A tuneful concert of well-known favourite choral music from Fauré (Requiem), Vaughan Williams (5 Mystical Songs) and Mendelssohn (Hear my prayer)
The South London Singers would like to invite you to a concert of lovely music to enjoy on a Sunday afternoon, 1st November. (Please note the day: not a Saturday this time!)
We have chosen three well-loved choral items to start our 2026 to 2027 season.
Fauré’s Requiem is full of beautiful melodies. It is his very personal take on the Requiem and includes some parts of the burial service with which he was very familiar as a church organist. In fact, he seems to have had his fill of playing for these services and, apparently said: ‘I know it all by heart and I wanted to write something different’. He revised and added to the piece several times from 1888 before his final version in 1900.
He did not write the piece for any particular memorial although he lost both his parents in the few years before the first version was aired in 1888. He is quoted as saying that he did not write it ‘for anything just his own pleasure’ and that it had been called ‘a lullaby of death’. The first performance of the final version was at the Trocadéro in Paris with 250 musicians.
It has been noted that it has a similar selection of movements to Brahms’ German Requiem which the S.L.S. performed earlier this year. Fauré’s Requiem was performed in 1924 for his own funeral and reached the U.K. in 1936, 90 years ago this year.
We will also be singing Ralph Vaughan Williams’ Five Mystical Songs: a setting of words of a spiritual nature by the seventeenth century Welsh poet, George Herbert. The work is, again, a tuneful piece and prominently features a baritone soloist along with varied contributions by the choir and organ. It was first performed in 1911 at the Three Choirs Festival (which was also the occasion for the first performance of ‘Nebuchadnezzar’ written for the 1935 Three Choirs Festival by Yorkshire born composer Sir George Dyson and performed by the S.L.S. in November 2025.)
The third of our choral items goes back somewhat in time to 1845 and its first performance which was given in London: Felix Mendelssohn’s ‘Hear My Prayer’ based on Psalm 55. It is written for soprano soloist, choir and organ and, again, is full of melody like the other two works.
Mendelssohn, though based in his native Germany, spent much time in Britain over ten visits where several of his major works were premiered, but was generally well travelled in Europe visiting France, Italy and Switzerland meeting musicians and other well-known cultural figures.
Please avoid disappointment by purchasing your ticket in advance.
Event organisers: The South London Singers
Website: South London Singers - South London Singers