St James’s Piccadilly, Friday 20 June 2025
Vivamus presents American, English, French, Latvian and Scottish music from the 20th and 21st centuries in a special programme celebrating light in forms from pale morning rays to gleaming stars. On the eve of the longest day of the year, our concert will begin in daylight and proceed through twilight, ending as night falls.
The concert includes choral works by Barber, Dodgson, Ešenvalds, MacMillan, McDowall and Saari, and instrumental items by Bingham, Debussy and Messiaen. It also features the world premiere of musical director Rufus Frowde’s Time. The venue is the Wren church of St James’s Piccadilly, notably the resting place of the astronomer Stephen Peter Rigaud (1774–1839).
Rufus and Vivamus are joined tonight by Michael Higgins, the pianist, composer and artistic director.
Programme
O Radiant Dawn – James MacMillan (b. 1959)
O Radiant Dawn by Scottish composer Sir James MacMillan is one of the Strathclyde Motets and was composed in 2007. The text is an English translation of O Oriens, a sixth-century antiphon (short liturgical chant). This is one of the ‘Great O’ antiphons traditionally used in the Roman Catholic Vespers service during the last seven days of Advent. Spare harmonies foretell the coming dawn and the imminent birth of Christ. For some, it acquired a new significance in the early days of the covid-19 pandemic, when humanity hoped for a new dawn.
Rivers of Light – Eriks Ešenvalds (b. 1977)
Given the scale of the Northern Lights, a natural light display in the sky around the Arctic, it is perhaps unsurprising that in his piece about them the Latvian composer Ēriks Ešenvalds deploys the large forces of two solo voices, nine-part mixed choir, stamping feet and a jaw harp in C. Rivers of Light begins and ends delicately but contains a rhapsodic central section in keeping with the natural wonders observed and journalled by two nineteenth-century Arctic explorers, Charles Francis Hall and Fridtjof Nansen. Not to be overlooked is the simple beauty of the Sámi or old Finnish texts sung by the soloists; that for baritone is a joik, a traditional form of song in Sámi music and part of one of the oldest musical traditions in Europe.
This performance features Eoin O’Connor on jaw harp, and Swéta Rana and Kieran Morgan singing the solo lines for upper and lower voice.
Joie et Clarté des Corps Glorieux – Olivier Messiaen (1908–92)
Olivier Messien was a French composer, organist and ornithologist. Among many other notable compositions, he is remembered for his Quartet for the End of Time composed in a German prison camp in 1940. The organ work performed tonight – Joy and Clarity of the Bodies Glorious – is part of a large cycle for organ composed in the summer of 1939 and completed a week before the declaration of World War II. The subtitle of this movement is: “Then the righteous will shine like the sun in the kingdom of their Father” (Matthew 13:43).
Canticle of the Sun – Stephen Dodgson (1924–2013)
Vivamus is especially honoured to perform the last choral composition by Stephen Dodgson, a free and robust four-part setting of words by his contemporary John Heath-Stubbs (1918–2006). Comparisons have been made between the score and that of Britten’s Hymn to St Cecilia; and between the text and works by W.H. Auden, Britten’s librettist for that work. Listeners may find the more playful passages reminiscent of Britten or MacMillan; the more restrained and prayerful Latin refrain, of Poulenc or of Stravinsky’s Symphony of Psalms. Either way, the effect on performers is like being touched by a giant star in the various phases of its existence, and we hope that experience comes across as we perform this visionary setting.
Solos: Max Bamford, Scott Milne, Rachel Wigmore and Sophie Cass.
Sunset – Eric Saari (b. 1986)
Eric Saari is a music educator, conductor and composer based in the sparsely populated US state of North Dakota. His setting of words from Song at Sunset by arguably America’s most influential poet Walt Whitman includes the phrase, ‘O setting sun! Though the time has come, I still warble under you, if none does, unmitigated adoration.’ Tenors who have just placed a loud and dissonant top A may feel underserved by the use of the word ‘warbling’ in this description.
Moon over Westminster – Judith Bingham (b. 1952)
Judith Bingham once said that she had no feeling of roots and lived in her imagination, which accords with the present writer’s experience of some of her deliciously unsettling choral and instrumental works. Moon over Westminster Cathedral (2003) is not only a transcription of a thitherto unrecorded choral piece, The Waning Moon (1997), but also proceeds from the composer’s desire to write a piece containing no dissonances, retaining tension and release, a first half using only minor chords, a second half using only major chords, and ending with an ambiguous coda.
Sure on this Shining Night – Samuel Barber (1910–81)
The conservative, neo-Romantic American composer Samuel Barber, like his compatriot Eric Whitacre, has inspired some warm and memorable performances by Vivamus over the years. In 1971, Barber said: ‘When I’m writing music for words, then I immerse myself in those words, and I let the music flow out of them.’ This choral arrangement of a song setting an untitled lyric by his near-contemporary James Agee is remarkable in many respects, including the fact that all four vocal lines do not sing the same word at the same time until the last two bars.
Music of the Stars – Cecilia McDowell (b. 1951)
Adapted from a composer’s note:
Music of the Stars was commissioned to celebrate the Chamber Singers of Iowa City’s fiftieth season and the power of music in these challenging times. In recognition of the racial issues which face us every day, the commissioners offered texts written by people of colour: James Weldon Johnson and Kenyan-born Brian Odongo. To continue the themes of music, singing and the stars, the composer discovered an absorbing explanation of ‘light’ and how we perceive it by the American astrophysicist Neil deGrasse Tyson.
The atmospheric text of the first movement has a gentle, almost mesmerizing pace. The composer wove a small part of a Ukrainian folksong into this movement as it seemed impossible to her to ignore the unfolding horror in Ukraine.
In the text of the second, up-tempo movement, Tyson explores the concept of how we analyse colour. According to the composer, setting prose to music needs a different approach, and she aimed to bring a more conversational style to the word setting, sometimes repeating the little phrase endings, to have a little more emphasis.
In the composer’s opinion, each verse of the final movement ends with a solution to the day’s challenge: the gift to sing. She hopes that the commission as a whole brings a response to the times in which we now live.
Clair de Lune – Claude Debussy (1862–1918)
Clair de Lune (Moonlight) is one of Debussy’s most famous works and forms the third movement of his Suite bergamasque, published in 1905. Its title is taken from Verlaine’s poem of the same name, which ends (in translation) with the words:
‘… the calm moonlight, sad and lovely,
Which makes the birds dream in the trees,
And the plumes of the fountains weep in ecstasy,
The tall, slender plumes of the fountains among the marble sculptures.’
It has been interpreted by pianists and non-pianists in many different ways, some highly romanticised or whimsical, while a 1913 recording by the composer perhaps tends to a more stripped-back approach with relatively modest pauses or changes in tempo or dynamic.
Time – Rufus Frowde (b. 1978) [premiere]
Vivamus is profoundly honoured to perform the world premiere of Time for SATB voices and piano by our Music Director, Rufus Frowde.
Dedicated to Martin, Susi and Thomas, Alison’s husband and children, the piece sets words by Alison Evans written some time between 2009 and 2012 and discovered after her death among her music books.
In a simple but affecting composer’s note, Rufus writes, ‘Written in thanks for countless afternoons playing chamber music in Alison’s front room with her children, Thomas and Susi, throughout my childhood.’
Stars – Eriks Ešenvalds (b. 1977)
For his setting of Stars, a highly Romantic poem by the American poet Sara Teasdale, Ešenvalds contents himself with a relatively modest dynamic palette but utilises up to fourteen parts (vocal or instrumental). Given the role of solitude and loneliness in Teasdale’s art and life the text seems exceptionally poignant. Performers are helped to remain rooted on Earth by the composer’s earnest note on sourcing and playing water-filled wine glasses, which contribute up to six parts to the texture of the music.
Solo: Alice Vink.
Sleep – Eric Whitacre (b. 1970)
Sleep is perhaps best left to make its own presence felt. By way of performance history, it was the first piece its Grammy-winning composer used to test his famous concept of the Virtual Choir, in which singers record and upload their videos from locations all over the world. Even more remarkable is how this four-part choral work commissioned by a loving daughter in memory of her late parents came into being; the music originally set a text by the poet Robert Frost, which was subsequently banned from use. The poet Charles Anthony Silvestri – Whitacre’s friend – created a new text incorporating key words from the Frost text (notably ‘sleep’) and a new work was the result.
Performers
Vivamus
Vivamus is a small, London-based chamber choir who singing a diverse and challenging range of repertoire, from well-known classics to new works by living composers. We rehearse weekly at St Clement Danes RAF church and aim to perform at least four times a year at venues in and around central London, including St Martin-in-the-Fields and St James’, Piccadilly. We also organise away weekends to sing in UK cathedrals.
Rufus Frowde, Musical Director
A freelance conductor, organist, pianist and composer, Rufus was Organist and Assistant Director of Music at the Chapel Royal, Hampton Court Palace from 2003 to 2023 as well as a long-serving Musical Director of Surrey Youth Choir. He has been the Musical Director of Vivamus chamber choir since 2008. He is also the Accompanist of Hertfordshire Chorus, one of the UK’s finest symphonic choirs. He became Artistic Director of The English Chamber Choir in 2024.
Rufus studied music as an Organ Scholar at Merton College, Oxford University. He subsequently became Organ Scholar of Worcester Cathedral and undertook prize-winning postgraduate study in Choral Direction and Church Music at the Royal Academy of Music.
Rufus has always maintained a versatile approach to music-making, seeking to ensure that barriers to quality music-making are overcome. As such, alongside his work as a professional musician, he nurtures the music at his local primary school (Samuel Lucas JMI School, Hitchin) as well as working as an animateur for the Chorister Outreach Project at St Albans Cathedral.
Rufus’ performances have included numerous UK cathedrals, Westminster Abbey, La Madeleine (Paris), Kaunas Cathedral, St Thomas’s Leipzig, St Paul’s Basilica (Rome), Cologne Cathedral, Haarlem Cathedral and Longwood Gardens (Pennsylvania). He has worked with musicians and performers including Emma Johnson, Crispian Steele Perkins, Kiri te Kanawa, José Carreras, Ian McMillan and Michael Rosen. He works with numerous orchestras as a guest conductor including The Hanover Band, Brandenburg Sinfonia, Southbank Sinfonia and the Brandenburg Baroque Soloists in collaboration with his choirs.
Rufus appears as a conductor, organist and composer on the Signum Classics, Resonus Classics, Diversions and Divine Art record labels and his work is frequently broadcast on national radio and television. Rufus was awarded Her Majesty’s Diamond and Platinum Jubilee Medals as well as a 2023 Coronation Medal.
Michael Higgins, pianist
Michael Higgins is a pianist, composer and arranger, and co-Artistic Director of Sonoro.
Michael has written for Chivenor Military Ladies Choir, Farnham Youth Choir, Royal Scottish National Orchestra Youth Chorus, the Stay at Home Choir, the National Children’s Choir of Great Britain, Wimbledon Choral, as well as music for corporate films and television commercials, the Classic BRIT awards, BBC Children in Need and the Royal Variety Performance. Many of his works are published by the Royal School of Church Music, Novello and Oxford University Press.
With a special interest in choral accompaniment, Michael is in demand with some of the leading choirs in the UK and regularly works with the National Youth Choirs of Great Britain and the BBC Singers. In 2012 he spent six months travelling across the USA filming a series for American television with popular choir master Gareth Malone and appeared on HM the Queen’s Christmas Message accompanying the Military Wives Choir at Buckingham Palace.
Michael studied piano with Margaret Newman at the Royal Birmingham Conservatoire, and at the Royal Academy of Music, London, with Iain Ledingham and Julius Drake. He was awarded the Joseph Weingarten Memorial Trust Scholarship and continued his studies with Kálmán Dráfi at the Franz Liszt Academy of Music, Budapest.
He has recently been honoured as an Associate of the Royal Academy of Music.
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