Tag: Elgar

TMC media review
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Review of Great Poets in Music online program

Ken Stephen, Large Stage Live. On Saturday, May 30, the Toronto Mendelssohn Choir was scheduled to round out its season with a concert devoted to great poets in music -- a concert which I had fully planned to attend.

With a little bit of luck and a great deal of ingenuity, planning, effort, and coordination, the Choir has managed instead to present an online virtual concert built around the same theme.  It originally aired at the same time that the live concert was scheduled to take place, and is now available online.

To pull this effort together, the Choir has brought together audio recorded performances from five other choirs, tossed in a previous video performance and a new social-distancing recording of their own, and tied the entire evening together with readings of great poetry and theatre by renowned Canadian actors Tom McCamus and Lucy Peacock and commentary by the choir's interim conductor, David Fallis.

TMC Media Release
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TMC presents Great Poets in Music online on May 30th

TMC presents Great Poets in Music online on May 30th
Stratford actors Tom McCamus and Lucy Peacock join TMC Interim Conductor David Fallis for a celebration of great poetry set to music. The Toronto Mendelssohn Choir’s 2019/20 concert-– Great Poets in Music – scheduled for May 30th was cancelled due to Covid-19 but the Toronto Mendelssohn Choir has found a way to create an online program, in the spirit of this planned concert, that brings together the spoken word and the sung word – and can be enjoyed by everyone safely from their homes. 

Toronto Mendelssohn Choir and Huddersfield Choral Society combine to create choral ecstasy!
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Toronto Mendelssohn Choir and Huddersfield Choral Society combine to create choral ecstasy!

Dave Richards, Toronto Concert Reviews. Yesterday’s concert was a momentous celebration of the great music that grew out of the nineteenth century British choral tradition. It included the music of the famed British composers Elgar, Vaughan Williams, Parry, Holst, Stainer, Sullivan and Tavener as well as Canadians Healey Willan and Elizabeth Ekholm, each heavily influenced by the musical traditions of England.

The concert began with organist Michael Bloss performing the long introduction to Handel’s Coronation Anthem Zadok the Priest. The first sound of the two hundred voice combined choir shook me so intensely that the majesty of the music overwhelmed me at a visceral level. It was a sound that produced goosebumps throughout the entirety of my body.

St. Paul's Basilica ceiling
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Sacred Music for a Sacred Space 2017 Program Notes

Noel loves the rich choral repertoire of the entire Easter season, and enjoys combining ancient music with contemporary. “The new has often been influenced by the old,” he says. “It’s like living in a modern house but with wonderful antique furnishings throughout. Both are worthy and both provide the sense of calm and personal reflection I love.”