Celebrating Gabrieli at Christ Church, Spitalfields
To celebrate our 30th anniversary in 2012 we would like to dedicate this page to past memories of all our concerts at Christ Church, Spitalfields over the last 7 years. We hope you will also like to contribute to this page, by telling us about your favourite Gabrieli concerts and what made them so special.
All memories are posted to the bottom of this page.
In June 2012 we will be associate artists at the Spitalfields Festival and will perform three very different programmes: Purcell’s Fairy Queen, Stravinsky Mass & Italian Renaissance polyphony, and a new a cappella programme based on English choral and pastoral music.
Click here to share your memories of Gabrieli's concerts at Christ Church, Spitalfields. 
A London home to Gabrieli
Christ Church, Spitalfields was built between 1714 and 1729 and designed by Nicholas Hawksmoor on the scale of a small cathedral. It was built under the Act of Parliament of 1711, which required the building of 50 new churches for the rapidly growing population of London. In the 20th century, the conditions of the church declined massively and by the 1960s, the Grade I listed building was threatened by demolition. A drive to raise funds to restore the church began and finally, after 25 years of renovation, Christ Church finally re-opened to the public in September 2004 and has since become one of London’s finest and most remarkable landmarks.
One month after opening, Gabrieli Consort & Players performed their first concert at Christ Church, Spitalfields and seven years on it has become one of our most cherished and memorable concert venues. The re-opening of this landmark finally gave us a perfect venue in which we could bring our tour programmes home. In the opening season at Christ Church, we performed mostly Baroque and sacred works; music that is closely associated with the ensemble. Gabrieli’s first ever performance at Christ Church was Mozart’s Mass in C minor and was described by the critics as “thrilling” and propelled by “feverish energy”. In October 2005, Gabrieli performed Monteverdi’s Vespers 1610 with two ‘Monteverdi violins’ that were specially commissioned for the 2006 recording of this masterpiece. The seasons continued with performances of Bach’s B minor Mass, Biber’s Requiem in F minor and Handel’s Belshazzar.
A growing theme in Paul McCreesh’s programming was the juxtaposition of repertoire from the ancient to the modern. This first emerged in the a cappella programme The Road to Paradise and more recently, A Spotless Rose, A song of Farewell and last year’s choral programme featuring Byrd’s Great Service and two new commissions by Jonathan Dove as part of the Spitalfields Summer Music Festival in 2011.
Click here to share your Spitalfields memories with us below! 
Your Gabrieli memories at Christ Church, Spitalfields