Lady Clare’s Consort: Songs of Turmoil (11th June)

Lady Clare’s Consort – Songs of Turmoil
📍 St Botolph’s Church, Cambridge
🗓 Thursday 11 June | 8:00pm

A powerful evening of choral music exploring conflict, loss, and resilience across five centuries.

Songs of Turmoil brings together music born from moments of crisis - from the religious upheaval of Renaissance Europe to the stark emotional landscapes of the 20th and 21st centuries. Featuring composers from Tallis and Byrd to Poulenc, Britten, MacMillan and Cecilia McDowell, this programme moves between intense drama and moments of luminous stillness.

At its centre, Poulenc’s Un soir de neige offers a chilling meditation on isolation and fear, while Renaissance masterpieces by Gombert, Ockeghem and Gesualdo confront mortality and grief with striking immediacy. Contemporary works bring a raw, personal urgency, reminding us that these themes remain as resonant today as ever.

Performed in the intimate setting of St Botolph’s Church, this is an atmospheric and compelling summer concert.

Programme

• Who Shall Separate Us? – James MacMillan
• O sacrum convivium – Thomas Tallis
• Nolo mortem peccatoris – Thomas Morley
• Un soir de neige, FP 126 – Francis Poulenc
  I. De grandes cuillers de neige
  II. La bonne neige
  III. Bois meurtri
  IV. La nuit le froid la solitude
• Defecit in dolore (Cantiones sacrae) – William Byrd
• Never weather-beaten sail – Hubert Parry
• Media vita in morte sumus – Nicolas Gombert
• Vigilate – William Byrd
• Standing as I do before God – Cecilia McDowell
• Mort, tu as navré de ton dart – Johannes Ockeghem
• Nymphes des bois – Josquin des Prez
• Musae Jovis à 6 – Orlande de Lassus
• Nunc Dimittis - Joanna Marsh
• Tristis est anima mea – Carlo Gesualdo
• The Lord’s Prayer – John Sheppard
• The Evening Primrose (Five Flower Songs) – Benjamin Britten