Having made our final bows after performing <L’ésprit de Noël>, our Christmas concert programme, at Issigeac and Eymet in a December full of seasonal singing, we’ve scarcely had time to put away the Christmas decorations and consider just what we were able to achieve in 2023 before we all meet again in a week’s time to kick off our 2024 Spring term.
In 2023 we delivered three concert programmes, the stylistic breadth of which challenged us all, including in April, Stainer’s Crucifixion and Fauré’s Requiem; in June Bob Chilcott’s Little Jazz Mass, Leonard Bernstein’s Suite from West Side Story, Canteloube’s Songs from the Auvergne, and in December Vaughan Williams’s Fantasia on Christmas Carols, Morten Lauridsen’s O Magnum Mysterium and a sequence of early French and English carols from the 15th century onwards.
We benefited enormously from working in new places and with new people, so many, many thanks from us all for what you have done with us and for us.
Thank you to Castillonnès’s mairie for hosting Cantabile at its beautiful Hôtel de Ville courtyard in June - truly a warm and intimate setting.
Thank you to Les Amis de l’èglise d’Issigeac, our marketing partners for our Issigeac concerts in the mighty gothic church of St Félicien at whose acoustic we simply marvelled.
Thank you to Radio 4 Lot et Garonne, who invited us to a lively interview as their ‘Invités du Matinée’ and allowed us to sing to their listeners.
Thank you to Sud-Ouest newspaper, whose local journalistic presence is unfailingly generous to Cantabile.
Thank you also to the Office de Tourisme Portes Sud Périgord, whose excellent Agenda of events enables us to spread the word about Cantabile’s work right across the Bergerac area and whose Offices at Eymet and Issigeac act as twin box offices for the local communities we serve,
And thank you to Eymet’s Mairie team which supports the choir in so many ways, not least the provision of our terrific new rehearsal space, ‘La Gare’ in the heart of Eymet and ongoing support to promote our events attractively.
We start 2024 as a choir which has grown to over 40 singers from France, Netherlands, North America and England and look forward to getting to grips with ‘Feel The Spirit’, combining John Rutter’s fine cycle of Spirituals with a full-on sequence of Choruses from grand operas, from Bizet to Verdi, and Purcell to Wagner.
Bonne Année!