RIAS KAMMERCHOR BERLIN & ENSEMBLE RESONANZ

"Music can surround you with a wonderful multidimensional sound sculpture that overwhelms you and then shrinks to a point on the horizon the next moment. For me, the most remarkable quality of music is its transformative physicality."


The RIAS Chamber Choir and Ensemble Resonanz, conducted by Justin Doyle, present the world premiere of Threadlands, a commissioned work for choir and string instruments that revolves around the themes of birth, new beginnings and hope.

But hope can also go hand in hand with grief. In the midst of the horrors of the First World War, Hubert Parry wrote his Songs of Farewell as musical epitaphs for fallen students and friends: moving testimonies of ethereal beauty between deep pain, confidence and the hope for peace and redemption.

With this purely British concert programme, the RIAS Chamber Choir continues its fruitful collaboration with the Ensemble Resonanz, which brings two of the crown jewels of the string orchestra repertoire to life: the floating, otherworldly Fantasia on a Theme of Thomas Tallis pays homage to the great English Renaissance composer. Entirely in this world, Edward Elgar's sparkling masterpiece Introduction and Allegro throws open the doors to fantastic inner worlds.

The concert will be broadcast live by Deutschlandfunk Kultur.

Works

Ralph Vaughan Williams
Fantasia on a theme by Thomas Tallis for string quartet and two string orchestras

Charles Hubert H. Parry
Songs of Farewell (excerpts)

Edward Elgar
Introduction and Allegro for strings

Joanna Marsh
Threadlands
World premiere

Conductor:
Justin Doyle

Cast:
Ensemble Resonanz, orchestra
RIAS Chamber Choir Berlin, choir