Your events at Classical Events
Details
Royal Festival Hall
Southbank Centre
Belvedere Rd
South Bank
London
SE1 8XX
England
Programme
Ralph Vaughan Williams – The Garden of Proserpine
Ralph Vaughan Williams – The Wasps: Overture
Ralph Vaughan Williams – A Sea Symphony
Performers
Roderick Williams – baritone
Elizabeth Watts – soprano
David Hill – Conductor
The Bach Choir
Philharmonia Orchestra
Programme Note
The Bach Choir join forces with the Philharmonia Orchestra to mark the 150th anniversary of Vaughan Williams’ birth. Ralph Vaughan Williams holds an unrivalled position in the history of British music, and in the hearts of many classical music fans. For The Bach Choir though, it’s personal – he sang in the Choir for decades, and was our Musical Director in the 1920s. His overture The Wasps paves the way for a rare performance of The Garden of Proserpine. This work for orchestra, chorus and soprano sets a poem by Swinburne, atheist enfant terrible of late Victorian poetry. Vaughan Williams clothes Swinburne’s longing for the oblivion of death in music of great tenderness and beauty. “Behold, the sea itself” – once heard, the magnificent opening bars of the Sea Symphony will not be forgotten. Chorus, baritone soloist and orchestra sing of ships and their captains, wind and waves, ocean voyages and the voyage of every human soul, in music so vivid you can almost taste the sea spray in the air.
