Saturday 25 March 2023, 7:30pm
High Street Methodist Church, Harpenden
Lili Boulanger - Hymne au Soleil (1912)
Francis Poulenc - Organ Concerto
Gabriel Fauré - Pavane
Maurice Duruflé - Requiem
John Holland-Avery - Baritone
Richard Hills - Organ
Paean Ensemble
Conducted by Rufus Frowde
Tickets: Click [here] or Call 0845 475 1664 *
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Unreserved £15; Students £8; Under 16 Free
* Calls cost 5p [plus 5p per minute after the first 60 seconds] plus your phone company's access charge
During her short life Lili Boulanger developed a distinctive personal style, and composed a huge variety of works, all with great inventiveness. The Hymne au soleil (Hymn to the sun) for mixed choir, alto solo, and piano, was written in 1912 to a poem by Casimir Delavigne.
Poulenc’s Organ Concerto, completed in 1938 is one of his most famous works. Although called a concerto, it’s actually more like a fantasia in a single movement. While writing the concerto he obtained technical advice from Maurice Duruflé (who gave the work’s première in 1939).
Fauré’s Pavane is a short work written in 1887, based on the slow processional Spanish court dance of the same name. Fauré described it as "elegant, assuredly, but not particularly important", but it has become one of his most popular works.
Duruflé published only eleven works, most of which have liturgical themes and texts. Duruflé's beautiful Requiem is his most famous piece, akin to Fauré's familiar setting in its sense of serene optimism.
