Celebrating 15 Years:
2015-2016 Season
What Sweeter Music: 15th Anniversary Concert
Friday, October 30, 2015
First Church, Cambridge
Our new season marks the fifteenth anniversary for the Ensemble. Our first concert celebrates this anniversary with pieces from the Ensemble’s repertoire from the last 15 years. We are joined by the two previous artistic directors, founder Thomas Cunningham and successor Miguel Felipe.
Lobet den Herrn, BWV 230 — J.S. Bach
Funeral Ikos — John Tavener
Magnificat — Arvo Pärt
Angel vopiyashe — Ivan Moody
Agnus Dei (Adagio) — Samuel Barber
Tribulationes —Vahram Sargsyan
BCE Commission, 2010
There is sweet music — Edward Elgar
The evening primrose — Benjamin Britten
My God, how wonderful thou art — Richard Scarth
Third Boston Byzantine Music Festival
Friday, November 13, 2015
First Church, Cambridge
BCE presents this concert as part of the Third Boston Byzantine Music Festival. We sing Byzantine-inspired music by Arvo Pärt, John Tavener and Ivan Moody.
Funeral Ikos — John Tavener
Angel vopiyashe — Ivan Moody
Solfeggio — Arvo Pärt
Apolytikon of St. Nicholas — Ivan Moody
Song for Athene — John Tavener
Magnificant — Arvo Pärt
Canticle of Simeon — Ivan Moody
Funeral Trisagion — Ivan Moody
Ave rex angelorum — John Tavener
Nowell! Nowell! — John Tavener
Sing Nowell: Holiday Concert
Saturday, December 19, 2015
Old South Church, Boston
Loosely based on the traditional service of Nine Lessons and Carols, this concert includes carols for choir and congregation using the fine organ in Old South Church, and many arrangements of secular carols to get you into the holiday spirit!
O come all ye faithful — Trad.
Venite, gaudente! — Adrian Peacock
A child is born in Bethlehem — Samuel Scheidt
Magnificat — Arvo Pärt
Bogoróditse Djévo —Arvo Pärt
Hymn to the Virgin — Benjamin Britten
There is a flower — John Rutter
In the bleak midwinter — Trad. (arr. Ola Gjeilo)
Silent night, holy night — Franz Gruber (arr. David Hill)
O holy night — Adolphe Adam (arr. René Clausen)
Angel’s carol — John Rutter
Tomorrow shall be my dancing day — John Gardner
Hark! The herald angels sing — Trad.
The holly and the ivy — Trad. (arr. Ola Gjeilo)
The twelve days of Christmas —Trad. (arr. Andrew Carter)
Jingle Bells — J. Pierpont (arr. Ralph Allwood)
A Voice from Heaven
Friday, February 12 2016
Marsh Chapel, Boston
Part of the annual conference of the Society for Christian Scholarship in Music, this concert includes two of the best choral works composed in the last one hundred years: Herbert Howells’ sublime Requiem (1936/1980) and the Pulitzer prize-winning Little Match Girl Passion (2008) by David Lang..
Requiem — Herbert Howells
Little Match Girl Passion — David Lang
Serenade to Music: Settings of William Shakespeare
Friday, May 13, 2016
First Church, Cambridge
Our final concert commemorates the 400th anniversary of the death of William Shakespeare in a concert of texts by Shakespeare set by composers such as Frank Martin, Jaakko Mäntyjävri and Ralph Vaughan Williams. This concert also includes the world premiere of a new work by Gregory Brown, winner of our 2015 Commission Competition. With special guests Anna Arazi (piano), Michael Hustedde (violin), and members of Actors' Shakespeare Project: Allyn Burrows, Sarah Newhouse, and Omar Robinson.
From Three Madrigals — Emma Lou Diemer
O Mistress mine
Take, oh, take those lips away
Three Shakespeare Settings — Ralph Vaughan Williams
Full fathom five
The cloud-capp’d towers
Over hill, over dale
From Five Pieces Based on the Tempest — Frank Martin
Full fathom five
Where the bee sucks
Neither rhyme nor reason — Greg Brown
Winner of BCE’s 2015 commission competition
Double, double toil and trouble — Jakko Mäntyjävri
Serenade to Music — Ralph Vaughan Williams