The Introit from this service, Jesu, grant me this, I pray, was composed by former Director of Music, Christopher Robinson. The Choir also performed the work as an introit on Wednesday 27 April as part of Choral Evensong, broadcast live on BBC Radio 3.
A Meditation on the Passion of Christ (also known as the Lent Meditation Service) is a service of music and readings reflecting on the Passion of Christ, with music by Bruckner, Byrd, Ireland, Lotti, Morales, Robinson and Stainer.
The anthem from this service, O vos omnes, was composed for the choir by Alex Woolf, an undergraduate music student at St John's. The work received its first performance in this service.
The Choir of Gonville and Caius College was founded at the end of the nineteenth century by the celebrated composer of Anglican church music, Charles Wood. The choir became an exclusively undergraduate male choir under its next director of music, Patrick Hadley.
Thomas Weelkes lived from 1576 to 1623 and was an organist as well as a composer. He became organist of Winchester college in 1598 before moving to Chichester Cathedral.
Parry’s six ‘Songs of Farewell’ were written between 1916-18 towards the end of his life. ‘My soul, there is a country’ is the first of the set and one of the most regularly performed.
John Sheppard was a composer and singer who lived from c.1515-1558. He was appointed 'Informator Choristarum' at Magdalen College, Oxford in 1543 and subsequently became a Gentleman of the Chapel Royal in 1552.
Orlande de Lassus was one of the most influential composers of the Renaissance. He was born in modern-day Belgium and worked in a variety of different locations across Europe, from Mantua to Munich.
Peter Tranchell was a composer and lecturer of Music at the University of Cambridge. He was a Fellow at Gonville and Caius College and directed the Choir as Praecentor of the College.
The St Paul's Service of Howells is an example of an expansive and luscious acoustic being accommodated by a slow rate of harmonic change in the music.
Brahms’ ‘Wie lieblich sind deine Wohnungen’ is taken from his German Requiem – a large-scale seven-movement work. The text of the work is not the usual Catholic Requiem mass but rather various scriptural passages (in German). The text of this particular movement is taken from Psalm 84.
In their first ever album dedicated solely to the Evening Canticles (Magnificat and Nunc Dimittis), the Choir of St John’s College, Cambridge releases Magnificat, a celebration of their daily tradition of Evensong.
The Choir's new album, Magnificat, is now available to buy, download and stream. Celebrating the Evening Canticles that play a significant part in the Choir's Evensong services, it is an Editor's Choice Pick from Gramophone magazine.
