Tewkesbury and another great concert

On Friday we sandwiched a short trip to Tewkesbury between our two rehearsals. Tewkesbury Abbey was founded in 1087, but the current building was largely constructed between 1102 and 1121, and is a fine example of the Norman Romanesque style. When we entered the abbey, we discovered a choral rehearsal in progress -- for a concert that afternoon of the Three Choirs Festival. Hearing Lauridsen's O magnum mysterium echo through the abbey as we walked in was an unexpected special moment.















The town of Tewkesbury, in Gloucestershire, is situated where the river Severn meets the river Avon. Unfortunately this means that it is occasionally subject to flooding. Tewkesbury has been called one of the best Medieval streetscapes in England, with a lot of half-timbered buildings and narrow alleys.












On Friday evening, many of us took the coach to Worcester for another wonderful concert. The Festival Chorus and Philharmonia Orchestra combined in two major works: An Oxford Elegy, by Ralph Vaughan Williams; and Johannes Brahms' Ein deutsches Requiem.

The text of An Oxford Elegy combines portions of two poems by Matthew Arnold, "The Scholar Gipsy" and "Thyrsis". Vaughan Williams had originally wanted to create an opera based on "The Scholar Gipsy". The text is conveyed primarily by a narrator, with the choir either singing wordlessly or echoing the narrator. It was interesting to hear passages referring to scenes in Oxford so soon after our visit there.

And the eye travels down to Oxford's towers:
That sweet city with her dreaming spires,
She needs not summer for beauty's heightening.
Lovely all times she lies, lovely to-day!

Brahms' German Requiem is much more familiar to choirs and audiences, but no less worth hearing again -- and this was an excellent performance. Brahms was an agnostic, but he know the Lutheran Bible well, and chose to use passages from the Old and New Testaments, and the Apocrypha, rather than the traditional Requiem Mass text.

Laura S.