A Weekend in Winchester Cathedral

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Winchester Cathedral

Winchester Cathedral

This coming weekend, 16-17 February, St Stephen’s Church Choir are singing the choral services in Winchester Cathedral.

Music on Saturday has a Tudor flavour, with the canticles and anthem by Orlando Gibbons. On Sunday, the First Sunday of Lent, music at the Sung Eucharist includes Palestrina’s ‘Missa Brevis’ and ‘Sicut cervus’. The responses throughout the weekend are by Ayleward, who was a chorister at Winchester in the 1630s and who went on to be organist of Norwich Cathedral.

For the full music list and service times, please click here.

St Stephen’s Choir singing Evensong in Canterbury Cathedral

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Canterbury Cathedral

Canterbury Cathedral

This coming Saturday, 26th February, St Stephen’s Church Choir are siging Evensong in Canterbury Cathedral at 3.15pm. The music is shown below – please come along and support us!

 

Preces & Responses – Ayleward

Psalm 119 vv. 145-152

Canticles – Stanford in C

Anthem – Cantique de Jean Racine – Fauré

Hymn – City of God, how broad and far (NEH 346)

Christmas Carol Singing at Ye Olde Beverlie

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It always feels like the Christmas season starts properly when we sing carols at our local pub, Ye Olde Beverlie, after our last rehearsal before Christmas and this year was no exception. A splendid evening of singing carols (including the Carol of the bells, as requested by Paddy, the Beverlie’s manager!) with a packed supportive audience, who even joined in where they knew the words! There are some photographs from the evening in the album below – click on the thumbnail for a larger image.

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Carol broadcast on BBC1 South East Today

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BBC South East Today

On Friday 21st December, St Stephen’s Church Choir will be seen on BBC South East Today, the local news programme for Kent and East Sussex broadcast on BBC1 at 6.30pm.

The choir spent an enjoyable evening at the beginning of last week recording the carol several times over so that the crew could shoot it from different angles without appearing in shot! For the braodcast several other local groups of nurses and soldiers will be mixed into the final cut – hopefully in tune and in time with us!

If you missed the broadcast, it’s sadly no longer available on iPlayer, but I have put our little bit up on YouTube so that you can see it below – I hope the BBC won’t mind too much! Do have a look at some of the photos below too of stills from the broadcast and those taken during filming.

It would be lovely to hear your feedback afterwards!

Still images from the broadcast:

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Images from the filming:

Coming soon!

Christmas Services 2012

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St Stephen's in the snow

St Stephen's in the snow

Below is a list of rehearsal and service times over the Christmas week. I know that is a very busy time of year for everyone but please try to be at as much as possible; your musical contribution to the worship at St Stephen’s is enjoyed and appreciated by so many people.

Friday 21st December 2012

6.30 pm

Broadcast as part of BBC South East Today

7.30 pm

Full Choir Practice

9.00 pm

Carol Singing in Ye Olde Beverlie

Sunday 23rd December 2012

The Fourth Sunday of Advent

10.30 am

Sung Eucharist

4.30 pm

Full Choir Practice

6.00 pm

Carol Service

Monday 24th December 2012

Christmas Eve

2:00 pm

Crib Service

5:30 pm

Community Carol Singing (Meet in Cathedral Chapter House)

11:30 pm

Midnight Mass

Tuesday 25th December 2012

Christmas Day

10.30 am

Sung Eucharist

Friday 28th December 2012

No Choir Practice tonight

Sunday 30th December 2012

The First Sunday of Christmas

10.30 am

Sung Eucharist

Monday 31st December 2012

2.00 pm

Wedding (Full Choir)

A fantastic weekend of services at Portsmouth Cathedral

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St Stephen's Choir in Portsmouth Cathedral

St Stephen’s Choir in Portsmouth Cathedral following Evensong on Sunday

Last weekend, 3-5 August, St Stephen’s Church Choir sang the services at Portsmouth Cathedral. Music included canticles by Stanford, Ireland and Brewer, anthems by Wood, Peeters and Goodall and Widor’s setting of the Mass on Sunday Morning. The weekend also included the world première of ‘Hail, gladdening light’, composed by Stephen Barker, Organist and Choirmaster of St Stephen’s. Full details of the music sung, together with photographs are available on the trip webpage.

Feedback from the Cathedral clergy was very positive, and the Dean asked us not to leave it four years before returning again (it’s four years since our previous visit).

Wonderful feedback from Canterbury Cathedral

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Canterbury Cathedral

Canterbury Cathedral

Following our singing at Evensong in Canterbury Cathedral last week where the music included plainsong psalms, fauxbourdons by Thomas Morley and my setting of ‘Teach me, O Lord’, I received a very complimentary letter from the Precentor today. It reaffirmed what was said on the day, that ‘…the music, and your performance of it, went down a storm with the Dean and Chapter!’

For more details of the service, along with some recordings of music sung, do visit our singing in Canterbury Cathedral page.

Congratulations to all who were involved in the service!

Choral Evensong from Canterbury Cathedral

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St Stephen’s Church Choir sang Choral Evensong in Canterbury Cathedral on Thursday 16th February, the on which the Cathedral commemorates Saints and Martyrs of our own time.  The quality of singing was excellent and the choir received many positive comments from the congregation.  Well done to everyone who was involved.  Below is a recording of Psalm 84 sung during the service:


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St Stephen’s Church Choir Top Choir Kent finalists again!

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St Stephen’s Choir are excited to have been offered a place in the final of the Top Choir Kent competition, run by Canterbury Rotary Club, for the third year running.

Established in 2010, the competition invites choirs from across Kent to audition. Each year, eight choirs are chosen for the live final held in the Shirley Hall, Canterbury – this year on Saturday 31st March at 6.30pm. Tickets are available from the Marlowe Theatre box office – for more details and to book, please follow this link.

According to the organisers, this year saw a very high quality of entries so the final should be a fantastic evening of choral music. St Stephen’s Choir will be singing Fauré’s Cantique de Jean Racine and Bob Chilcott’s Gloria from his ‘Little Jazz Mass’.

More details about the competition can be found on the official website.