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Julian Anderson in "Total Immersion" with the BBC Symphony Orchestra and Chorus

Oct. 01, 2017

Julian Anderson in "Total Immersion" with the BBC Symphony Orchestra and Chorus

The BBC Symphony Orchestra and Chorus present a "Total Immersion" program exploring Julian Anderson's music for mass unaccompanied voices on October 21. The program, which revolves around Anderson's recent Bell Mass for double mixed chorus and organ, also includes performances of My Beloved Spake, O Sing Unto the Lord, and Four American Choruses on Gospel Texts.

Anderson, who has been fascinated by the sounds of massed voices throughout his career, composed several works for chorus which draw upon material from his larger orchestral scores. The most recent work on the program, Bell Mass, was composed in 2010 on commission for the 450th anniversary of Westminster Abbey’s Collegiate Charter. Throughout the work, Anderson took inspiration from bells, "their sonorities, overtones and the tradition of change-ringing." "Many phrases," he writes, "start with a clear, bell-style accent, and much of the harmony was derived from listening closely to bells, including those of Westminster Abbey."


For his Four American Choruses, Anderson selected texts from Ira D. Sankey’s nineteenth century popular American Gospel Hymn Book, a volume much beloved by Charles Ives who quoted many of Sankey’s tunes in his late works. The two shorter works on the program, My Beloved Spake and O Sing Unto the Lord, premiered at Westminster Abbey in 2007 and 1999 respectively, conducted by James O'Donnell.

The BBC’s “Total Immersion” program takes place at St Giles' Crippelgate, London, conducted by Nicholas Kok.

For more information on Julian Anderson, visit schott-music.com and fabermusic.com.

Julian Anderson
Bell Mass (2010)
for double SATB choir and organ
text (Lat) from traditional mass text
17’

My Beloved Spake (2006)
for SATB chorus and organ
text (Eng) from the Song of Songs
4’

O Sing Unto the Lord (1999)
for SATB chorus
text (Eng) from Psalms 96 and 98 (King James version)
5’

Four American Choruses on Gospel Texts (2003)
for SATB chorus
text (Eng) from gospel hymns
20’

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