Concert

Ancient and Modern

Saturday 17 June 2023, 7:30 pm

St John the Evangelist Church, Iffley Road, Oxford

J.S. Bach, Komm, Jesu, Komm, D. Scarlatti, Stabat Mater, and Vaughan Wiliams, Mass in G

Generations of composers have long been entranced by the beauties of the old polyphonic style perfected by the likes of Palestrina. The OBC’s summer concert showcases three great works whose composers tried to recreate that old style, but each ended up saying something quite new and special in their own way.

This concert offers a real feast for the musical palate, with three masterpieces of choral polyphony: the heavenly meditation that is Bach’s motet Komm, Jesu, komm; a remarkable Mass setting by Vaughan Williams, which constructs a ‘cathedral in sound’ for voices to match the sonorities of his Tallis Fantasia; and, in Domenico Scarlatti’s 10-voice Stabat Mater, some of the richest choral harmonies to have come down to us from the Italian Baroque.

These pieces will sound especially fine in the magnificent acoustic of St. John the Evangelist.