Saturday  June 19 2010 7.30 pm

TICKETS £12, STUDENTS £6, CHILDREN UNDER 12 free Online booking here

Exhibition of rare editions and manuscripts from 6.45 pm, free pre concert talk at 7 pm

St John the Baptist Church,WELLINGTON TA21 8SF

HANDEL, ARNE & FRIENDS

Musical Director Peter Leech, Lutes,  Lynda Sayce and organ continuo Jeremy Martin

Thomas Arne was a prolific and highly successful composer of music for London theatres operating during the period 1730-1770. A Roman Catholic, he was barred from applying for official court musical posts, but nevertheless achieved great notoriety for his theatrical works, glees and masses performed by London’s foreign embassy chapel choirs. It is ironic that Arne, the composer of ‘Rule Britannia’ (a piece which came to symbolise the victory of the Hanoverian regime over its Catholic enemies) himself practised the religion of the Pretenders! Arne was a colleague and friend of the leading composers of his day such as William Boyce, Maurice Greene, John Travers, James Nares and Handel. In this concert we bring together Arne and his contemporaries with a range of sacred choral works from mid-eighteenth century London, a period during which the English anthem is said to have been in decline, yet a closer examination of lesser-known pieces very much suggests the opposite! The concert will also feature an exhibition of rare eighteenth-century printed editions and manuscripts.

 Thomas Arne (1710-78) – Mass in G, O salutaris hostia, Poculum elevatum
William Boyce (1711-79) – O where shall wisdom be found
G.F.Handel (1685-1759) – Like as the hart

Maurice Greene (1696-1755) – Lord let me know mine end
John Travers (c.1703-58) – Jehovah reigns (Psalm 99)

James Nares (1715-1783) – By the waters of Babylon

William Boyce  ( 1711 – 1779) Turn Thee unto me (Psalm 25)