The Kingdom in Sherborne Abbey

Tuesday 9th of February 2010, 05:02 PM

Following their acclaimed performance of Gerontius in 2007, a not to be missed opportunity to hear another of Elgar's finest works performed by the Sherborne Festival Chorus with the Chameleon Arts Orchestra and Soloists.  First performed at the Birmingham Music Festival in 1906, The Kingdom is Elgar's final oratorio and tells the story of the lives of Jesus's Disciples following the Ascension.  With rich and colourful orchestral writing and a dramatic vocal style which is almost operatic in places, it is Elgar at his most inspired.  Like Gerontius a few years earlier, The Kingdom was commissioned by the festival.  Unlike Gerontius however, which had a disastrous start, it was popular from the outset and at the first rehearsal the players kept breaking into spontaneous applause.  Though it is not as often performed as its predecessor, Sir Adrian Boult considered it to be Elgar's greatest choral work - praise indeed!

Tickets.  £25, £20, £12 available from Sherborne Abbey Festival, PO Box 6317, Sherborne,  Dorset, DT9 9AP or online at http://www.sherborneabbey.org

Ticket and Concert Enquiries: 07724 396470