Acknowledged as one of the great choral works of the Romantic era, Brahms’s German Requiem was clearly intended as a comfort to the living rather than as a requiem for the souls of the dead. This much-loved masterpiece, with tonight’s soloists Philippa Boyle and Peter Lidbetter was originally scored for full symphony orchestra. This performance is accompanied by Iain Farrington‘s refreshing arrangement for seven instrumentalists along with piano to create a rich and satisfying texture, retaining much of the original orchestration. Conducted by Christopher Herrick, in his last season as Conductor and Music Director of Twickenham Choral, the Requiem is partenered with the delicious Romantic choral music of Rheinberger’s Mass in E flat for Double Choir.
Tickets £22 (£11 for full-time students)
Philippa Boyle - Soprano
Soprano Philippa Boyle trained in Rome at Opera Studio Santa Cecilia, where she studied with world-renowned soprano Renata Scotto, and Conservatorio di Musica Santa Cecilia. Prior to her studies in Italy she was a choral scholar at Clare College, Cambridge, where she read Classics.
Projects this season include the release of a highly acclaimed recording of vocal works by Elisabeth Lutyens with organist Tom Winpenny for Toccata Classics; Vaughan Williams A Sea Symphony with the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra at the Royal Albert Hall; Verdi’s Requiem with the London Mozart Players at the Royal Festival Hall, and with East Anglia Chamber Orchestra in Ely Cathedral; Respighi’s Deità Silvane with Sinfonietta Cracovia under Lee Reynolds, a programme of music by Zbigniew Preisner with the Philharmonic Orchestra of the Republic of North Macedonia under Nicholas Chalmers, and Elgar’s The Apostles with the Philharmonia under Adrian Partington in Gloucester Cathedral in the closing concert of the 2023 Three Choirs Festival.
Other concert highlights include Mahler Symphony no.2 “Resurrection” at Blackheath Halls London, Rossini Stabat Mater and Verdi Requiem at Winchester Cathedral, Handel Messiah with Orquesta Ciudad de Granada, Tchaikovsky selections from Eugene Onegin and Queen of Spades with conductor Damian Iorio for Milton Keynes City Orchestra, Elgar’s The Apostles with the Nottingham Bach Choir and Players, and Dvořák’s Te Deum with the Nottingham Concert Orchestra in Nottingham Albert Hall. She has performed Verdi’s Requiem with conductor Franz-Peter Huber and the L’Arpa Festante München Orchestra in Fulda, Germany, with Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra at Leeds Town Hall under conductor David Hill, with Cambridge University Music Society at King’s College, Cambridge, as well as at Southwell Minster, Southwark Cathedral and Norwich Cathedral.
Philippa also enjoys a busy career on the opera stage. Recent engagements include Lady Macbeth for Paisley Opera, Senta (The Flying Dutchman) for OperaupClose, Agrippina (cover) for English Touring Opera; Leonora (La forza del destino) Jenifer (Tippett A Midsummer Marriage) and Ortlinde (die Walküre) both for Regent’s Opera and for London Opera Company. Other engagements include Mum (Mark-Anthony Turnage (Greek), Arcola Theatre; cover Angrboda (Gavin Higgins The Monstrous Child), ROH Linbury; Eva (Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg), Elisabetta de Valois (Verdi Don Carlo), Jenůfa and Kát’a Kabanová, Fulham Opera; Elizabeth (Donizetti Maria Stuarda), OperaUpClose, the title role in Puccini’s Tosca, King’s Head Theatre. She has also performed for Glyndebourne Festival Opera, Nevill Holt Opera, Wexford Festival Opera and Festival d’Aix-en-Provence.
Peter Lidbetter - Bass
Peter Lidbetter is a British/Irish lyric bass from London. 2023 opera engagements included Haly (L’italiana in Algeri) and Simone (Gianni Schicchi), both with Wexford Festival Opera; and Don Basilio (il Barbiere di Siviglia) and Kecal (The Bartered Bride) both covers with Garsington Festival Opera. He is also a principal guest artist with Edvard Grieg Korene in Bergen Norway. Peter holds an MMus and PGdip in vocal performance from the Royal Northern College of Music (both with distinction), where he won the Elizabeth Harwood Memorial Award for graduating singers and the Brigitte Fassbaender Award for Lieder, and was a finalist in the Gold-Medal competition for all students.
Peter studied music at the University of Cambridge and was a choral scholar and, later, lay-clerk at St John’s College. His teacher is Nicholas Powell.
Daniel King Smith
Daniel King Smith has given concerts all over the world as both soloist and accompanist. He has been broadcast on both BBC TV/Radio in the UK (In Tune, Proms, Young Musician of the Year) and NHK TV/Radio in Japan, most recently in recital with Yuki Ito as part of NHK’s “Best of Classic” and “Classic Club” series. Daniel has recorded a number of CDs, including releases with Yuki Ito for Sony and with Anna Hashimoto on the Meridian label.
As a soloist, Daniel’s extensive concerto repertoire has lead to many concerts in the UK and around Europe. He has frequently been a featured Solo Classical Artist on many Cruise lines around the world.
Accompaniment and chamber music are a major part of Daniel’s life, having held staff accompanist posts at both Royal College of Music and Royal Academy of Music Junior Departments and at the Purcell School. He regularly accompanies auditions, lessons, masterclasses and end of year recitals at the London conservatoires as well as being official accompanist for the Countess of Munster Trust. Daniel gives recitals every year with a number of people who have been accepted onto the Countess of Munster Recital Scheme as well as both the Tillett Trust and Making Music Recital Schemes. He is also official accompanist for the Tunbridge Wells International Young Concert Artists competition. Daniel is often resident pianist on summer music courses including the British Isles Music Festival and Musicale. He has given recitals with Michael Collins, Carmel Kaine, Susan Milan, Robert Max, Yuki Ito and Anna Hashimoto, amongst many others and is a member of the Ridgeway Ensemble.
He took up his new post as Assistant Conductor with Twickenham Choral in September 2023.
Conductor - Christopher Herrick
Tonight is Christopher’s final concert with Twickenham Choral after 50 years.
He began his conducting career in the early 1960s while an organ scholar at Exeter College, Oxford, where he held the Parry/Wood Organ Scholarship. Here, he read for an Honours Degree in Music (MA), also assuming the role of Director of Music of the Chapel Choir and conducting the Exonian Singers and Orchestra. After Oxford, he secured a Boult Scholarship at the Royal College of Music, broadening his musical horizons to include the harpsichord and to study conducting with Sir Adrian Boult.
Christopher’s early career was at various Church of England establishments: from 1964 to 1967 he was Organist and Choirmaster at St Mary’s Primrose Hill in north London, before moving to St Paul’s Cathedral as assistant organist from 1967 to 1974.
In 1974 he moved from St Paul’s to Westminster Abbey, the same year that he auditioned for Twickenham Musical Society (see later). His Westminster Abbey days were marked by royal and state occasions, over 200 solo recitals on the Abbey organ, and the release of an album ‘Organ Fireworks’ in 1984 with Hyperion Records, which heralded his solo career as an international concert organist.
This new chapter saw Christopher touring the globe, recording extensively, notably the ‘Organ Fireworks’ and ‘Organ Dreams’ series as well as the complete organ works of Bach and Buxtehude for Hyperion. Since 1984, Christopher has dedicated himself to performance, recording nearly 50 CDs, as well as broadcasting for the BBC and many overseas radio stations – but always working round the Choir’s weekly rehearsals wherever possible. His solo organ performances are accessible on various platforms including Spotify, Apple Music, Amazon Music, Hyperion Records and YouTube.
Back to autumn 1974: after a rigorous series of interviews and an audition by the choir, Christopher took over as conductor of Twickenham Musical Society, as the choir was then called. For his first concert, the choir performed Gerald Finzi’s In Terra Pax and Haydn’s Nelson Mass. The secretary at the time wrote in her report to a committee meeting in January 1975: ‘the choir had given one concert under his baton and this had confirmed their confidence in Mr Herrick; it was hoped that he had no regrets about having accepted the job.’
Christopher’s half-century with the choir has been characterised by steady improvements coupled with judicious innovations, such as the policy of performing works in their original language. The choir has grown in size as well as in ability and reputation. For 22 of those years Christopher was musical director of both Twickenham Choral Society (as it had become) and Whitehall Choir, when several joint concerts were given – at Westminster Abbey, Guildford Cathedral and the Royal Albert Hall.
For a dozen years until the pandemic Christopher also directed the choir at the Brandenburg Spring and Autumn Choral Festivals at St Martin-in-the- Fields; and from the 1990s Christopher has led the choir on tour in Europe usually every two years.
The choir has performed works by living composers and often in the presence of the composer, for example Naji Hakim’s Gloria, Paul Spicer’s Easter Oratorio, Roxanna Panufnik’s Wild Musick, Robin Holloway’s The Spacious Firmament and On a Drop of Dew; and The Burning Heavens, An Old Belief and Jazz Cantata, all commissioned from Iain Farrington.
The choir is indebted to Christopher for his superb leadership and unwavering dedication to the choir.
