Berlioz Te Deum and Faure Requiem

The intimacy and familiarity of Fauré’s Requiem contrasts with the grandeur and sheer spectacle of the Berlioz Te Deum in this tour de force of French choral masterpieces.

Over 900 performers took part in the premiere of Berlioz’ lavishly-scored, organ-rich, chorally-supersized setting of the Te Deum, a majestic, at times elemental hymn writ large to ‘the eternal hopes and fears of the human race’. Its first performance provoked wild enthusiasm and ‘tears that flowed like a river’. Tonight’s performance is writ larger than usual, including two movements often omitted, and for the ringing tenor ‘Te ergo quaesumus’ we welcome Paul Charles Clarke - recently an ardent Alfred for Welsh National Opera’s ‘Fledermaus’. Cementing the French connection and forging a liturgical entente cordiale is Fauré’s altogether more intimate and reassuring Requiem - a ‘lullaby of death’ discharged in the reposeful resignation of the beguiling ‘In Paradisum’.

Saturday 31 March 2012 7.30pm
Colston Hall, Bristol

Requiem - Fauré
Te Deum - Berlioz

Bristol Choral Society
Gloucester Choral Society
Choristers of Bristol and Gloucester Cathedral Choirs
Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra
Adrian Partington - Conductor

Hannah Atherton - Soprano
Paul Charles Clarke - Tenor
Richard Walshe - Bass

Tickets £23, £19, £15, £12, £10. (Under 25s £5, Concessions available) on sale now from Colston Hall 0117 922 3686 or online: http://www.colstonhall.org/whatson/Event2587

This will be a repeat of a 24 March concert at Gloucester Cathedral


Hector Berlioz Gabriel Fauré