FOR YOUR DIARIES

Musical Events

Saturday 14th March -  Freda Parry Scholarship Fundraising Concert (more details to follow)

Saturday 21st March a Gaudeamus Concert

Easter Story

J.S.Bach - Easter Oratorio

Schutz - The Seven Last Words Of Jesus

D'Astorga - Stabat Mater

Baroque Music for Good Friday and Easter,

with soloists from the choir and the Leigh Bach Orchestra

Tickets are £15 and can be bought on the website www.gaudeamuschoir.co.uk  through TICKETSOURCE, or by phoning 0333 666 3366 (£1.75p charge for phone bookings) or purchase on the door.  Please see flyer at the back of the church

Our concert 'Easter Story' features three works from the Baroque period which tell the story of Good Friday and Easter.  We think that this may be the first time some of them have been performed in the Southend area.

Stabat Mater, by Emanuel d'Astorga, tells the story of Mary seeing her son on the cross and weeping at his fate.  Astorga was an Italian nobleman who lived at the same time as Vivaldi, and his musical style is like Vivaldi's but with some unusual harmonic twists and a darker mood, to fit the subject of the poem.  The work is a combination of choral movements and solos and it features solos from our members Elizabeth Upsher, Shirley Masterson, Colin Gilmore and Lawrence Barker.  

The Seven Last Words of Jesus Christ on the Cross, by Heinrich Schutz, relates the sayings of Jesus.  Schutz lived a century before Astorga and Bach and his style is simpler, with the story being told mainly in recitative, or sung speech.  We are singing this piece in English, so you can follow the story as Schutz's congregation would have done on Good Friday four centuries ago.   It is direct and very moving.

Then we come to Bach's Easter Oratorio.  Johann Sebastian Bach needs no introduction, and his Easter Oratorio is effectively a large cantata.  The music is Bach at his most joyful, with lively choruses accompanied by orchestra with trumpets and timpani to celebrate Jesus rising on Easter Sunday, and solos and duets where our four soloists are accompanied by oboes and flutes, and ending with a final chorale.

We are delighted to be joined again by our orchestra, the Leigh Bach Players and to feature various members of the choir as soloists.

Gaudeamus Choir:  The brilliant Gaudeamus, one of Southend's leading choirs will be returning to St Augustine's on Saturday 21st March.

See a picture of Gaudeamus below

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All Souls Service.  All Soulstide in early November is that time when the Church especially remembers all those who have died and those who mourn them.