Concert

Thomas Tallis, Spem in alium

Saturday 21 June 2025, 7:30 pm

Sheldonian Theatre, Oxford

Enjoy the unique sound of a large choir singing unaccompanied, as the Oxford Bach Choir for its summer concert takes you on a journey through five centuries of music.

We will begin and end our concert with Thomas Tallis’s astonishing motet for 40 voices, Spem in Alium, During the evening, we will travel by way of J. S. Bach’s classic masterpiece Lobet den Herrn, via the rich romanticism of motets by Anton Bruckner and Charles Stanford to the fascinating sonorities of three modern heirs to the great choral tradition, Cecilia McDowall, Caroline Shaw, and John Tavener, including the latter’s much loved Song for Athene.

Such music is not often performed by choirs as large as the OBC, and the greater number of singers promises to give it an added intensity.