Choral society with joy of singing for all ages

HENLEY Choral Society and Henley Youth Choir are going from strength to strength and tickets have just sold out for their Christmas concert.

However, music director Richard Harker says there is still plenty of room for new members for both the society and the youth choir, which is performing tonight (Friday) at Henley Christmas Festival.

“If people are unable to make the concert, then the youth choir are singing at the lights on, I think we’re on at 5.45pm, we’re looking forward to doing something with them,” he says.

“Our youth choir is supported by Henley Choral Society. We’re really keen to continue promoting the kids and their singing and we feel that it’s a really important part of Henley’s cultural life.

“We’ve had a really interesting year because it was the youth choir’s 10th anniversary.

“We did some lovely performances with Studio Forcada, which is a string ensemble run by Claudio Forcada in and around Henley, so we teamed up with them and that was a real highlight. We’ve been doing the Harpsden
Hoo-Ha for a couple of years, which again is completely different. We get in a small band, a bass drummer and Anita D’Attellis on the piano and sing songs at the music festival and now we’re ready for our Christmas gig. We’ll be back at Henley Youth Festival in March.

“So the kids just do a whole variety of things. We’ve been going into a few schools recently to try and promote the choir and raise awareness and support for singing in schools in Henley and the surrounding area.

“We’re very open to new members and really encouraging people to come and join us because they sing so well, they are an excellent group of musicians, the kids who sing, and what they achieve is really impressive. We’re just keen to spread the message about that and how good singing is for the kids.”

Next up for the choral society is a Brahms Requiem “Come and Sing” workshop, at St Mary’s Church in Henley on Saturday, January 31 (10am to 4pm), followed by a performance at Reading Concert Hall on Saturday, March 14, alongside the City of London Sinfonia.

“If there are people in Henley or the surrounding area who would like to trial the choir and trial singing one of the absolute masterworks of all western classical music, then do come along,” adds Richard.

“It's going to be a really great concert. We’ve got Ross Ramgobin coming back, he sang for us a couple of years ago.”

Written between 1865 and 1868 by German Romantic composer Johannes Brahms, after the death of his mother and of his friend, Robert Schumann, A German Requiem, Op. 45 comprises seven movements, of which four are for chorus.

Richard says: “The requiem certainly comes out of his devotion to his mum but it also comes out of a slightly challenging place for him because he is not overtly religious and yet he’s desperate to try to find something that says something about death in a meaningful way.

“All of the texts are selected by him from scripture. There’s no overt reference to God or Jesus, they’re texts that offer consolation and understanding.

“The first movement of the text is ‘Blessed are they who mourn’ and the final movement is ‘Blessed are the dead’ and so that frames the entire work, this understanding that people need to be comforted in their grief as we think about those who have left us.

“So it’s an incredibly moving work but unusual in that it has no requiem text. Religion was such a big part of cultural life at that time and it is a departure.”

l Henley Choral Society’s Christmas concert has sold out, to join the wait list visit its website. New members are welcome. Rehearsals take place at the d:two centre in Market Place on Monday evenings at 7.30pm. Henley Youth Choir is for children aged seven to 17, with rehearsals at the d:two centre on Thursdays. Junior choir rehearsals (ages seven to 11) take place from 5.30pm to 6.15pm and senior choir rehearsals (ages 12 to 17) from 6.30pm to 7.15pm. For more information, visit henleychoralsociety.org.uk