester Choral Society dating all the way back to 1873.

“It was a privilege and a pleasure to discover many historic riches of the Medway area, which is often referred to in relation to Charles Dickens, the former Dockyard and as a stronghold to and from London, but in fact contains numerous other riches. Spending extensive time in Rochester library and reading around the history in detail, it became swiftly apparent that the area’s rich social history made up for any perception Medway may have externally of lack of charm; as the text and music were forming, I was delighted to have conversations with local Medway Council operative John Lester, who is a X generation of the Lester family in Rochester and who offered personal anecdotes of life in Medway since the Victorian era, some of which I have incorporated into the work.

Above and beyond the history books and local connections, in this work I have aimed to reflect throughout the work on the nature of life in 2022, both beyond the recent pandemic (which let’s face it indelibly changed life as we know it) and also in the shadow of contemporary issues that affect our society, not least our collective sense of identity and perhaps most importantly, the current climate change crisis.”

REGARDS FROM ROCHESTER – movements

Introduction & Rochester

The River Medway

Early History

The Cathedral

Seven Weeks (The Siege of Rochester)

Down to the Docks (Chatham Dockyard)

That House, 1857 (Charles Dickens)  Baritone soloist playing Dickens

The Victorian High Street

Our Changing World (Contemporary themes incl. Social Conscience and Climate)

The Medway Hymn – rousing end with audience singing in unison

Tickets / info

Rochester Choral Society, one of Britain’s oldest-established choral societies, has always striven to achieve high standards of singing, from the great choral works to traditional folk songs. Since 1922, the choir, which comprises around 75 singers, aged 18-80+, has performed regularly in Rochester Cathedral.

Rochester Choral Society appeared on BBC One’s Antiques Road Trip in January 2023 in an episode featuring Samuel Coleridge-Taylor, who conducted the choir between 1902 and 1907. After the world-premiere of Thomas Hewitt Jones’ Regards from Rochester, the choral society looks forward to a summer performance of Mendelssohn’s St Paul, which was also performed at their very first concert in 1873.

rochesterchoral.co.uk

Thomas Hewitt Jones is an award-winning composer of contemporary classical and commercial music. Since winning the BBC Young Composer Competition in his teens, his music has been published by many of the major music publishers and is frequently heard in concert and on radio, TV and in the cinema. Thomas’s diverse catalogue includes small instrumental, orchestral, choral and ballet works, and his large number of choral titles includes seasonal carols. ‘What Child is This?’ (OUP) has become a choral classic of recent years, garnering large numbers of performances each season. In 2021, he released ‘Can you hear me?’, an acclaimed response to the COVID19 pandemic. His most recent projects include ‘In Our Service’, a special commission from the Royal School of Church Music to celebrate the late Queen’s Platinum Jubilee in 2022, and a ‘Divertimento for Strings’ commissioned by Lucy Melvin to celebrate the 10-year anniversary of her ‘Chamber Players’ courses.

He is also a composer of Library (Production) music for several commercial publishers, with a current catalogue of around a thousand tracks available for licensing which can be heard on a variety of media worldwide. He works from his own cutting-edge studio facility. He was selected to be a member of the BAFTA Crew x BFI Network for 2021-2.

thomashewittjones.com

(Illustration by Rosie Brooks)

For further press information / interviews, please contact Frances Wilson frances_wilson66@live.com

 

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Who or what inspired you to pursue a career in music?

I started my musical life as a chorister at Ripon Cathedral in Yorkshire. Exposure to the greats of choral music was the basis for becoming a composer and conductor, and was a great introduction to the technical as well as the aesthetic aspects of music.

Who or what were the most significant influences on your musical life and career as a composer?

In my teens I corresponded quite a bit with Benjamin Britten in the later years of his life, and he gave me a lot of ideas and encouragement to become a composer. Studying music at Christ Church, Oxford as an undergraduate was also an important step on the road.

What have been the greatest challenges/frustrations of your career so far?

The greatest challenges revolve around presenting pieces to audiences which require active listening on their part. People are everywhere bombarded with noise, and commercial music of all kinds, which requires no active participation from the listener. This puts them off the idea of listening to something and being challenged to think about what the music is trying to say to them.

Of which works are you most proud?

The Sonata for Organ, which was premiered and recorded by Clive Driskill-Smith; Suite – King Richard III for Solo Violin, premiered and recorded by Rupert Marshall-Luck; the works I have written for Christ Church, Oxford (especially King Henry VIII’s Apologia); the setting of the Jubilate Deo (in Zulu) which I wrote for the 750th Anniversary of the foundation of Merton College, Oxford; and a number of choral pieces for choirs in Germany, especially the Frankfurt Canticles and Responses, and the Berlin Canticles and Responses. I have also had a number of commissions from the London Festival of Contemporary Church Music. My Sonata for Piano is just about to be premiered in London, and this is a major piece.

What are the special challenges/pleasures of working on a commissioned piece?

Making sure that we are all agreed at the outset as to what exactly is being requested, and the reason why the person is commissioning the piece. However, it is a very rewarding experience to deliver a new work to someone who has commissioned it. People are very generous in their appreciation of new works like that. It is very exciting to be writing for a distinguished performer or ensemble, in particular to write a work which fits their style of performance, their character, and their ethos. The challenge is to write something which is appropriate to the performer, and is a work that they will want to play frequently and be identified with. Of course, they can be very demanding (!), but that is also good, because it means they have thought a lot about what they are looking for and why.

What are the special challenges/pleasures of working with particular musicians, singers, ensembles and orchestras?

Mainly this is a great pleasure, because the reason they will want to play your music is because they choose to. This enables one to develop a longer-term relationship with performers who are looking to include this type of music in their repertoire. Then a very fruitful discussion about new pieces can ensue, and trying new things which enhance the appeal of the performer to the audience.

How would you characterise your compositional/musical language?

It varies from very simple tonal pieces (especially some of the pieces for church choirs), through to more complex works, like the larger Sonatas. Maybe it could be see as being a continuation of the English musical tradition, from VW, Howells, Finzi, Britten, Tippett, Leighton, Lutyens.

How do you work?

I do like things to be organised, because I really do not like missing deadlines! A lot of planning goes into each piece. They will have been forming in my mind for many months (sometimes even years) before the pencil even hits the paper. I tend to write things out long-hand, and then put them onto Sibelius. Then it’s off to the publishers.

As a musician, what is your definition of success?

That people are interested enough to listen to the music, and that if they studied it in detail, they would appreciate the logic, structure, and meaning of the pieces I have written. Where listeners have done this, they tell me the music appeals to the ear, the heart, and the brain. It’s lovely when you get feedback like that.

What do you consider to be the most important ideas and concepts to impart to aspiring musicians?

To work hard, listen to the great music, and enjoy what you are doing. You have an individual voice as a composer or performer, and you need to find ways to express yourself. Others will guide you, but your voice is your own.

Richard Pantcheff’s Piano Sonata is premiered by Duncan Honeybourne on 6 November 2019 at the 1901 Arts Club, London. Introduction by Richard Pantcheff. More information

Richard Pantcheff is internationally renowned as a composer in many genres, and has established a prominent reputation as a composer of Choral, Organ, Chamber and instrumental music of the highest quality. His musical career commenced as Head Chorister at Ripon Cathedral, in England. During his five years as a Music Scholar at senior school, he corresponded regularly with Benjamin Britten, who acted as occasional mentor to him in composition. Thereafter, he graduated with Honours in Music at Christ Church, Oxford University, under Simon Preston and Francis Grier.

Read more

You can see most of Richard’s music on his publisher’s website : www.musicaneo.com

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An initial approach via this blog in March 2017  led me this week to St George’s Bristol for a lunchtime concert by the sparkling Piano 4 Hands duo (Waka Hasegawa and Joseph Tong).

Last year Josie Dixon emailed me to ask if I might feature her mother, the composer Ailsa Dixon, in my Meet the Artist series. One of Ailsa’s choral works was receiving its premiere as part of the Oriana Choir’s Five15 project. This was rather special because, as Josie explained, her mother had rather “hidden her light under a bushel for the majority of her lifetime”. Ailsa’s interview was published on my Meet the Artist site in July 2017, to coincide with the premiere of her anthem These things shall be, a setting of verses by John Addington Symonds. Around the same time, Josie contacted me again to ask if I knew a piano duo who might be interested in giving Ailsa’s piano sonata ‘Airs of the Seasons’ its first performance. Knowing their fondness for contemporary repertoire for piano duo, I immediately suggested Waka Hasegawa and Joseph Tong (Piano 4 Hands), and was delighted to hear from Josie that they had enthusiastically taken up the piano sonata.

Sadly, Ailsa died in August 2017, just short of her 85th birthday.

In April this year, as I was in the throes of preparing to move from London to the West Country, Josie contacted me again to tell me that Waka and Joseph would be premiering Ailsa’s piano sonata in Bristol on 8 November. As I’d never visited St George’s (considered by many of my musician friends and colleagues to possess the UK’s finest acoustic), nor heard Waka and Joseph together as a duo, I was delighted to join Josie and her family and friends to celebrate the premiere of her mother’s piano sonata.

St George’s, a former church in the graceful, well-proportioned Greek Revival style of the early 1820s, is a really fine venue, and a handsome new extension has added a contemporary bar and social area which perfectly complements the building’s clean neo-classical lines. The concert hall itself retains the columns and balcony of the original church, together with a fine altarpiece. A small illuminated star in the ceiling indicates where a bomb fell through the roof during the Second World War but did not explode. At just shy of 600 seats, St George’s is about the same size as London’s Wigmore Hall.

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St George’s Bristol with its new extension

The purity of St George’s acoustic combined with Waka and Joseph’s split-second precision, supreme technical assuredness and musical sensitivity brought wonderful clarity and contrasting shading to Mozart’s Andante with Variations KV 501, which opened the concert. This linked neatly to David Matthews’ Variations on a theme by Haydn, which was written for Waka and Joseph. The unsually chromatic theme from the opening of Haydn’s last string quartet is the starting point for this set of 12 variations which initially remain close to the originally theme before moving into wider musical territory, including a tango (Var. 5), a blues variation (Var. 7) and a moto perpetuo (Var. 10). The work has a delightful sense of fantasy suffused with romanticism and musical wit, and ends with a humorous exchange between the two players which Haydn would surely have appreciated. It was evident from the performance that Waka and Joseph really relish this kind of repertoire, which proves that the piano duet is not confined to small-scale salon works.

Ailsa Dixon’s Airs of the Seasons was composed in the early 1990s and is her only substantial work for piano. Its four brief movements are each prefaced by a short poem, evoking in turn the magical stillness after a winter snowfall, the first stirrings of spring, a dragonfly darting over the water in summer, and finally amid the turning leaves of autumn, a retrospective mood which recalls the earlier seasons and ends with the hope of transcendence in ‘Man’s yearning to see beyond death’. The opening chords of the first movement are reminiscent of Debussy and Britten in their timbres, and the entire work has a distinctly impressionistic flavour. Ailsa’s admiration of Fauré for his “harmonic suppleness” is also evident in her harmonic language, while the idioms of English folksong and hymns, and melodic motifs redolent of John Ireland and the English Romantics remind us that this is most definitely a work by a British composer with an original musical vision. The entire work, although quite short, is really delightful and inventive. Rich in imagination, moods and expression, the musical evocation of each season is distinct and characterful – Summer, for example, is not all sunshine as a brief but dramatic storm interrupts the warmth and serenity, while Autumn contains flashes of music from earlier movements to underline its reflective, retrospective mood. From a pianistic point of view, the textures of the music are carefully conceived to bring a range of colours and voicings imaginatively shared between the two players.

Mme Debussy deemed her husband’s La Mer unplayable in its piano four-hands version, but Waka and Joseph made impressively light work of this masterful evocation of water, light and wind (and reminded me of my coastal home in Dorset, currently in the grip of gale force autumnal winds!). Their brilliant pianism complemented by total synergy at the keyboard brought this work to life with vivid drama and passion, and was a thrilling close to an absorbing and varied programme.

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back row: pianists Waka Hasegawa & Joseph Tong; front row from L to R – Brian Dixon (Ailsa’s husband), Josie Dixon (Ailsa’s daughter) and Frances Wilson (The Cross-Eyed Pianist)

Meet the Artist interview with Ailsa Dixon

More about Ailsa Dixon

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The genteel Wigmore Hall audience was startled by the abrupt slamming of the lid of the piano, heralding the start of a brand new work by a composer celebrating a significant birthday on the day of the concert. The pianist was Igor Levit, always very popular with Wigmore audiences, and the composer was Frederic Rzewski. As a student Levit was captivated by Rzewski’s music and asked the composer to write a new piece. The work premiered at this concert was commissioned by Wigmore Hall for Levit to play.

Read my full review here

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Stephen Hough, composer and pianist with The Prince Consort at Wigmore Hall, Friday 28th October 2016

An evening of music for piano and voice by pianist and polymath Stephen Hough, performed by The Prince Consort, with Hough himself playing in the second half, promised to be something intriguing and special, especially as the programme included the world premiere of Hough’s song cycle Dappled Things, dedicated to John Gilhooly, director of Wigmore Hall.

In setting poetry to music, Hough is working within a fine English song tradition that includes composers such as Purcell, Elgar, Delius, Vaughan Williams, Butterworth and Britten, and indeed there were fleeting musical glimpses of these composers within Hough’s works

Read my full review here

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(picture: The Economist)

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Benjamin Ellin, the award-winning and critically acclaimed British conductor and composer, has been commissioned to create a classical composition focusing on the concept of peace and this year’s centenary of the Battle of the Somme.  The resulting Oratorio One Before Zero is one movement for orchestra, solo baritone, solo mezzo soprano and boys’ choir.

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(picture source: 1914.org)

This large-scale musical narrative work is inspired by the moment before battle, before zero, zero hour, the time at which hostilities commence.  Benjamin Ellin explains: “It’s the time when all that is known can be turned upside down and where a world of emotions dominates the mind and soul of any soldier”.

The work is in English, French and German and aims to illustrate musically and linguistically how the race to war, the loss of life and the destruction of humanity affected all sides in this devastating war.

Benjamin explains the inspiration behind the new work: “The Imperial War Museum provided a great deal of the research materials that helped inform my understanding of the period and I used the archives of Royds Hall School in Huddersfield which was a military hospital during WW1.  I enlisted the talented writer Ben Maier to help me ensure the work flows as a  continuous and complete line. The work has a personal connection too. My great relative, Private Samuel Vincent Boot (No. 19463) was killed in WW1.  I used his army number to develop a lot of musical material and develop the narrative.”

The performance will take place on 11th November 2016 at the renowned Maison de la Culture in Amiens in Northern France which is located just behind where the front line was established in WW1.  A second performance is scheduled on 12th November 2016 in Beauvais, Maladrerie Saint-Lazare.

benjamin_ellin

In this Meet the Artist interview, Benjamin discusses his musical influences, the challenges of his career as a composer, and the creation of ‘One Before Zero’.

Who or what inspired you to take up composing, and pursue a career in music? 

I heard a performance of the Nutcracker at the Royal Ballet as a young boy – my mother took each of us (myself and my two older sisters) to see a ballet when we were young by way of a musical intro – and I was hooked. I persuaded her to buy me the tape recording in the shop and listened to it constantly. Whenever I hear a great piece of music, in whatever genre, I just want to write music or do something creative.

Who or what were the most significant influences on your musical life and career as a composer? 

There isn’t one single thing. My initial musical impulse often comes from the environment I am in or the world events of our time. I also love the sounds that are around us generally and how they often turn in to little musical ideas all by themselves. For instance, one of the tracks from the TAFAHUM album ‘Osmosis’ is inspired by the sound of the Victoria Line tube at Highbury and Islington; the piece is called Three Fishes Laughing.

What have been the greatest challenges/frustrations of your career so far?  

Being pigeonholed really – or people trying to. For me, music is genuinely indivisible and once you try to put people in to boxes you are missing the point. Sadly it seems, at times, this obsession is a by-product of lazy elements of the ‘business’, but I have always believed that the most inspiring characters around do more than one thing and I genuinely just happen to love and feed off different musical arenas.

What are the special challenges/pleasures of working on a commissioned piece? 

The shape of a piece is very important. Once the overall structure is set in your mind, even if it changes slightly in the process of being realised, you can really start to write it out. For ‘One Before Zero’ that really was the main issue; deciding on the form and arch because after that a lot of decisions have been made for you. The challenge is knowing what to not use or not do and structure helps that process of illumination a lot. Pleasures? I love harmony and the juxtaposition of chords and the resonances they have; that and treating the audience to the theatrical elements of music so they are – hopefully – truly gripped and engaged.

What are the special challenges/pleasures of working with particular musicians, singers, ensembles and orchestras? 

If you have a relationship with a performer or a group then you can try and build the musical material around them in subtle ways; this is a joy. A challenge is to always respect the skill and talent of the musicians. They have to play your music and you hope that they actually want to. I don’t believe music is all about the composer in an egotistical way but always about the collective.

Of which works are you most proud? 

I am proud of my Violin Concerto which was premiered last year with the Philharmonia Orchestra, my Trombone Concerto for Joseph Alessi, my tracks on the TAFAHUM album ‘Osmosis’ and the works I have written in conjunction with Violist Rivka Golani and the people of the Siksika nation in Canada – amongst others…

How would you characterise your compositional language?

That is a difficult question – in fact, all these questions are! In short a mix of Stravinsky, Shostakovich, Britten, Vaughan Williams and the jazz world of Miles Davis and Count Basie amongst others. Jazz and blues were major influences growing up in that they were the main style of music that I heard and I still love them. In general, as a composer, I don’t seek to reinvent the wheel but I’ll always express myself as honestly and boldly as I can.

How do you work? 

It largely depends on the piece or the commission. Sometimes a solid idea for a gesture within a piece starts the process and other times I have to work relatively slowly. Waiting for inspiration is all well and good, but sometimes it doesn’t always flow and you have to then rely on your technique – however good it is – when a deadline is there! I also like to sow ideas in my mind and let my subconscious chew them over for a bit; they nearly always find a way of becoming a key part of the process.

Please tell us more about your new work ‘One Before Zero’, to be premiered on Remembrance Day. 

In short it is a large oratorio for orchestra, solo baritone, solo mezzo and SATB male choir to commemorate the Battle of the Somme.

Not so short, well, subconscious played a major part here too. I first worked in Amiens several seasons ago when I wrote two smaller pieces for a new festival there. As soon as I went on a research trip I was hooked on the area, the cathedral and the history of World War 1. I knew I wanted to write something about it and that was a good start for mental gestation! Then I had the chance to work with the orchestra in Picardie as both a composer (I wrote a new work for them) and also as a conductor in several performances. Therefore I got to know the players a little and I also got to work with their Music Director Arie. By the time the commission came I had soaked a lot up about the people, the area and so I could start from a decent place. The desired use of an all male SATB choir provided another set of options for the work as it was clear to me that the choir should be the soldiers and the baritone soloist is one of them whilst the mezzo represents the home front, picking up the pieces and trying to make sense of everything that was going on through the mirage of propaganda and misinformation through media…how things change!

Then, after lots of reading and textual research I decided on the structure of the piece. The soldier (baritone solo), drained, exhausted and battle-hardened from war stands at the front of the stage. Gazing out at the audience he begins to question who are the people across the stretch of no man’s land in front of him who he will shortly be ordered to attack, to kill, or indeed be killed by. Who are they? Are they anything like him? How did he get to this point where a mere order from a higher rank can result in him, a hitherto ordinary man, attacking with such aggression and ferociousness.

This awakening marks the start of the work. The title itself (ONE BEFORE ZERO)  underlines the importance of this moment before battle, before zero, zero hour  – the time at which hostilities commence – when all that is known can be turned upside down and where a world of emotions can surely fly through the mind and soul of any soldier.

The text is also a mixture of source letters, propaganda and diary entries from the time and also a number of commissioned texts by Ben Maier – a writer who I work with regularly. The new texts help knit everything together and I wanted to move away from using war poetry as it had already been done several times. The piece is in three languages, English, French and German as the aim of the piece is to underline the human cost on all sides of this conflict.

What is your most memorable concert experience? 

Again, there have been many for all sorts of reasons. I think my first concert as a conductor at the Philharmonic in St Petersburg was very special. I studied in St Petersburg and saw a concert there during my studies with the St Petersburg Philharmonic. Amazing. Then, years later when I used to do stage managing I stage managed a concert with the EUYO and Ashkenazy there. A few years after that I made my debut as  conductor and with one of my own pieces, WHITE CRUCIFIXION, so it was a powerful feeling of full cycle!

What do you consider to be the most important ideas and concepts to impart to aspiring musicians?

Be really honest with yourself about what you are trying to do, what you love and what you are doing. Lots of people will try and knock you down, directly or just through ignorance. If you genuinely love what you do, no matter what, then just keep going – however hard it gets. Take what you do seriously, but never take yourself seriously so that it becomes destructive – ego is the ugliest trait in people and especially in music.

Where would you like to be in 10 years’ time?  

Music Director of a Professional Orchestra, writing a small handful of film scores a year, touring and collaborating with Tafahum, guest conducting with a handful of organisations and carving out commissions that I am interested in.

What is your idea of perfect happiness?  

Now, as a father, a good afternoon picnic with my wife and children followed by prating around with them, and possibly some creative work in the garden with my daughter helping.

What is your most treasured possession?  

I would say my family, but they are not a possession, so, therefore, I don’t have one.

What do you enjoy doing most?  

Lots of things and as much as I can. I learn about other things from doing something seemingly different so I love variety in work and in life.

What is your present state of mind? 

A mixture of love, contentment, frustration at the world and hope in the many beautiful things that still manage to exist.

‘One Before Zero’, a new oratorio in one movement commissioned by l’Orchestre de Picardie for the Network ONE® – an Orchestra Network for Europe – to commemorate the centenary of the Battle of the Somme will be premiered in France on Remembrance Day, 11th November 2016. Further information and tickets

Award-winning and critically acclaimed British conductor and composer Benjamin Ellin is currently Music Director of Thursford Productions, Founder of the Contemporary Fusion ensemble Tafahum, Principal Conductor of the Slaithwaite Philharmonic Orchestra, Music Director of Focus Opera and President of Pembroke Academy of Music, London.

His belief in the positive power of music within society is reflected in the wide-ranging projects of which he is currently a major figurehead. From his own ensemble Tafahum, major projects and collaborations at London’s Southbank Centre, his own commissioned works with the First Nation communities of Alberta, Canada to his commitment to outreach and development work as well as appearing on stage with leading ensembles across the globe, Ellin’s belief in a musical world without boundaries is equalled by a tireless commitment as a guest artist and as a Music Director.

www.benjaminellin.com