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KEMS Choir
Welcome to KEMS Choir.We're a friendly bunch of people who enjoy singing together.Trained and
conducted by our popular, young and talented Choral Director, Ian Chesworth, we
extend a warm welcome for enthusiastic 'young at heart' singers (male and
female) to join us.
KEMS has its own Orchestra which plays for most of our choral concerts and
sometimes we're joined by some of the KEMS Concert Band members - we all enjoy
making great music together.
Major works performed by the KEMS choir in the 2017-18 season
• Bernstein: Chichester Psalms
• Vivaldi: Gloria
• Monteverdi: Beatus Vir / Gabrieli Hodie Christus Natus Est
• Mozart: Solemn Vespers / Requiem
KEMS Choir Music Director Ian Chesworth looks back on the 2017-18 season
The major challenge the choir faced for the November concert was learning a
rather difficult work in Hebrew! Of course, the work in question was Bernstein’s Chichester Psalms written in 1965 for the Chichester Festival (and using music
from an abandoned stage work). Gustav Hawkins was the treble soloist (along
with six members of the choir) who then joined with Mary Halloran and Sarah
Chesworth as soloists for the Vivaldi Gloria. The contrast of both works was
very useful over the rehearsal period allowing the choir to have a bit of light
relief from the difficulty of the Bernstein whilst still making progress. Both
items worked well together well in the programme although the orchestration for
them was very different!
The main work in the Christmas programme was Monteverdi Beatus Vir with the many
solos taken by singers from the choir. We were lucky to have the luxury of five
rehearsals for this concert which we put to good use learning the Monteverdi
and also a Gabrieli motet which was accompanied by members of the brass
section. The remainder of the programme made good use of our ‘Carols for Choirs 5’ and ‘Christmas Spirituals for Choirs’ books.
In the New Year we began looking at music for the April Choral Concert, Mozart
Requiem and Solemn Vespers. Both works are unusual in their scoring with the
Requiem requiring only clarinet and bassoon in the wind and the Vespers with
the lack of violas. The Vespers is rarely performed (although there was a
performance by another local choir just a few weeks before) and it is great fun
to sing with lots of contrast in the individual movements. The Requiem of
course is deserved in its reputation of being one of Mozart’s greatest works even if he was only able to sketch some movements. I decided to
perform the works in ‘authentic’ Germanic latin which gives added bite to the diction which took a little bit of
getting used to particularly in the Requiem. The orchestra opened the concert
with ‘Eine kleine Nachtmusik’ and the whole programme proved to be popular with the public with a large
turnout and many many comments afterwards on how much audience members had
enjoyed the evening’s music making.
The 2017-18 season has been challenging for both choir and orchestral librarians
but we managed to source most material either from the internet or the library
service with just the orchestral parts for ‘Chichester Psalms’ having to be hired from the publishers. Many thanks to Barbara and Melanie for
all their hard work.
In the 2018-19 season, we are central to the Macclesfield Observance of the
100th Anniversary of the Armistice with a concert on 10-Nov including Vaughan
Williams ‘Dona Nobis Pacem’ and with a return to the RNCM in March in a joint concert with Shrewsbury
Choral Society to sing ‘The Kingdom’ by Elgar. We will also have the opportunity to sing the work twice ‘on tour’ in Shrewsbury Abbey. In the summer, we are currently planning a lighter
concert.
Why not join us? Singing in a choir is very rewarding and is great fun too. KEMS are always happy
for new singers to join us, without audition. If you fancy joining us please
telephone Steve Kleiser (01625 431 544) or send us an e-mail by clicking here.
Sopranos
Fiona Ablett
Cherry Bradley
Judith Burrows
Annette Butler
Sarah Chesworth
Sue Coffey
Marianne Day
Lesley Hanson
Julia Harding
Pam Hargreaves
Di Heald
Kathleen Insley
Christine Johnston
Jenny Kendal
Nick Knight
Elisabeth Leech
Maggie Lumpkin
Bobbski Mather
Moira Mccourt
Catherine Morris
Pauline Pedlar
Kathleen Phillips
Shelagh Proctor
Hilary Raymond
Lesley Reynolds
Carol Riesen
Elaine Sharples
Anne Shribman
Di Stephenson
Ann Taylor
Moira Taylor
Tilly Thomas
Hannah Thorpe
Jan Wilkin
Janet Winrow
Altos
Heather Armes
Heather Bayley
Kath Birtwistle
Ginny Carter
Rita Dawson
Maggie Earl
Margaret Eaton
Adrienne Fox
Mary Halloran
Sarah Jacot
Wanda Johnson
Sophie-Anne Keegan
Barbara Kleiser
Louise Lewis
Anthea Lightowler
Val Mead
Elizabeth Morris
Saly Parsonage
Dot Phillips
Judith Ritchie
Jane Rouse
Lynne Spedding
Sheila Thompson
Anne Thomson
Judy Turner
Judy Weeks
Tenors
Keith Armes
Tim Gravett
Geoffrey Holden
Duncan Haworth
Jim Kendon
Steve Kleiser
Sandra Moss
Ruth Partington
Nick Phillips
Andrew Tyler
Michael Wootton
Basses
Will Ablett
John Bayley
Michael Bell
Richard Cochrane
John Fryer
Peter Hargreaves
Derek Kite
Mike Lynch
Peter Mather
Tim Povall
Paul Reynolds
Jeff Sharples
Paul Simms
David Smith
Paul Spedding
Scott Thomson
Bohdan Waszkowycz
Brian Law
About the Choir
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