Programme for Friday

Chat with our many and varied Corporate and Associate members, including other choral organisations, publishers and composers, who will all be happy to answer your questions and chat - just as they would at our long-running Convention exhibition.

New repertoire from our Gold Members, OUP and Hal Leonard. Including new works by three Oxford Composers: a chance to look at and sing along to works especially designed to help and inspire choirs singing once again by Oxford composers, Sarah Quartel, John Rutter and Bob Chilcott, and new works from the Hal Leonard stable introduced by Jeremy Haneman.

Our Friday evening session features two of today's top ensembles. Papagena is a rarity in the UK, an all-female consort of five professional vocalists, ground-breaking in its discovery and development of new repertoire for women’s voices. Its two albums on the SOMM record label were released to critical acclaim with The Darkest Midnight reaching No.6 in the UK Classical charts and seeing the group featured on BBC Radio 4’s Woman’s Hour. The Gesualdo Six is an award-winning ensemble comprising some of the UK’s finest consort singers. Praised for their imaginative programming and impeccable blend, the ensemble formed in 2014 for a performance of Gesualdo’s Tenebrae Responsories in Cambridge and has gone on to perform at numerous major festivals across the UK, Europe, North America and Australia. Directors Sarah Tenant-Flowers, Suzzie Vango and Owain Park chat about what makes their groups unique, what they've been doing during the pandemic and their plans as live music restarts - and share some of their performances. 

Time for the famous ABCD bar - choose your favourite tipple and join us for a chat. The chance to chat informally with colleagues and ABCD staff about all matters choral! Find out how others are planning the resumption of their choirs, pick up useful tips, share your problems, worries and hopes.