Glebe Music Festival

In conjunction with The Glebe Society Inc

14th Glebe Music Festival
8 to 23 November 2003

Bel a cappella presents

Charpentier's Midnight Mass for Christmas

St Scholastica's Convent Chapel

Sunday 16 November at 1500hrs

Bel a cappella Choir and Orchestra
Matthew Wood, conductor

Programme

A Hymn to the Virgin (1930, revised 1934)
Benjamin Britten (1913-1976)
Semi-chorus:
Alison Morgan, soprano
Jenny Duck-Chong, mezzo-soprano
Philip Chu, tenor
Simon Lobelson, baritone

Ave Maria
Tomas Luis de Victoria (1548?-1611)

The Lamb (1995, revised 2001)
Dean Apolinaiy Ransevycz (1968- )

Te Deum in C (1934)
Benjamin Britten
Soprano Solo: Alison Morgan

O Quam Gloriosum
Tomás Luis de Victoria

The Lamb (1982)
John Tavener (1944- )

Messe de minuit sur les Airs de Noël (Midnight Mass on Christmas Carols) (c.1694)
Marc-Antoine Charpentier (1643?-1704?)
Alison Morgan, soprano
Jenny Duck-Chong, mezzo-soprano
Philip Chu, tenor
Simon Lobelson, baritone

ABOUT THE MUSIC

A Hymn to the Virgin: Benjamin Britten (1913-1976)

With his precociously virtuosic choral variations, A Boy Was Born op 3 (1933), the young Benjamin Britten effectively announced him-self as a new voice in choral music. However, it is another choral work, which, though not specifically written for Christmas, has become a frequent inclusion in choral Christmas concerts - A Hymn to the Virgin. Composed in 1930 when Britten was only sixteen, it sets an anonymous thirteenth-century text in praise of Mary which combines English and Latin phrases. Britten draws attention to this 'maceronic' formula, common in Medieval poetry, by dividing the text between full choir (which sings the English words) and a semi-chorus (which sings the Latin). The unaffected har-monies, which sparkle with dissonances, and the gently arching melody, create a suitably contemplative atmosphere which climaxes on the words 'Of all thou bear'st the prize, Lady queen of paradise'. It was first performed at St John's, Lowescroft, on 5 January 1931 and published in 1935. (Incidentally, the only other of his works specifically in praise of a virgin queen, in this case Elizabeth I, is his rarely-performed opera Gloriana written in 1953 for the coronation of Elizabeth II).

Notes by Stephen Schafer.

Ave Maria: Tomás Luis de Victoria (c.1548-1611)

While not as prolific as his contemporaries and leaving no secular works, Victoria's music represents the culmination of the Renaissance style in Spain.

Initially educated in Spain, he travelled to Italy to study at the German Jesuit College. He succeeded Palestrina as master of music at the Collegium Romanum. In succeeding years Victoria held the same post at the German Jesuit College and was resident priest at the Church of San Girolamo, before returning to Spain in 1587 as chaplain and choirmaster to the Dowager Empress Mary.

This Ave Maria setting displays Victoria's ad-vanced harmonic and melodic sense. Also characteristic of his music is the change to triple meter on "Sancta Maria" and the inter-play of brief contrapuntal and homophonic sections.
Notes by Dean Apolinary Ransevycz.

The Lamb: Dean Apolinary Ransevycz (1968- ) and John Tavener (1944- )

Dean Apolinary Ransevycz has been a member of Bel a cappella since 1999. He studied at La Trobe University in Melbourne and the Sydney Conservatorium of Music. His compositions have been performed by groups in Sydney, Melbourne and Perth. In particular, Dean has had a long association with The Sydney University Musical Society (SUMS). Significant works in his oeuvre are the Bagatelles for String Quartet; Verbum est Deus vita et lux omnem hominem illuminans, a motet for large chorus; and The Flea, a piece for baritone and woodwind quartet. Currently Dean's interest is focused on choral music.
The four-part a cappella work The Lamb has had many performances. Most notable was its performance in 1997 in Perth at the 48th Intervarsity Choral Festival. Ben Macpherson, the conductor of SUMS, has suggested that the motive on the repeated words 'little lamb' evokes for the listener the bleating of the lamb. These same repetitions are to the composer a mantra that evokes "the prayer-like peace of Blake's poem".

Notes by Rosa Corbishley.

Born in London, John Tavener is regarded as one of Britain's most significant living com-posers and a foremost exponent of the "mystic minimalist" style. He studied at the Royal Academy of Music under Lennox Berkeley and David Lumsdaine, achieving wide public attention with his 1968 cantata The Whale. Central to his oeuvre is the large body of choral music which includes the carols (of which The Lamb is one) as well as large-scale works celebrating his Russian Orthodox faith, such as The Liturgy of St John Chrysostom and Akathist of Thanksgiving.
The main melodic material of The Lamb is constructed from two 3 note cells which Tavener transforms using techniques of 12-tone and set-theory based composition tech-niques used in various guises since the Renaissance): re-ordering, inversion, retrogression. In turn these melodies are mirrored in the upper and lower voices (altos and basses mir-roring the sopranos and tenors). Despite these highly deterministic, modernist methods, the arrival of e minor at the end of each stanza is the logical answer to the questions posed.

The composer says of the piece: The Lamb came to me fully grown and was written in an afternoon and dedicated to my nephew Simon for his third birthday.

Notes by Dean Apolinary Ransevycz.

Comparisons are inevitable when two works using such an uncommon text are presented in the same programme, indeed one should encourage such discussion - dances about architecture notwithstanding. Not to pre-empt the direction of such musings, both pieces were written quickly from substantially complete ideas - the revisions to my setting being clarifications of dynamics and a change of time signature from 4/4 to 2/4 - and although I knew of Tavener's setting when I came to write The Lamb, I had not yet heard it. Also not that something in the order of thirteen years separates the two pieces, and 10-odd hours and 24½ years separate the composers.

Note by Dean A Ransevycz.

Te Deum in C: Benjamin Britten

Britten's first setting of the Te Deum was written for St Mar's, North Audley Street, London and first performed on 27 January 1936. A more complex work than A Hymn to the Virgin, it nonetheless also combines sim-plicity of utterance with compositional sophis-tication, the choir, organ and soprano (treble) soloist sharing little material yet melding into a convincing whole. The work is in tripartite form. It opens with pianissimo chords unset-tled by an enigmatic figure in the organ's bass register (which will permeate the piece) out of which arise choral declamations based around the C major triad, hushed at first, slowly rising to a crescendo on 'Heav'n and earth are full of the majesty of They Glory' and gradually subsiding again. Following the central section, in which the soloist's sinuous melody is under-pinned by soft choral interjections, the material heard at the outset returns in an embellished form - rich in interweaving choral arpeggios - before the work concludes as quietly as it began. Throughout, Britten takes full advan-tage of every opportunity to illustrate the text in musical terms that give the piece a quasi-theatrical character, an approach which he would greatly amplify in large-scale works such as the War Requiem (1961).

Notes by Stephen Schafer.

O Quam Gloriosum: Tomás de Victoria

The motet O Quam gloriosum hails from Victoria's first book of motets, publishes in 1572. It displays both the surety of his contrapuntal and harmonic technique and his characteristically impassioned word-setting. In this motet the hosts of heaven really do rejoice with Christ: the rising figure on "gaudent" conveying beyond doubt the joy of the white-robed saints and the close counterpoint of "quocumque ierit" evoking those same saints following the Lamb "wheresoever he shall go".

Notes by Dean Apolinary Ransevycz.

Messe de minuit sur les Airs de Noël, H. 9 for soloists, chorus, flutes and continuo:
Marc-Antoine Charpentier (c.1643-c.1704)

Among the many contemporaries of that cynsure of French Baroque music, Jean-Batiste de Lully (1632-1687), Marc-Antoine Charpentier was regarded as equal, if not superior, to his more strategically-placed rival. Born in Paris, probably around 1643, to Louis Charpentier (a talented copyist and calligrapher), he studied for some years during the 1660s in Rome with Giacomo Carissimi (1605-74) and, after returning home around 1667, worked for the influential Marie de Lorraine, Duchess de Guise (who may have sponsored his Italian studies) until her death in 1688. Following the commencement under Royal monopolistic privileges of Lully's career as a composer and producer of opera in 1672, Molière (?1622-1673) chose Charpeniier as his new musical collaborator. The pair created a number of musico-theatrical entertainments (including Le malade imaginaire) for what became, in 1680, the Comédie-Française. Charpentier continued to work with the company until 1686. During the early 1680s, he was also employed by the dau-phin and was granted a pension by Louis XIV m 1683. Patronage by Philippe, duc de Chartres (later duc d'Orleans and Regent of France) kept Charpentier in proximity to court circles until his death in Paris, which sources variously date to 1703 or 1704. (Bel a cappella will commemorate the tricentenary of Charpentier's death in 2004).

Despite an impressive catalogue of secular woks, including soma 40 airs sérieux, 8 cantatas, 34 stage works (pastorals, divertissements and his sole tragédie mise en musique, Medée), 27 intermèdes and sets of incidental music, 10 or so instrumental works, and some published writings, Charpentier is today remembered mainly for his sacred music, which dominates his oeuvre. In addition to approximately 30 sa-cred instrumental works, he composed an aston-ishing 176 motets, 84 Psalm settings, 54 Tenebrae lessons and responses, 37 antiphons, 31 oratories and dramatic motets, 19 hymns, 10 Magnificats, 9 litanies, 4 sequences, 4 Te Deums and 11 masses.

Even the most devout of composers rarely wrote sacred music without a firm commission or at least financial support from a religious institution that wanted to perform them. Despite having failed to appear for an audition to become one of the sous-maitres at the Chapel Royale in 1683 - claiming illness but possibly out of fear of out-shining (read: offending) Lully - Charpentier composed for a number of religious houses and establishments. During the 1680s he became composer and maitre de musique at the Jesuit Church of St Louis-St Paul, described by a con-temporary as 'among the most brilliant' posts in Parisian musical life, as well as for Port-Royale de Paris.

Charpentier's claim that diversity was 'the very essence of music' is amply exemplified by his oeuvre, not only with regard to the wide range of different forms but also within each work. Well acquainted by direct experience with the music of Italian contemporaries, and fully conversant with both official court style and the works of his cosmopolitan colleagues, Charpentier achieves a seemingly effortless synthesis in his own music. Affecting word-painting, enhanced by the judi-cious use of dissonance and a sometimes auda-cious approach to harmony, reveal a fascination with the expressive potential of sonority; the textural contrasts arising from constantly-shifting combinations of vocal and instrumental forces building these blocks into larger units, each per-fectly shaped into a dramatic, emotionally satisfying whole.

The pioneering Charpentier scholar H Wiley Hitchcock concluded mid-last century that the Messe de minuit de Noël was written during the early 1690s. Catherine Cussac has subsequently suggested 1694 as the most likely date, noting further that in this Mass, "Charpentier achieved a perfect synthesis between the secular and the liturgical, between popular art and learned writ-ing'. Certainly, since the Fifteenth Century, there had been a tradition of using secular songs as the basic material for Mass settings (Taverner's 'Western Wynde' Mass and Josquin's Missa L'homme armé. Sexti tani being arguably the most famous). By Charpentier's time this practice had declined, although instrumental noëls (or Christmas carols, of which Charpentier wrote several) remained popular.

The Messe de minuit, based on a number of noëls, is constructed in the episodic manner typical of grand motets and other large-scale sacred music of the time. Short instrumental symphonies introduce or conclude passages featuring concerted soloists or choir, each evoking a mood appropriate to the text. Unlike triumphal pieces such as his most famous setting of the Te Deum, the Messe de minuit lacks brass and tympanic, its paired flutes, strings and organ creating a some-what bucolic ambience. For seventeenth-century audiences, flutes were almost the sine qua non of the pastoral mood or of the operatic sommeille (dream scene), and the folk-like quality of the noëls even imbues Charpentier's counterpoint with a refreshingly popular character.

It is only in its most declamatory moments, such as the opening of the Credo, that Charpentier adopts the orthodox formality established by Lully's church music, without, however, succumbing , to merely bumptious rhetoric. In contrast, and occupying the emotional heart of the Messe de minuit, is Charpentier's setting of the text dealing with the incarnation of Christ. Here, time seems suspended as the choir intones the central mystery of Christianity. With the excep-tion of the Benedictus, the rest of the Messe de minuit draws extensively from noëls whieh would have been as familiar to congregations of the time as Hark! The Herald Angels Sing is to us.

The noëls are rarely transcribed literally; instead, Charpentier adapts both the notes and rhythms to suit the Latin text. Many noëls have similar intervallic or motivic material (for instance, four of the noëls used open with a rising fourth, and many phrases move stepwise or can be reduced to common arpeggiations) and Charpentier seems to have capitalised on these musical fea-tures. The first seven notes of the first Kyrie are not those of the noël on which it is based (Joseph est bien marié), being instead transposed from Voici le jour solennel de Noël, the noël used as the basis of the Crucifixus: Charpentier neatly links with a musical sleight of hand the traditional cry for divine mercy with the occa-sion of its fulfillment in the sacrifice of Christ on the Cross.

In the manuscript score which is held with many of Charpentier's other works by the Bibliothèque Nationale in Paris, the composer has noted after the first Kyrie 'Icy l'orgue joue le mesme noël' (Here the organ plays the same carol), with a similar instruction following the Christe eleison. Somewhat puzzlingly, Charpentier requires the strings to play Laissez paître vos bêtes after the Credo without providing the necessary music. Perhaps here he intended one of his own Noëls sur les instruments to be performed.

Another curious feature of the score is the absence of the third repeat of the Agnus Dei text, which prays for peace. So Charpentier's Messe de minuit de Noël ends as it began: with a plea for mercy.

Notes by Stephen Schafer.

A note on Notes inégales and ornamentation

Charpentier's younger contemporary François Couperin le grand (1668-1733) famously com-mented that 'The Italians...write their music in the true time values in which they intend them to be played, [while we French] dot several conse-cutive eights [ie quavers] in diatonic succession and yet write them as equal'. This is the princi-ple of notes inégales, 'unequal notes', which is such a characteristic feature of French Baroque music. The precise degree of 'dotting' which should be applied, whether single or double or somewhere in between, depends strongly on the context. Grandiose or martial passages may imply runs of more marked notes inégales, while more intimate or restrained measures may only require a slight feeling of tenuto on the first of each pair of dotted notes.

As is well known, Baroque music is rarely intended to be performed unornamented. French Baroque music is unusual, though, in applying certain principles of ornamentation more exten-sively than, say, German or Italian music of the time. Indeed, in some French vocal lines orna-mentation can be melodically indispensable, particularly at cadences. The French also applied ornamentation such as trills and appoggiaturas to choral parts, sometimes noting them in the score, at others assuming that suitable ornamentation would be applied according to the performance practices of the time and place. In this performance, choral ornamentation has been applied with restraint, based on examination of the in-strumental parts.

Notes by Stephen Schafer.

THE PERFORMERS

Conductor
Matthew Wood

Organ
Sarah Kim

Soloists

Soprano
Alison Morgan

Mezzo-soprano
Jenny Duck-Chong

Tenor
Philip Chu

Baritone
Simon Lobelson

Bel a cappella

Sopranos
Anne Blake
Catherine Clements
Judy Chen
Kate Horstcraft
Kristen Rundle
Mary-Louise Callaghan
Rosa Corbishley
Sue Justice

Altos
Amanda Harris
Gabrielle Bermingham
Helen Trenerry
Lucy Bermingham
Rachel Moerman

Tenors
Brian White
Frank Maio
Patrick Blake
Stephen Schafer

Basses
Dean Apolinary Ransevycz
Kevin Wolfe
Michael Johnson
Nic Orr

The Orchestra

Flutes
Steven Meyer
Nicola Monteiro

1st Violins
Petra Davies
Alex Norton

2nd Violins
Inge Courtney-Haentjes
Kerrie O'Dea

Violas
Rudy Crivici
Michael Tabrett

Violincellos
Emily Duffill
Deborah Coogan

Organ
Sarah Kim

ABOUT THE PERFORMERS

Bel a cappella

Dynamic and youthful, Bel a cappella is a chamber choir based in Glebe that presents lively and inspiring performances of music from the early Renaissance to contemporary Australian compositions.

Since Bel a cappella's inception in 1995 under Katrina Jenns, the choir has made many festi-val appearances, including the Blue Mountains "Spirit of the Wind" Arts Festival, the Newtown Festival and the A cappella Association Music Festival. Bel a cappella also success-fully competed in the Sydney and National McDonald's Performing Arts Challenges from 1995 to 1998.

In 1999 Matthew Wood, one of Sydney's most tal-ented professional conductors, was engaged as Artistic Director. Inspired by Matthew's lead-ership and musical vision, Bel a cappella has risen to greater heights.

In 2000 and 2001 the choir performed at the Hunter Valley Harvest Festival with sponsor Piggs Peake Winery in two acclaimed Bring me Wine! concerts featuring Byrd's Mass for Three Voices and Purcell's Celebrate this Festival alongside many medieval and modern drinking songs!

Most recent highlights include the premiere Australian performance of the original 1888 score of Fauré's Requiem, as reconstructed by conductor Matthew Wood; a concert version of Purcell's opera Dido and Æneas with the Bel Chamber Ensemble on period instruments; two live broadcasts on ABC Radio National's Late Night Live show with Philip Adams; Britten's Rejoice in the Lamb; Mozart's Requiem; Haydn's Mass in Times of Trouble (Nelson Mass); Kodaly's Missa brevis; J S Bach's motet Jesu, meine Freude and the premier of Andrew Robbie's Joyce Songs.

Since 2001 Bel a cappella has sung at the Vaucluse House "Carols by Candle-light" with the NSW Police Band. This year Bel a cappella continues this tradition on 14 December.

Bel a cappella regularly performs in the stunningly beautiful and resonant Chapel of Saint Scholastica in Glebe.

Please phone 9314 7520 or email belacappella@mail.com to hire Bel a cappella for weddings and functions and for general information on the choir.

Matthew Wood Conductor
"a great deal of flair…drawing unexpected colours out of the great welter of sound"
The Sydney Morning Herald, 27 November 2001.

"Matthew Wood...received support from en-lightened individuals to explore the link be-tween music and words with intelligence, subtlety and sophistication."
The Sydney Morning Herald, 15 October 2002.

"….showed responsiveness to the tenor of the central Andante, keeping its pace moving steadily, and also generating some surprises with his phrasing choices".
The Age, 12 August 2003.

In recent years Matthew Wood has emerged as a musician of versatile talents. He is regularly employed as a conductor of orchestral, choral, operatic and new music repertoire.

As a finalist in Symphony Australia's 2002 Young Conductor of the Year Award Matthew conducted the Melbourne Symphony Orchestra in Gerswhin's An American in Paris. This successful performance led to an invitation to conduct The Australian Pro Arte Orchestra in concerts throughout 2003 and 2004. As a finalist in 2001, Matthew conducted the Syd-ney Symphony in a programme of Stravinsky and Sibelius, subsequently being awarded a financial scholarship from The Orchestral As-sociation Network (TOAN).

On the invitation of internationally recognised conductor pedagogue Maestro Jorma Panula, as one of only 16 conductors chosen world-wide, Matthew recently travelled to Brasov, Romania to attend and conduct at the World Symposium on the Orchestral Music of Jean Sibelius. After a successful performance of Sibelius' 1^st Symphony, Matthew was invited by the Brasov Philharmonic Orchestra to re-turn in 2004 and 2005 as a guest conductor as part of their concert season.

Matthew is also committed to the performance and recognition of new music and Australian compositions. He regularly commissions and performs such works, with his ensembles. He is also frequently engaged by new music en-sembles, most notably Australia's "premiere new music ensemble", Halcyon. Matthew recently conducted Halcyon in a series of con-certs in Sydney and Canberra, premiering two Australian compositions by Rosalind Page and Andrew Robbie along with the Australian premiere of renowned Finnish composer Kaija Saariaho's Grammaire Des Rêves. Matthew will return to conduct Halcyon later in 2003.

In 2003 Matthew also worked as chorus master with vocal group Cantillation, in conjunction with both the Sydney Symphony Orchestra's Contemporary Music Festival working along-side renowned contemporary music conductor Reinbert van Leeuw, and the concert 'Mozart: Requiem for our Time' with Norwegian conductor Rolf Gupta.

Matthew has studied conducting with Maestros Jorma Panula, Gianluigi Gelmetti, Arvo Volmer, David Porcelijn, Johannes Fritzsch, Peter McCoppin, Christopher Seaman, and János Fürst. In 1999 he was awarded a position in the Masters of Performance (Conducting) course at the Sydney Conservatorium of Music. He was soon the recipient of the Elaine McCaghern Musical Scholarship for post-graduate study and was awarded the same scholarship in 2000, along with the Alan Bellhouse Memorial Scholarship for Conducting.

In 2002, Matthew conducted the Tasmanian, Adelaide, Melbourne and Queensland Sym-phony Orchestras along with the Australian Opera and Ballet Orchestra. In 2003 Matthew returned to the Melbourne and Tasmanian Symphony Orchestra as part of Symphony Australia's Conductor programme.

Matthew has worked as an assistant conductor for many of Sydney's leading ensembles such as the Sydney Philharmonia Choirs, the Ku-ring-gai Symphony Orchestra, Sydney Youth Orchestra Association and the Sydney Cham-ber Choir. He is currently the Conductor and Artistic Director of Bel a cappella, Conductor and Artistic Director of the Waverley/Randwick Philharmonic Orchestra, guest conductor of the North Sydney Symphony and is lecturer of orchestral conducting for the Wesley Institute of Music.

Alison Morgan Soprano
Soprano Alison Morgan was born in England and migrated to Western Australia at the age of thirteen. She later studied at the Queensland Conservatorium of Music as a flautist, but chose to pursue singing after moving to Syd-ney in 1989. Since then, she has built a suc-cessful performing career, with a particular commitment to the promotion and perform-ance of new works for voice.

As a concert artist, Alison's engagements have included Handel's Dixit Dominus, Solomon and Mendelssohn's Elijah with Sydney Philharmonia Choirs, Mahler's Resurrection Symphony with the 9th International Music Festival and Haydn's The Seasons, Handel's Messiah and Bach's Christmas Oratorio and Magnificat. She has performed with the Sydney Symphony Orchestra, The Australian Ballet, Pinchgut Opera, The Song Company, Ensemble Offspring, Sydney Alpha Ensemble, The Contemporary Singers, Voiceworks and Cantillation, and has featured in numerous ABC broadcasts and recordings.

Alison is an accomplished exponent of con-temporary vocal music and is co-director of acclaimed Sydney ensemble Halycon, which performs new and recent chamber music for voice.

In the recording studio, Alison has featured in numerous projects, including the soundtrack for the feature film The Bank, TropFest winner Uno Amore, the TV Series Farscape, ABC Christmas CD Glorious Night and ongoing recordings for Cantillation with ABC Classics.

Alison is currently vocal consultant to Sydney Philharmonia Choirs.

Jenny Duck-Chong Mezzo-soprano
Mezzo-soprano Jenny Duck-Chong is a talented and versatile artist who works in many spheres - from early music and opera to art song and contemporary compositions. She has worked as a soloist with many prominent en-sembles including the Sydney Symphony Or-chestra, Sydney Philharmonia Choirs, Sydney Alpha Ensemble, Ensemble Offspring, Cantillation, Sydney Baroque and The Renaissance Players. She is sought after by Sydney's finest vocal ensembles and has performed with The Song Company, Cantillation and Voiceworks as well as working with Opera Australia and Pinchgut Opera.

Jenny is the co-founder of contemporary vocal chamber music ensemble Halcyon which promotes new music from around the globe and spanning the twentieth and twenty-first centuries. With this ensemble she has performed works by Australian composers including Ross Edwards, Anne Boyd, Margaret Sutherland, commissioned works by Claire Jordan, Andrew Robbie, Rosalind Page and Jane Stanley, presented the Australian premiere of songs by Canadian Melissa Hui and British Kerry Andrew and the chamber work Grammaire des Rêves of Finnish Kaija Saariaho.

As an accomplished recital singer, Jenny Duck-Chong has recorded numerous concerts for broadcast by the ABC and 2MBS-FM, Other recording credits include mezzo soloist on the ABC Classics recording of Fauré's La Naissance de Venus and several film scores, including "The Bank" by Alan John as well as other Cantillation releases including Handel's Messiah, Prayer for Peace and the recently released Allegri Miserere.

Philip Chu Tenor
Born in Hong Kong, 22-year-old tenor and conductor Philip Chu is completing a com-bined degree in Music and Arts at University of Sydney. He is currently singing with Cantillation, and has sung with leading ensembles including The Song Company, Brandenburg Choir, Sydney Chamber Choir, Christ Church St. Laurence and Sydney Philharmonia Choirs. As a conductor, he holds the post of assistant chorus master of Willoughby Symphony Or-chestra and Choir and has been assistant con-doctor for Sydney Chamber Choir, Sydney University Symphony Orchestra and Sydney Conservatorium Chamber Choir.

At the age of 17, Philip made his solo debut in the Sydney Opera House, performing the world premiere of Dreams for the Earth, a youth cantata written by renowned Australian composer Anne Boyd, as part of the Sydney Spring International Music Festival 1998. He has done regular solos with the Sydney Conservatorium Chamber Choir, Big Choir and Orchestra including CPE Bach's Magnificat, JS Bach's Cantata BWV 182, Bernstein's Chichester Psalms, Handel's Dixit Dominus, Haydn's Missa di Sancti Nicolai, Mozart's Requiem and Vaughn Williams's Mass in G minor.

In 2002, Philip was invited to perform with the Noumea Symphony Orchestra and Choir in Gounod's Messe Solennelle, and Mahler's Des Knaben Wunderhorn with the Sydney University Symphony Orchestra, which also engaged him as a conductor in 2001.

Earlier in 2003, Philip sang the tenor solo in JS Bach's Jesu, meine Freude and Schubert's Mass in G with Bel a cappella. He also ap-peared as a soloist in Mozart's Solemn Vespers with the Sydney Chamber Choir.

Future engagements include Saint Saën's Oratorio de Noël with the University of New South Wales Orchestra and Choir, Haydn's Missa di Sancti Nicolai with the Choir of St. Francis of Assisi and Purcell's Fairy Queen with Pinchgut Opera.

Simon Lobelson Baritone
Born in Sydney and brought up in Brussels, Simon Lobelson currently resides in London, studying at the Royal College of Music on a scholarship, under Roderick Earle. He has had substantial experience as both an operatic and concert soloist, and has sung with some of Sydney's most prestigious ensembles, includ-ing The Song Company, Cantillation and ACO Voices.

In Sydney Simon studies under John Pringle, and was recently a semi-finalist in The Australian Singing Competition. He recently appeared as bass soloist in Sofia Gubaidalina's Jetzt immer Schnee with the Sydney Symphony Orchestra and Cantillation, and has per-formed twice as a soloist with Bel a Capella.

Simon has appeared in a wide variety of operatic roles, including Mozart's Figaro, Papageno (The Magic Flute), Guglielmo (Cosi fan tutte), Dancairo (Carmen), Noye, Macheath (The Beggars' Opera), Aeneas and the Pirate King, amongst others. Future engage-ments include Plunkett in Flotow's Martha in Scotland and baritone soloist in Rameau's Les Grands Motets with Sydney Philharmonia Choirs.

Sarah Kim organ
Sarah Kim was born in 1983 in Cologne, Germany and started learning the organ when she was 11 years old, gaining her A.Mus.A four years later. She is now in her second year of a B.Mus. performance course at the Sydney Conservatorium of Music, where she is study-ing organ with Philip Swanton.

Her outstanding abilities as a young organist were recognised over the last two years by the Conservatorium with the award of the "Sarah and Muriel Jeavons Memorial Scholarship". Last year she also took first prize In the Open Championship pipe organ section of the Warringah Eisteddfod. In addition to her win in the Sydney Organ Competition this year, Sarah featured on the cover of the Sydney Organ Journal.

Sarah has given numerous solo performances around Sydney and is increasingly in demand as an accompanist. Prominent performances this year have included the premier of Richard Meale's fanfare for organ, trumpet and percus-sion at the AMC Classical Music Awards and performances as part of the 30th birthday cele-brations of the Sydney Opera House. Cur-rently she is the Organ Scholar at St James' Anglican Church in King St, Sydney and the University of Sydney.

THE TEXTS

A Hymn to the Virgin
Anonymous c.1300

Ave Maria

The Lamb
William Blake (1757-1827)

Little Lamb, who made thee?
Dost thou know who made thee?
Gave thee life, and bid thee feed
By the stream and o'er the mead;
Gave thee clothing of delight,
Softest clothing, woolly, bright;
Gave thee such a tender voice,
Making all the vales rejoice?
Little Lamb, who made thee?
Dost thou know who made thee?

Little Lamb, I'll tell thee,
Little Lakb, I'll tell thee:
He is called by thy name,
For he calls himself a Lamb.
He is meek, and he is mild;
He became a little child.
I a child, and thou a lamb.
We are called by his name.
Little Lamb, God bless thee!
Little Lamb, God bless thee!

Ted Deum
Nicetas of Dacia (c.335-414) attrib.

We praise thee, O God. We acknowledge thee to be the Lord.
All the Earth doth worship thee, the Father Everlasting.
To thee all Angels cry aloud, the Heavens and all the Powers therein,
To thee Cherubim and Seraphim continually do cry:
Holy, holy, holy Lord, God of Sabaoth. Heaven and earth are full of the majesty of they glory.
The glorious company of the Apostles praise thee.
The goodly fellowship of the Prophets praise thee.
The noble army of Martyrs praise thee.
The holy church throughout all the world doth acknowledge Thee,
The Father, of an Infinite Majesty;
Thine honourable, true and only Son;
Also the Holy Ghost, the Comforter.

Thou art the King of Glory, O Christ. Thou art the Everlasting Son of the Father.
When thou lookest upon thee to deliver men, Thou didst not abhor the virgin's womb.
When thou hadst overcome the sharpness of Death,
Thou didst open up the Kingdom of Heaven to all believers.
We believe that thou shalt come to be our judge.
We therefore pray: help thy servants whom thou hast redeemed with thy precious blood.
Make them to be numbered with thy saints in glory everlasting.

O Lord, save thy people and bless thine heritage. Govern them and life them up for ever.
Day by day we magnify Thee, and we worship Thy name ever, world without end.
Vouchsafe, O Lord, to keep us this day without sin. O Lord, have mercy upon us.
O Lord, let Thy mercy lighten upon us, for our trust is in Thee.
O Lord, in thee have I trusted: let me never be confounded.

O Quam Gloriosum
Antiphon for All Saints

Messe de minuit sur les Airs de Noël
Midnight Mass on Christmas Carols

Kyrie

Gloria

Credo

Sanctus

Agnus Dei

Translations by Dean Apolinary Ransevycz.

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