Paul is on a six month sabbatical period (July-December) funded by a major grant from the British Academy researching his biography of Sir George Dyson.
Paul is also working on a major new commission for a half-evening work for choir/soloists and orchestra for December 2009 commissioned by the Lichfield Cathedral Special Choir for their 50th anniversary.
Sunday 18 – Saturday 24 July, 2010
English Choral Experience course at Abbey Dore
(see www.englishchoralexperience.co.uk)
Monday 19 July, 2010
Birmingham Bach Choir concert
Saturday 3 July, 2010
Whitehall Choir concert
Saturday 26 June, 2010
Birmingham Bach Choir at Much Wenlock
Thursday 3 – Sunday 6 June, 2010
Ludlow Festival of English Song
Friday 28 – Monday 31 May, 2010
Birmingham Bach Choir on tour in Italy
Saturday 15 May, 2010
Workshop for Lytham St Anne’s Choral Society
Saturday 8 May, 2010
Whitehall Choir Come and Sing
Monday 26 April, 2010
Birmingham Conservatoire Chamber Choir sing at Birmingham Town Hall
Saturday 24 April, 2010
Workshop for Chester Bach Singers
Tuesday 20 April, 2010
Birmingham Conservatoire Chamber Choir sings Musicians Service London
Friday 16 – Saturday 17 April, 2010
Adjudicate at Leith Hill Festival
Saturday 27 March, 2010
Birmingham Bach Choir St.John Passion in Lichfield Cathedral
Monday 22 March, 2010
Whitehall Choir concert at the Banqueting House, Whitehall
Saturday 20 March, 2010
Petersfield Festival concert
Thursday 18 March, 2010
Petersfield Festival final rehearsal for B minor Mass
Saturday 13 March, 2010
Petersfield Festival concert
Thursday 11 March, 2010
Petersfield Festival final rehearsal for Brahms/Elgar
Monday 8 March, 2010
Birmingham Bach Choir Come and Sing
Saturday 27 February, 2010
Petersfield Festival rehearsal
Sunday 21 February, 2010
Finzi Friends meeting
Saturday 20 February, 2010
Stafford Choral Society B minor Mass workshop
Sunday 14 February, 2010
Preach at Jesus College, Oxford
Saturday 13 February, 2010
Whitehall Choir workshop
Friday 12 February, 2010
Petersfield Festival rehearsal
Monday 8 February, 2010
Choral Workshop for Goring Choral Society
Friday 5 February, 2010
Birmingham Bach Choir dinner
Thursday 4 February, 2010
Petersfield Festival rehearsal
Friday 22 – Saturday 23 January, 2010
Petersfield Festival rehearsals
Saturday 16 January, 2010
Annual Choral Workshop for Three Spires choir at Truro
Monday 28 December, 2009 – Saturday 2 January, 2010
Choral Course at Hay on Wye for Andrew van der Beek’s Music at Lacock
Tuesday 22 December, 2009
Finzi Trust at RSA, London
Sunday 20 December, 2009
Birmingham Bach Choir Nine lessons and Carols at St.Paul’s Church, Jewellery Quarter
Tuesday 15 December, 2009
Whitehall Choir Christmas concert at Rochester Row
Saturday 12 December, 2009
Birmingham Bach Choir Christmas Cheer concert
Saturday 5 December, 2009
First performance of Advent Oratorio in Lichfield Catherdal
Saturday 28 November, 2009
Auditions for Blenheim Singers, Hertford College, Oxford
Friday 27 November, 2009
Whitehall Choir performs Handel’s Judas Maccabaeus at St. John’s Smith Square, London
Saturday 21 November, 2009
Workshop on my new Advent Oratorio with Lichfield Cathedral Special Choir
Thursday 19 November, 2009
Petersfield Festival rehearsal day
Sunday 15 November, 2009
Finzi Friends committee
Saturday 14 November, 2009
Concert with Bimingham University Singers at St.Philip’s cathedral, Birmingham
Saturday 7 November, 2009
7th Finzi Friends day in Chester
Saturday 31 October, 2009
Petersfield Festival choirs rehearsal day
Friday 30 October, 2009
Petersfield Festival choirs rehearsal
Saturday 24 October, 2009
Mozart C minor Mass (Levin completion) in Symphony Hall, Birmingham with ECO and Birmingham Bach Choir
Saturday 17 October, 2009
Choral Workshop for Stafford Choral Society
Friday 16 October, 2009
Dyson Trust meeting in Winchester
Saturday 10 October, 2009
Birmingham Bach Choir rehearsal day for Mozart C minor Mass (Levin)
Thursday 8 October, 2009
First rehearsal for project with Birmingham University Singers
Monday 4 October, 2009
Choral Workshop at All Saints East Sheen, London
Saturday 3 October, 2009
Choral Workshop with Laetare Singers in Bristol on Pizzetti’s Requiem
Sunday 27 September, 2009
Workshop on B minor Mass with Petersfield Festival Choir
Saturday 26 September, 2009
Choral Workshop with Congleton Choral Society
Sunday 13 September, 2009
Birmingham Bach Choir at ArtsFest in Birmingham
Saturday 12 September, 2009
Annual choral workshop at Abbey Dore, Herefordshire
(Stanford Songs of the Fleet)
Saturday 5 September – Sunday 6 September, 2009
English Weekend at Dordrecht, Holland for Andrew van der Beek singing choral Evensong
Saturday 1 August – Thursday 9 August, 2009
Organ Fireworks recording with Christopher Herrick for Hyperion Records at Melbourne Town Hall, Australia
Saturday 25 July – Wednesday 29 July, 2009
English Choral Experience course/festival at Abbey Dore, Herefordshire. See www.englishchoralexperience.co.uk
Saturday 11 July, 2009
Birmingham Bach Choir concert at Great Witley, Worcestershire
Friday 10 July, 2009
Whitehall Choir concert
Monday 29 June 2009
Concordia Choir, Twickenham performing Paul’s new setting of Psalm 150
Saturday 27 June, 2009
Birmingham Bach Choir concert at St.Chad’s Cathedral Birmingham
Saturday 20 June, 2009
Finzi Friends Harrogate day: Paul giving workshop on Dyson’s Canterbury Pilgrims and Haydn’s Nelson Mass at St.Wilfred’s Church
Saturday 13 June, 2009
Birmingham Bach Choir concert at St.Alphege, Solihull
Saturday 9 May, 2009
Darlington workshop
Thursday 7 May, 2009
Ardingly College workshop/rehearsals
Thursday 23 April – Sunday 3 May, 2009
USA workshops
Monday 6 April, 2009
Whitehall Choir: Brahms Requiem at Banqueting House, Whitehall
Saturday 11 April, 2009
Paul’s Easter Oratorio is performed in main concert hall of the Sydney Opera House
Monday 6 April, 2009
Whitehall Choir: Brahms Requiem at Banqueting House, Whitehall
Saturday 4 April, 2009
Birmingham Bach Choir concert: James MacMillan Seven Last Words from the Cross and Purcell: Birmingham Oratory
Sunday 29 March, 2009
Final of Feis Ceoil competition
Monday 23 March – Wednesday 25 March, 2009
Adjudicating at Feis Ceoil choral competition in Belfast
Saturday 21 March, 2009
Petersfield Festival concert 2: Mozart Requiem
Thursday 19 March, 2009
Whitehall Choir at St Martin-in-the-Fields, London: Fauré Requiem/Cantique de Jean Racine. See www.whitehallchoir.org.uk
Tuesday 17 March, 2009
Petersfield Festival final rehearsal
Monday 16 March, 2009
Whitehall Choir final rehearsal for Fauré concert
Saturday 14 March, 2009
Petersfield Festival concert 1: Handel’s Saul
Thursday 12 March, 2009
Petersfield Festival final rehearsal
Saturday 28 February, 2009
Petersfield Festival chorus joint rehearsal
Saturday 21 February, 2009
Birmingham Bach Choir ‘Come and Sing’: choruses from Haydn’s Creation
See www.birmingham.bachchoir.com
Monday 16 February, 2009
University of Leicester Choral Society workshop
Friday 13 February, 2009
Dyson Trust meeting
Join Petersfield Festival chorus rehearsal
Saturday 7 February – Sunday 8 February, 2009
Whitehall Choir recording at St.Alban’s, Holborn, London
Tursday 5 February, 2009
Joint Petersfield Festival chorus rehearsal
Wednesday 28 January – Saturday 31 January, 2009
Producing second recording in complete Buxtehude organ music series for Hyperion Records with Christopher Herrick in Trondheim, Norway
Friday 23 January – Saturday 24 January, 2009
Joint rehearsals for Petersfield Festival choirs
Saturday 17 January, 2009
Birmingham Conservatoire Chamber Choir concert for Birmingham Chamber Music Society at the Adrian Boult Hall, Birmingham
Friday 16 January, 2009
Birmingham Bach Choir annual dinner
Saturday 10 January, 2009
Choral Workshop for Three Spires choral society at Truro Cathedral (Beethoven Mass in C)
Sunday 21 December, 2008
Birmingham Bach Choir Service of Nine Lessons and Carols at St Paul’s Church, Hockley
Tuesday 16 December, 2008
Whitehall Choir Carol concert
Saturday 13 December, 2008
Birmingham Bach Choir Christmas Cheer at St Francis Church Bournville
Thursday 4 December, 2008
Whitehall Choir Christmas concert at St Marylebone Parish Church
Saturday 29 November, 2008
Birmingham Bach Choir performs Bach’s B minor Mass at Birmingham Town Hall with Brandenburg Baroque Soloists.
Saturday 8 November, 2008
Petersfield Festival joint choir rehearsals
Saturday 1 November, 2008
Whitehall Choir Come and Sing event at Clapham: Haydn Nelson Mass
Saturday 18 October, 2008
Paul gives illustrated lecture on Howells’ songs at St John’s College, Cambridge (annual HH Day)
Sunday 12 October, 2008
Howard Ferguson centenary event organised by Finzi Friends at Westminster School and Westminster Abbey
Saturday 11 October, 2008
Paul gives talk on conducting choirs for Incorporated Association of Organists at Lichfield Cathedral
Saturday 4 October, 2008
Choral Workshop in Warwickshire
Saturday 27 September, 2008
Paul takes choral workshop on Bach’s B Minor Mass at Bedales School, Petersfield
Saturday 20 September, 2008
Paul takes conducting workshop in London for Royal College of Organists
Sunday 14 September, 2008
Birmingham Bach Choir take part in Birmingham’s ArtsFest
Saturday 13 September, 2008
Annual Choral Workshop day at Abbey Dore, Herefordshire
Saturday 23 August, 2008
Workshop at Helensburgh, Scotland
Sunday 20 July – Saturday 26 July, 2008
2nd English Choral Experience course/Arts Festival at Abbey Dore in Herefordshire. See www.englishchoralexperience.co.uk.
Monday 7July, 2008
Whitehall Choir concert.
Saturday 28 June, 2008
Paul presents the prizes at Worksop College, Nottinghamshire.
Saturday 21 June - Sunday 22 June, 2008
Whitehall Choir at Holy Cross, Winchester.
Saturday 7 June, 2008
Birmingham Bach Choir at Malvern Priory. Programme of music by Bax, Elgar, Britten, Finzi, Holst, Vaughan Williams and JC Bach.
Thursday 24 April - Sunday 11 May, 2008
Paul in USA giving lectures, workshops and guest conducting.
Saturday 12 April, 2008
Birmingham Bach Choir Come and Sing Vivaldi Gloria and Bach’s Magnificat at St.Peter’s Harborne, Birmingham.
Thursday 10 April, 2008
Whitehall Choir: Monteverdi Vespers at Holy Trinity, Sloane Square, London with London Baroque Sinfonia.
Friday 21 March, 2008
Birmingham Bach Choir’s annual performance of Bach’s St Matthew Passion at Symphony Hall, Birmingham with the English Chamber Orchestra.
Saturday 15 March, 2008
Petersfield Festival concert 2 (Festival Hall).
Saturday 8 March, 2008
Peterfield Festival concert 1 (Festival Hall).
Saturday 1 March, 2008
Paul gives workshop in Durham.
Sunday 24 February, 2008
Paul at unveiling of Diana Lee-Browne’s new memorial to Herbert Howells in Lydney Parish Church.
Saturday 16 February, 2008
Birmingham Bach Choir Come and Sing Haydn’s Nelson Mass at The Edge, Much Wenlock.
Saturday 2 February, 2008
Birmingham Bach Choir concert: Bach Family concert at Holy Trinity Church, Much Wenlock, Shropshire.
Wednesday 9 - Friday 11 January, 2008
Selwyn College, Cambridge choir records a CD of Paul’s choral music.
Tuesday 11 December, 2007
Whitehall Choir’s Christmas Concert at St.Stephen’s Rochester Row.
Friday 16 November, 2007
Whitehall Choir performs Handel’s Saul at St John’s Smith Square, London. 7.30pm.
Saturday 10 November, 2007
Petersfield Festival joint choral rehearsals start (music includes Dyson’s Agincourt written for the Petersfield Festival).
Saturday 3 November, 2007
Whitehall Choir ‘Come and Sing’ day on Beethoven’s Mass in C in Clapham, London.
Saturday 6 October, 2007
Workshop day for the Laetare Singers of Bristol
Sunday 30 September, 2007
Premiere of A Living Stone. Introit commissioned for the re-dedication service of Oakham School Chapel, Rutland.
Saturday 15 September, 2007
Conductors workshop for Ulster Society of Organists in Belfast.
Saturday 8 September, 2007
Paul’s annual choral workshop day at Abbey Dore Elgar’s from the Bavarian Highlands.
Sunday 22 – Sunday 29 July, 2007
Paul’s new English Choral Experience course held at Abbey Dore. Some spaces left for tenors and basses. Full details at www.englishchoralexperience.co.uk.
Saturday 7 July, 2007
Whitehall Choir and London Baroque Sinfonia concert at St John’s Smith Square. Robert Levin’s recent completion of Mozart’s great Mass in C minor K427.
Saturday 30 June, 2007
Birmingham Bach Choir concert at Great Witley, Worcestershire
Sunday 17 June, 2007
Paul goes to Sheafhayne Manor, Yarcombe in Devon to participate in Terry Barfoot’s Choral Classics weekend. Paul’s Easter Oratorio is a main feature of the weekend. www.artsinresidence.co.uk
Saturday 16 June, 2007
Birmingham Bach Choir concert at St Alphege church, Solihull.
Saturday 9 June, 2007
Choral workshop for Charles Janz’s choir at All Saints East Sheen, London.
Saturday 2 June, 2007
Paul gives talk at Ledbury for the Traherne Society.
Thursday 31 May – Monday 4 June, 2007
Ludlow Weekend of English Song (Finzi Friends event). This includes Paul’s first major lecture on George Dyson’s music.
Saturday 19 May, 2007
Paul conducts J S Bach Missa Brevis (choir and orchestra) for MEMF (Midlands early Music Forum).
Friday 11 – Monday 14 May, 2007
Paul travels to Dordrecht in Holland to conduct English Weekend. (Choral Evensong). One of Andrew van der Beek’s courses.
Thursday 10 May, 2007
Paul gives choral conducting workshop for the Royal College of Organists at the Birmingham Conservatoire (evening).
Thursday 10 May, 2007
Birmingham Conservatoire Chamber Choir 2 concert.
Friday 4 – Monday 7 May, 2007
Whitehall Choir tour to Toulouse, France.
Sunday 29 April, 2007
Paul goes to Cambridge to discuss CD recording by Sarah MacDonald and Selwyn College Choir of his shorter choral works.
Thursday 26 April, 2007
Whitehall rehearsal for tour (extra).
Saturday 21 April, 2007
Whitehall Choir workshop day for forthcoming French tour.
Thursday 12 April, 2007
Paul and Christopher fly to Muri in Switzerland to record Buxtehude.
Sunday 8 April, 2007
Paul flies to Denmark for Organ Fireworks recording at Haderlev with Christopher Herrick.
Friday 6 April, 2007
Birmingham Bach Choir and ECO’s annual performance of J S Bach’s St.Matthew Passion at Symphony Hall, Birmingham (2pm).
Thursday 5 April, 2007
Paul rehearses the English Chamber Orchestra and soloists for St Matthew Passion in London.
Friday 30 March, 2007
Whitehall Choir and London Baroque Sinfonia perform A.H.Gomme’s reconstruction of J S Bach’s St Mark Passion BWV247 at St John’s Smith Square, London.
Thursday 22 – Sunday 25 March, 2007
Mary Wakefield Festival final rehearsals and concert in Kendal Parish Church. Howells’ Hymnus Paradisi, Dyson In Honour of the City and
Elgar’s Enigma Variations www.communigate.co.uk/lakes/marywakefieldfestival.
Saturday 17 March, 2007
Petersfield Festival Concert 2 www.petersfieldmusicalfestival.org.uk.
Thursday 15 March, 2007
Paul goes to Cardiff to hear rehearsal of The Deciduous Cross conducted by Neil Ferris with the Cardiff Polyphonic Choir (performance on the 24th).
Tuesday 13 March, 2007
Petersfield Festival joint rehearsal.
Monday 12 March, 2007
Royal College of Music Chamber Choir concert 7pm.
Saturday 10 March, 2007
Petersfield Festival Concert 1 www.petersfieldmusicalfestival.org.uk.
Thursday 8 March, 2007
Petersfield Festival joint rehearsal.
Saturday 3 March, 2007
Birmingham Bach Choir A Torch for John concert in honour of John Joubert’s 80th birthday in Birmingham Cathedral.
Thursday 1 March, 2007
Petersfield Festival joint rehearsal.
(During March Robert Sharpe’s recording of all Paul’s organ music at Truro Cathedral will be released on the Regent label.)
Saturday 24 February, 2007
Petersfield Festival joint rehearsal.
Saturday 17 February, 2007
Paul takes a workshop on his Easter Oratorio with the Pheonix Singers of Leek who perform it in March.
Saturday 17 February, 2007
Paul then goes up to Lytham St Annes to give after dinner speech for their centenary dinner.
Thursday 15 February, 2007
Petersfield Festival joint rehearsal.
Saturday 10 February, 2007
Birmingham Bach Choir Come and Sing event at St Peter’s Harborne Mozart’s Requiem.
Friday 9 February, 2007
Petersfield Festival joint rehearsal.
Friday 1 / Saturday 2 February, 2007
Paul conducts joint rehearsals in Kendal for Mary Wakefield Festival 2007: Howells Hymnus Paradisi and Dyson’s In Honour of the City.
Thursday 1 February, 2007
Birmingham Conservatoire Chamber Choir 2 concert at St Paul’s Church, Birmingham.
Saturday 27 / Sunday 28 January, 2007
Paul conducts recording with the Whitehall Choir and Brandenburg Sinfonia of Bruckner’s E Minor Mass and his The Deciduous Cross at St Mary le Bow church in the City of London.
Friday 26 January, 2007
WORKS by two outstanding composers of church music have yielded two richly rewarding recordings in recent months. Read More>>
Sunday 21 January, 2007
Alive first liturgical performance by Birmingham Cathedral Choir.
Saturday 20 January, 2007
Join rehearsals at Petersfield with Festival choruses.
Thursday 18 January, 2007
Birmingham Conservatoire Chamber Choir concert of the recording repertoire at St.Alban’s Birmingham.
Saturday 13 January, 2007
Open Workshop for Three Spires Chorus in Truro on Mozart Requiem.
Thursday 11 / Friday 12 January, 2007
Birmingham Conservatoire Chamber recording of English music programme in St.Alban’s Church, Birmingham. Repertoire includes Paul’s How Love Bleeds set of four Christmas pieces and his Alive written for the centenary of the Birmingham Diocese.
Monday 8 January, 2007
Recording The Land of Lost Content at Ludlow Parish Church with Martin Setchell. New organ work written for this recording.
Saturday 6 January, 2007
Guest of Honour Oakham School Chapel Choir dinner.
Sunday 17 December, 2006
Birmingham Bach Choir’s service of Nine Lessons and Carols at St. Paul’s Church in the Jewellery Quarter.
Saturday 16 December, 2006
Birmingham Bach Choir performs Bach’s Christmas Oratorio at Symphony Hall, Birmingham with the English Chamber Orchestra.
Tuesday 12 December, 2006
Whitehall Choir Christmas Concert at St.Stephen’s, Rochester Row, London.
Saturday 2 December, 2006
Birmingham Bach Choir’s annual Christmas Cheer concert at St Francis, Bournville.
Sunday 26 November, 2006
Paul conducts Haydn’s Creation at Glenalmond College, Perth.
Friday November 24 – Saturday November 25. 2006
Rehearsals for 2007 Mary Wakefield Festival (Kendal, Cumbria): Howells Hymnus Paradisi and Dyson In Honour of the City.
Thursday 23 November, 2006
Whitehall Choir concert at St.Paul’s Knightsbridge
Elgar/Mendelssohn/Bach/Brahms and Parry.
Saturday 11 November, 2006
Birmingham Bach Choir concert at St Thomas Stourbridge
Britten/Purcell/Duruflé.
Saturday 4 November, 2006
Whitehall Choir Come and Sing event at St Paul’s Covent Garden: Mozart Requiem.
Saturday 14 October, 2006
Finzi Friends choral day at St Matthew’s Northampton. Paul conducts Finzi’s Intimations of Immortality.
Thursday 5 October, 2006
Paul gives talk at Lichfield Cathedral VSC for National Art Collection Fund.
Thursday 28 September, 2006
Mozart C Minor Mass at the RCM. Paul prepares the RCM Chamber Choir for the concert conducted by Sir Charles Mackerras. 7pm.
Saturday September 9, 2006
Paul's annual choral workshop day at Abbey Dore, Herefordshire.
Monday August 28 – Tuesday August 29, 2006
Robert Sharpe records all Paul’s organ music in Truro Cathedral for Regent Records.
Saturday August 19 – Sunday August 27, 2006
Paul directs various choirs at Ardingly Summer Music (the main choir will be singing Finzi's Intimations of Immortality).
Saturday August 12, 2006
1st performance of Paul’s ‘We wait for thy loving kindness’ in Lichfield Cathedral (wedding).
Sunday July 30 – Sunday August 6, 2006
Choral course at Valence sur Baïse in southern France.
Tuesday July 15, 2006
Paul conducts choir of Trinity Episcopal Cathedral, Columbia at Gloucester Cathedral.
Saturday July 8, 2006
Birmingham Bach Choir concert at Pershore Abbey, Worcestershire.
Thursday July 6, 2006
Whitehall Choir concert at St John's Smith Square, London. Haydn Nelson Mass and Handel Dixit Dominus with London Baroque Sinfonia.
Saturday July 1, 2006
Finzi Friends Day in Oxford (exhibition of Finzi mss at the Bodleian Library, afternoon concert at the Holywell Music Room, Evensong at Exeter College).
Tuesday June 6 – Thursday June 15, 2006
Period with the National Chamber Choir of Ireland culminating in concert at the National Gallery in Dublin on the 15th.
Saturday May 20, 2006
Birmingham Bach Choir choral workshop day on Bach’s B minor Mass. St George’s School, Beaufort Rd, Edgbaston.
Saturday June 10, 2006
Finzi Friends day at Ashmansworth.
Friday May 12, 2006
Paul conducts Birmingham Conservatoire Chamber Choir
Concert at St.Alban’s Church, Conybere Street, Birmingham 6.30pm. Dvorak/Haydn/Howells/Bainton/Vaughan Williams.
Saturday May 6 – Sunday May 7, 2006
Choral Workshop weekend in Brussels.
Thursday April 27, 2006
Choral Workshop for the Royal College of Organists at the Birmingham Conservatoire.
Friday April 14, 2006
Paul conducts annual performance of Bach’s St Matthew Passion at Symphony Hall, Birmingham. Birmingham Bach Choir and English Chamber Orchestra.
Friday March 31, 2006
Paul conducts Whitehall Choir and Brandenberg Sinfonia at St John’s Smith Square, London in his own The Deciduous Cross and Bruckner’s E minor Mass.
Saturday March 25, 2006
Paul conducts 2nd Petersfield Festival choral concert.
Saturday March 18, 2006
Paul conducts 1st Petersfield Festival choral concert.
Thursday March 9, 2006
Paul gives illustrated talk on Music and the Passion at Gloucester Cathedral in their Lent series.
Thursday March 2, 2006
Paul adjudicated music competitions at Bedford School.
Saturday February 25, 2006
Paul conducts Handel’s Samson at Symphony Hall Birmingham with Birmingham Bach Choir and English Chamber Orchestra.
Saturday February 4, 2006
Paul conducts Birmingham Bach Choir’s Come and Sing day. Mendelssohn’s Elijah (extracts).
Saturday January 14, 2006
Choral Workshop at Truro for the THree Spires Singers on Mozart's Requiem. (Open to all singers).
Saturday January 7 – Thursday January 12, 2006
Producing the next volume of Christopher Herrick's Organ Fireworks series for Hyperion Records in Dallas USA.
Friday 27 December, 2005 – Saturday 1 January, 2006
Paul conducts choral Winter Choral Week at Zennor in Cornwall (Music at
Lacock).
Sunday December 18, 2005
Birmingham Bach Choir Nine Lessons and Carols service at St Paul’s Church, Hockley, Birmingham.
Saturday December 17, 2005
Launch of the recording of Paul's Easter Oratorio. See full details at www.easteroratorio.com.
Tuesday December 13, 2005
Paul conducts Whitehall choir in Christmas concert at St Stephen’s Rochester Row, London.
Saturday December 10, 2005
Paul conducts Birmingham Bach Choir in Christmas concert at St Francis Bourneville.
Thursday November 24, 2005
Paul conducts Whitehall Choir at St Paul’s Knightsbridge (Frank Martin Mass and Duruflé Requiem).
Saturday November 19, 2005
Paul conducts Birmingham Bach Choir at Birmingham Cathedral.
Saturday November 12, 2005
Paul takes choral workshop at Cirencester Parish Church on Bach Magnificat.
Saturday 5 – Sunday 6 November, 2005
Paul conducts Choral Festival in Peterborough.
Wednesday October 12, 2005
First performance of ‘Alive’: anthem commissioned to celebrate the centenary of the Birmingham Diocese in Birmingham Cathedral.
Thursday September 29 – Sunday October 2, 2005
Recording of Paul’s Easter Oratorio at Hawksyard Priory, Armitage. Birmingham Bach Choir, English Symphony Orchestra, Lichfield Cathedral Choristers, Lichfield Cathedral Special Choir: Rachel Nicholls (s), Philip Salmon (Evangelist), Nathan Vale (t), Jonathan Gunthorpe (b).
Tuesday September 27, 2005
Paul conducts Dvorak’s Stabat Mater at the Cadogan Hall, London with Whitehall Choir and Brandenburg Sinfonia (postponed from 7 July, 2005).
Saturday September 24, 2005
Paul gives lecture on Herbert Howells to WM branch of Elgar Society at the Elgar Birthplace.
Sunday September 11, 2005
Paul conducts Birmingham Bach Choir at Birmingham ArtsFest.
Saturday September 10, 2005
Paul takes annual choral workshop at Abbey Dore, Golden Valley, Herefordshire.
Wednesday August 31, 2005
Paul gives organ recital at Lichfield Cathedral.
Monday August 8, 2005
Worcester Three Choirs Festival. Paul’s Come out Lazar and the last movement of the Suite for Organ are performed at Evensong.
August 2005
Paul Spicer has just been commissioned by the Dyson Trust to write the first major biography of the composer Sir George Dyson (1883-1964).
Read more>>
Sunday July 31 – Sunday August 7, 2005
Paul conducts choral course in Valence sur Baïse, Southern France.
Saturday 9 July, 2005
Paul conducts the Birmingham Bach Choir at St Michael and All Angels Great
Witley, Worcestershire in the same programme as St Martin’s in the
Bullring. Tickets: 01299 896437 (Peter Heighway).
Saturday 25 June, 2005
Paul conducts the Birmingham Bach Choir at St Martin’s in the Bullring,
Birmingham.
Mozart motets, Verdi Pater Noster, Mendelssohn and Bach motets.
Tickets 0121 236 5622.
Saturday 28 – Sunday 29 May, 2005
Paul takes English Weekend at Dordrecht in Holland preparing for Choral
Evensong. (Music at Lacock).
Saturday 14 May, 2005
Paul takes choral workshop with Lytham St Anne’s Choral Society
Bach’s Magnificat. All welcome.
Tuesday 5 – Monday 9 May, 2005
Recording Paul’s EASTER ORATORIO for CD at Hawksyard Priory.
Saturday 30 April, 2005
EASTER ORATORIO in Durham Cathedral 7.30pm (same forces as above)
Tickets: 0191 384 3720.
Saturday 16 April, 2005
Paul conducts his own EASTER ORATARIO at St Philip’s Cathedral, Birmingham
7.30pm.
Natalie Clifton-Griffith, Robert Murray (Evangelist), Ed Lyon, Jonathan
Gunthorpe.
English Symphony Orchestra, Truro Cathedral Choristers, Birmingham Bach
Choir. Tickets: 0121 236 5622.
Saturday 9 April, 2005
Paul conducts workshop for the Elgar in Hereford Society on Elgar Partsongs
(open to all).
Tuesday 29 March, 2005
“Paul Spicer is the country’s only professor of choral conducting”
Peter Kingston,The Guardian.
Please click on the image above to read the article.
Friday 25 March, 2005
Paul conducts annual performance of Bach’s St Matthew Passion in
Symphony Hall, Birmingham at 2pm.
Catherine Bott, Jean Rigby, Christopher Gillett (Evangelist), Mark Lebrocq,
Ashley Holland (Christus), John Bernays.
English Chamber Orchestra, Birmingham Bach Choir
Tickets from Symphony Hall Box Office (0121 780 3333).
Saturday 19 March, 2005
Paul conducts Bach’s St John Passion at the Petersfield Festival.
Saturday 12 March, 2005
Paul conducts the Mary Wakefield Festival concert in Kendal, Cumbria
Britten Spring Symphony, Verdi Te Deum and Schumann Spring Symphony.
Tuesday 8 March, 2005
Paul conducts choral workshop with the Monmouth Choral Society on Elgar’s The Music Makers.
Monday 7 March, 2005
Paul conducts the Royal College of Music Chamber Choir in a Tippett centenary
programme (including music by Palestrina, Monteverdi, Purcell and Britten).
RCM Concert Hall 7pm.
Saturday 5 February, 2005
Birmingham Bach Choir Come and Sing day working on Brahms’s German
Requiem. All welcome: Ring Celia Potts on 0121 454 0681.
Thursday 3 February, 2005
Paul gives the annual Crees Lecture at the Royal College of Music at 6.30pm. Making mountains out of molehills: twentieth century British choral
music in performance.
Friday 14 January, 2005
Peter Schreier conducts the RCM Chamber Choir in a performance of Bach’s
B Minor Mass at St John’s Smith Square which Paul has prepared.
Saturday 8 January, 2005
Birmingham Conservatoire Chamber Choir concert in Wolverhampton.
Programme to include Liszt Missa Choralis, Peter Cornelius Requiem and
Brahms Fünf Gesänge op.104.
Friday 17 October, 2003
Review of Paul Spicer’s The Deciduous Cross in The Church
Times.
Turning autumn to gold
Roderic Dunnett catches up on Spicer.
Paul Spicer, Music Director of the Birminham Bach Choir, The Whitehall
Choir in London, and the Finzi Singers, is one of the most interesting
and – dare one say it? – inspired of those composers writing
for choirs today in a broadly traditional vein.
As witnessed by his immensely striking Easter Oratorio, first heard
two years ago in Lichfield Cathedral, Spicer draws both consciously and
unconsciously on certain obvious models: Britten, Tippett, Messiaen. Nor
is he afraid of overt ‘Englishness’. But the fusion he creates
is, or is fast approaching, something of originality, as evidenced by
only the second performance of his new cantata for chorus, wind and brass The Deciduous Cross, a setting of writings by the Welsh poet-priest
R.S.Thomas, commissioned for his Birmingham Bach Choir, and last month
given only its second performance, in Tewkesbury Abbey.
Thomas, who died three years ago, aged 87, was one of life’s great
observers: his writings fuse ancient rhetor, pulpit fire, and the verbal
ruggedness of Heath-Stubbs or Mackay Brown with the wry insight of the
socialist journalist James Cameron, bathed in a religious perspective.
What drew Spicer to Thomas was, first, his courage in depicting human
desolation as he saw it all around him, and wresting from it a positive,
optimistic vision; and, second, the power of his poetry, such as those
lines from ‘The Prayer’ (from Laboratories of the Spirit) – ‘let leaves from the Deciduous Cross Fall on us, washing Us
clean, turning our autumn To gold by the affluence of their fountain’ – which furnished the title for these new settings.
This was a fine performance of a promising work, comprising six Thomas
settings and an instrumental interlude redolent of those ‘sad processionals’ that people the music of Arthur Bliss. Bliss (especially in Morning
Heroes) was inspired by personal loss – that of his brother in
the Great War – and Spicer comes from similar starting point: the
death of his mother.
Any criticism might reside in the third setting, ‘A Blackbird Singing’,
which starts (as does the first, a song as vital as Gurney’s ‘Spring’),
by chirruping gloriously, like a Tippett aubade, but whose word-setting
eventually grows too stolid. Likewise, apart from one dubious chorus triplet
and the tendency of trumpets to overbear, there was a crying need at several
points for more choral pizzicato and portamento, so that the words of
certain lighter-stepped phrases might be heard to better advantage,
But it is Spicer’s wide-reaching musical literacy, musical ear and
intelligence that combine to support the natural empathy he has with his
texts. He can manage the broad brush and the long line. Frequently chromatic
chordings suggest not so much his special love, Howells, as Debussy (Le
Martyr de St Sébastien) or Frank Martin. Parts of the delicious
last song might have been another Britten Flower Song.
What makes a composer is more his structural command than such outward
decoration, but Spicer has demonstrated he is out and away the best person
(since the death of William Mathias) for a future Three Choirs, Leeds
or Huddersfield commission.
Saturday 21st June, 2003
Spicer’s composition is intoxicating
Birmingham Bach Choir
Birmingham Cathedral
When Paul Spicer took over the baton of the Birmingham Bach Choir a decade
ago, he found a body which its retiring conductor, Richard Butt, had moulded
and maintained as one of great responsivesness and musical intergrity
over a good many years.
Amazingly, Spicer has been able to follow this hard act by developing
and extending the work of the BBC, widening its repertoire and finding
new avenues for its expertise – so much so, that the nearest
we came to Bach in Saturday’s anniversary celebration was in certain
aspects of the Bruckner E minor mass.
But the most spectacular aspect of this joyous evening was the premiere
of Paul Spicer’s own The Deciduous Cross, a 25-minute setting
commissioned by BBC chariman Nicholas Fisher of religious poems by R S
Thomas.
The highly personal response of these texts to imagery of the Crucifixion
is mirrored in Spicer’s deeply-felt composition, almost intoxicatingly
melodic throughout to create a chaste kind of spiritual ecstasty in which
elements of reviving nature figure strongly.
There are elements of birdsong here, scurryings of returning life, and
even a cathartic kind of country dance. The ending in genuinely consoling,
with an E major chord which links it by coincidence with the Bruckner’s
conclusion.
Together both works make rewarding and economical choral-society material,
needing merely a wind band (Saturday’s was superb), and requiring
no soloists.
After some insecure intonation to launch the Bruckner, this sumptuous
work was warmly, thrillingly given. As for Spicer’s piece, his choristers
did their much-loved director proud.
Christopher Morley.
Good Friday, 2003
Bach: St Matthew Passion
Birmingham Bach Choir/ECO
Life-affirming performance of Passion
Birmingham Bach Choir/National Youth Orchestra of Great Britain
Symphony Hall
Paul Spicer earned the gratitude of more than 2000 listeners even after
conducting Symphony Hall's annual Good Friday performance of Bach’s
St Matthew Passion, for he knew exactly how to approach the unnecessarily
vexed issue of applause.
We have had po-faced injunctions from other sources in the past not to
clap at the end of sacred works: demands made by people who obviously
have no understanding of Psalm 100, its exhortations applying even at
the end of as harrowing a narrative as this, where musicians and audience
have shared a sacramental experience and need the emotional release of
marking the fact.
So Spicer conjured something wonderful, holding us silent and awed for
a considerable interval at the end of this presentation from the Birmingham
Bach Choir, before eventually lowering his arms, inviting his soloists
to stand and the torrent of acclaim to begin.
And the acclaim was well-deserved, for the BBC is surely among the premier
division of the country's choirs, its many members responding with amazing
unanimity of tone, unflinching attack and unforced naturalness of diction
to Spicer's inspiring and urbane direction, almost at times, indeed, singing
with the fluidity and deftness of an extra soloist.
Supporting the choristers was the English Chamber Orchestra, playing with
an unhectoring “period” style, bringing athleticism and colour
to Bach's wonderful orchestral writing – and special praise to Richard
Boothby, making something musical out of the viola da gamba obbligatos
which so often in the past have merely added to purgatorially bum-numbing
experiences.
Christopher Morley
Birmingham Post