Angels and Devils, July 2023

We are delighted to announce next year’s summer residential course, entitled ‘Angels and Devils’, centred on Elgar’s magnificent oratorio The Dream of Gerontius. With an amazing line-up of world-class soloists, Nicky Spence will sing the titular role of Gerontius, Anna Stéphany as the Angel and Andrew Foster Williams as the Priest and Angel of Agony. The course will culminate in a performance with Gabrieli’s renowned orchestra in Ely Cathedral on 26th July 2023, and will also include singers from the Polish National Youth Choir in Roar’s first international collaboration.

Following excellent feedback from the 2022 Elijah residential course, this year’s course will be one day longer, and will expand the range of activity on offer. As well as tackling The Dream of Gerontius, we will also concentrate on few a cappella pieces, in various musical styles, to introduce our young singers to a wider range of choral music.

Our Roar Chorus Directors, Charles MacDougall and Emily Dickens, will be leading the course alongside our Artistic Director, Paul McCreesh, and an expanded group of Gabrieli singers and coaches – a Roar Vocal Faculty – will be on hand throughout the course.

This course is designed for young people aged 14-18 years, although younger singers with some choral experience, especially when part of pre-formed choirs, are also welcome, if their choir directors believe they have the requisite aptitude and ability. The capacity to sing in parts with reasonable confidence is a requirement, but as always in our Roar activity, we will support singers to develop their skills rapidly, to enable them to perform this challenging work in a short period of time. We do ask choir directors to prepare the choirs at least with some basic note familiarity before we meet, although with less-experienced choirs, we would be more than happy to support this process and can sometimes send coaches to your rehearsals in advance.

Angels and Devils Residential Course Details:
Dates: 21 July 2023 – 26 July 2023
Accommodation: New Hall School
Performance Venue: Ely Cathedral
Participants: 250 young singers from youth and school choirs around the country
Cost to participate: £250 per person with partial and full bursaries available to those in need of financial assistance

Register your interest:

More details about the course will follow soon, in the meantime please register your interest with us here.

Choirs

    Individuals


      We are also in the process of forming a new choir for senior Roar singers and alumni, in the age range 16 – 21 years and this will meet for the first time immediately after this course, 28th – 31st July for further performances and recording of Gerontius. This will be an auditioned choir focused on those who wish to follow music as a career and further information for application and audition procedure will be announced in due course.

      Contact

      If you are interested in finding out more about the project, please get in touch with:

      Anna Winstone
      Roar Manager
      anna@nullgabrieli.com