Exmoor Singers of London Chamber Choir

The Exmoor Singers of London Chamber Choir is a choir with a strong focus on music by living composers and in particular British composers. [ [http://www.exmoorsingers.org/newmusic/index.jsp Exmoor Singers of London Chamber Choir ] ]

As hosts of the London Tallis Festival, the choir was most recently broadcast on BBC Radio 3 on 28 October 2007. [ [http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio3/thechoir/pip/uphr4/ BBC - Radio 3 - The Choir - Exmoor Singers' Tallis Festival ] ] In addition, the choir collaborated with rock group Bloc Party [ [http://www.blocparty.com/story.php?newsID=316 Bloc Party : Business : Story ] ] to perform at the BBC Electric Proms, [ [http://www.bbc.co.uk/electricproms/2007/artists/blocparty/ BBC - Electric Proms 2007 - Bloc Party ] ] which was broadcast on both BBC2 television and BBC Radio 1, on 27 and 29 October 2007 respectively. The choir also appears regularly on BBC1 television on Songs of Praise. [http://www.bbc.co.uk/religion/programmes/songsofpraise/factsheets/20040627.html] [http://www.bbc.co.uk/religion/programmes/songsofpraise/factsheets/20060129.html] [http://www.bbc.co.uk/religion/programmes/songsofpraise/factsheets/20061210.html] [http://www.bbc.co.uk/religion/programmes/songsofpraise/factsheets/20070304.html] [http://www.bbc.co.uk/religion/programmes/songsofpraise/factsheets/20070729.html] [http://www.bbc.co.uk/religion/programmes/songsofpraise/factsheets/20071028.html]

Exmoor Singers actively promote music by living composers, in dedicated concerts; by more generally programming new works; and specifically in commissioning new works. For the choir's first concert dedicated entirely to living composers, on 29 May 2002, the group received a four-star review from The Times. [http://www.exmoorsingers.org/promotions/TheTimesPurcellRoom.pdf]

The choir has given a number of first performances, but more particularly aims to give second performances of works that might not otherwise be heard again.

New commissioned music

The choir has commissioned six new choral works:
*"Sounds: Three Kandinsky Poems" (1999) – David Sawer
*"This Sceptr'd Isle" (2005) – Paul Ayres
*"Dreaming England (This Sceptr'd Isle)" (2005) – Peter McGarr
*"Tentatio" (2006) – Jaakko Mäntyjärvi
*"Their Lonely Betters" (based on a poem by W. H. Auden) (2007) – James Lavino
*"Love You Big as the Sky" (a Lindisfarne Love Song) (2007) – Peter McGarr (broadcast in full on BBC Radio 3)

The two works commissioned in 2005 entitled "This Sceptr'd Isle" [ [http://www.exmoorsingers.org/newmusic/SceptrdIsle.jsp Exmoor Singers of London Chamber Choir ] ] are potentially the only settings for choir based on the speech in William Shakespeare's King Richard II, Act 2 scene 1.

Both "Tentatio" and "Love You Big as the Sky" were commissioned for the Tallis Festival, and are 40-part unaccompanied works inspired by Thomas Tallis' Spem in alium.

References