Stand-in musical director for Fernhurst Choral Society's November concert

The concert will be on Saturday, November 16 at 7.30pm at St Mary’s, Petworth, featuring Bernstein’s Chichester Psalms and Fauré’s Requiem plus other musical treats by Saint-Saens, Franck and Fauré, accompanied by organ, harp, percussion and violin with professional soprano and baritone soloists.

George said: “It's a lovely opportunity for me. I am the choir’s regular accompanist and I usually play for their rehearsals and a lot of concerts, But it is lovely that Tim has trusted me to stand in this time. It's lovely to work with such a fabulous choir. They are passionate and friendly and tolerant, and they seem to laugh in all the right places! And they do everything that I want them to do. And they're growing in numbers as well which is lovely. We have certainly had nearly ten new members this term.

“But there are certainly challenges. I'm still a new director to them. They know me as a pianist and as a singer, and they've got to get used to a director with a slightly different style to Tim. Every musician picks up on different things and has different priorities in their heads. It's hard to pinpoint but I prioritise listening to each other as they sing and also lovely vowel qualities. It's quite hard to describe but also obviously we are physically different. We move differently and we encourage them differently. And that's part of why I think it's such a good experience for them and for me. They're getting this extra input on top of the already wonderful input that they have.”

As for the programme, certainly the Chichester Psalms are a challenge in their own right: “There is no other choral work quite like it. You have the standard romantic classical baroque repertoire which they do and then you have this which comes from a man who had a feeling for all sorts of types of music. There is the jazzy musical theatre style as well as a good classical technique. There are moments which are bold and dramatic. But the number one challenge is the singing in Hebrew. Luckily he was a very kind man who gave us a transliteration which means it is brought into an alphabet that we can recognise. But it's so exhilarating to do, the jazziness and the boldness. We have got a great opportunity to be really dramatic and to make lots of noise”

The piece was commissioned for and originally performed in Chichester Cathedral in July 1965 as part of the Southern Cathedrals Festival of that year.

Alongside it, the choir will perform Fauré’s Requiem. Composed in the late 1880s, it is focused on eternal rest and consolation and is Fauré's best-known large work.

“It is one of the most loved pieces of all time for choirs and for audiences. We've got the opportunity to explore the full gamut of emotions in this concert. But I think the challenge with this is number one that it is so well loved. People are going to be expecting a flawless performance. A lot of people will know it, and there is that challenge of meeting their expectations. There is also a challenge of bringing something new to the table with this piece. Every time you do it has to be fresh. You have to tackle everything as if it were new and we need to make sure that it is really fresh and vibrant when we do it.”