Repertoire and Sound Samples

New Cambridge Singers specialize in baroque and contemporary music, while also performing a wider range of a cappella music.

The first aim of the choir is to perform a range of baroque music using, where necessary, an orchestra or ensemble of appropriate size and playing style. The cantatas of Bach are central to the choir’s planning, although it also puts on the more well-known works of Bach and his contemporaries, such as the B minor Mass, the Passions, and Messiah.

The second major interest of the choir is 20th and 21st century music, and especially British music of this period. In this field the choir explores lesser-known repertoire alongside mainstream pieces and also commissions new works, encouraging new and established composers. Recent commissions include works by Richard Rodney Bennett, Thomas Ades, Christopher Brown, John Webb, Alicia Grant and Peter Maxwell Davies.

Beyond this, the choir covers as wide range of a cappella repertoire and styles as possible, often through themed programmes embracing music from different periods and countries and, wherever possible, in the original language. Programmes generally reflect this policy and each is usually performed once in Cambridge and once in a rural location in the surrounding region. There is often some variation between town and country programmes, with the inclusion of more overtly popular pieces (such as the Requiems of Fauré or Mozart, or settings of spirituals) at informal summer concerts or to encourage new audiences outside Cambridge.

In recent seasons the choirs repertoire has included works by Arensky, Bach, Bartok, Richard Rodney Bennett, Lennox Berkeley, Brahms, Britten, John Blow, Byrd, David Bedford, Gordon Crosse, Andrea and Giovanni Gabrieli, Gibbons, Hammerschmidt, Handel, Nicholas Maw, Palestrina, Praetorius, Purcell, Rachmaninov, Keith Roberts, Schubert, Schütz, Stanford, Weelkes, Wilbye and others. The choir performed Bach’s B minor Mass, with the Sweelinck Ensemble playing on period instruments, in March 2004. With the same orchestra the choir performed Handel’s Messiah in Cambridge and Oundle in the spring of 2006.

In March 2001, New Cambridge Singers gave the première of what we believe was the world’s first e-commission, Richard Rodney Bennett’s The Glory and the Dream. With the help of the Internet we contacted choirs in Australia, New Zealand, Canada, Iceland, the USA and the UK, and 15 of them joined with us in this global commission. The composer more than exceeded everyone’s expectations with a setting for choir and organ of Wordsworth’s “Intimations of Immortality” which is not only very beautiful, but is also a most rewarding challenge for singers and organist. In 2003 the choir made a recording of the work with Riverrun Records in Queens’ College, Cambridge, along with Benjamin Britten’s Flower Songs and Invocation by Christopher Brown, and the compact disc is available from Riverrun Records. The Kestrel Road, by Peter Maxwell Davies, was a joint commission between over 40 choirs including New Cambridge Singers, and was performed by the choir in March 2005. A subsequent performance of this took place in Oundle and a recording is to be released on CD soon by Riverrun Records.

In 2007-8 the choir commissioned and performed David Bedford's The Soft Stars that Shine at Night (jointly with Making Music) and Christopher Brown's Sunlight on a Pale Green Ocean which the choir commissioned to mark his ten years as musical director and his 65th birthday. We were pleased to see that Sunlight was broadcast on BBC Radio 3 in December 2008 in a performance by the BBC Singers. We also performed Gordon Crosse's Covenant of the Rainbow, an unusual but entertaining piece for choir, piano duo and organ, and Finnish composer Jaakko Mäntyjärvi's hauntingly beautiful setting of Four Shakespeare Songs.

New Cambridge Singers have a New Music Fund which enables us to commission new works either by ourselves or in conjunction with other choirs. If you would like to contribute towards new choral music in the 21st century then please contact musical director, Christopher Brown on musicaldirector@newcambridgesingers.org.uk or any committee member. Even better, you could join our shareholder scheme, New Cambridge Songs, which enables you to sponsor a particular piece if song 'shares' are still available, or you could let us decide on the piece for you. Read about the scheme here (in PDF format).

The choir is available for smaller events such as weddings or dinners. It often supports charitable causes and is interested in further developing educational work and collaborative work with youth groups in the region.

Sound samples
Click on the MP3 links below to hear some samples of New Cambridge Singers' repertoire.

  McKie: We Wait for thy Loving Kindness (0.7MB)
  Radcliffe: O bone Jesu (1.16MB)
  Bach: Jesu meine Freude (1.02MB)
  Bach: In Sancto Spiritu (1.83MB)
  Chris Brown: Song of the Rain Chant (0.8MB)

Repertoire – further links:  First Performances  Recordings

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