Go Ravens! 
< World Premiere >
KAIKHOSRU SHAPURJI SORABJI : Piano Sonata No. 2
Monday 13 January, 1922
Kammersaal, Musikverein, Bödendorferstrasse, Vienna
Kaikhosru Shapurji Sorabji, Piano
< World Premiere >
ROBIN WALKER : I have thee by the hand, O Man
(A Madrigal for 40 Voices a cappella )
Friday 10 January, 2003
Bridgewater Hall, Manchester, England
The Tallis Scholars, cond. Peter Phillips
< World Premiere >
ALFRED SCHNITTKE : Penitential Verses
(for unaccompanied SSAATTBB div. choir)
Monday 26 December, 1988 - Moscow
USSR Ministry Culture Chamber Choir,
cond. Valery Polyanski
Compozitor Saint Petersburg, 2017 (No. 6993)
“The importance of the theme of repentance to Schnittke is shown in his 1987 work 'Penitential Verses', a large scale composition for unaccompanied choir which, at around 40 minutes duration, is comparable in scale to his 'Concerto for Mixed Choir' (1984-1985).
The work, written for the 1000th anniversary of the founding of Russia, was inspired by a collection of early Russian literature which includes these spiritual lines or poems by anonymous monks. Although thematically these texts might seem to offer much less variety than those of St. Gregory of Narek (whose words Schnittke used in his 'Choir Concerto'), the music employs essentially the same techiques and is characterized by the same degree of technical virtuosity.
In both pieces there are very strong echos of the Russian sacred repertoire of the 19th and early 20th centuries; this imparts a sense of belonging to a tradition which, in turn, provides much of the music's strength.” — Ivan Moody
< World Premiere >
COLIN MATTHEWS : A Rose at Christmas
(for unaccompanied SATB div. choir)
Friday 21 December, 1990
St. Albans Church, Birmingham
BBC Singers, cond. Simon Joly
Text: Shakespeare's 'Love's Labour's Lost', Act 1, Scene 2
Faber Music Ltd., London, 1990
< World Premiere >
KAIKHOSRU SORABJI :
Toccata Seconda per pianoforte, KSS57
Wednesday 16 December, 1936
Stevenson Hall, Glasgow, Scotland
Kaikhosru Shapurji Sorabji, Piano solo
< World Premiere >
ERNST PEPPING : Die Weihnachtsgeschichte des Lukas
(for unaccompanied SATB div. choir)
Sunday 13 December, 1959 – Göttingen, Germany
Göttinger Stadtkantorei, dir. Ludwig Doormann
Bärenreiter Verlag, 1959 (BA3947)
< World Premiere >
CHRISTOPHER BROWN :
Hodie Salvator Apparuit, Op. 28 - A Sequence for Christmas
(for unaccompanied SSAATTBB choir & soli)
Wednesday 9 December, 1970 – St. Andrew's Church, London
Salterello Choir, cond. Christopher Seaman
J. & W. Chester, Ltd., 1976 (CH55008)
< World Premiere >
KAIKHOSRU SORABJI : Le Jardin Parfumé, KSS35
Tuesday 7 December, 1976 – Wigmore Hall, London, UK
Kaikhosru Shapurji Sorabji, Piano solo
J. Curwen and Sons Ltd., 1927 (999.019)
< World Premiere >
RALPH VAUGHAN WILLIAMS : Mass in G minor
(for unaccompanied SATB-SATB choir & SATB soli)
Wednesday 6 December, 1922 – Town Hall, Birmingham
City of Birmingham Choir, cond. Joseph Lewis
J. Curwen & Sons, Ltd., 1922
< World Premiere >
KAIKHOSRU SORABJI : Symphonic Nocturne, KSS97
Thursday 3 December, 2015
Miryzaal, School of Arts, Koninklijk Conservatorium Gent, Belgium
Lukas Huisman, Piano solo
< World Premiere >
ESA-PEKKA SALONEN : Two Songs from Kalender Röd
(for unaccompanied SSAATTBB choir)
Saturday 2 December, 2000 – Stockholm
Swedish Radio Choir, cond. Stefan Parkman
Texts : Ann Jäderlund
Chester Music Ltd., 2005 (CH63470)
“I became enchanted with Ann Jäderlund's poetry because of its sensual intensity and lack of sentimentality. She describes sensations with amazing effectiveness, with few words, but with a rhythm that immediately awakens mystical associations ... The songs are dedicated to the Swedish Radio Choir on the occasion of their 75th anniversary.” – Esa-Pekka Salonen
< World Premiere >
DAVID MATTHEWS : The Ship of Death
(for unaccompanied SSAATTBB choir)
Tuesday 1 December, 1992 – Pebble Mill, Birmingham
Finzi Singers, cond. Paul Spicer
Text: D. H. Lawrence
Faber Music, Ltd., 1996 (Cat. No. 0571554148)
< World Premiere >
KAIKHOSRU SORABJI : Opus Clavicembalisticum, KSS50
Monday 1 December, 1930 - Stevenson Hall, Glasgow, Scotland
Kaikhosru Sorabji, Piano
J.Curwen and Sons Ltd., 1931
“It is so difficult to know how to convey to those who are unfamiliar with Sorabji's work just how strange and profoundly rewarding he can be. In many respects it could be said to be a new, and thus far quite distinct, form of music. His 'Opus Clavicembalisticum' is a major, if little appreciated, piece of twentieth century abstract modern art, being to music what Joyce's 'Ulysses' is to literature, or Pollock's 'Lavender Mist' is to painting. It is music as stream of consciousness, and to understand it one must arguably learn new ways of listening, to hear the music of the music, so to speak. Its sheer scale and duration insist that one can only engage with it as ritual, requiring one to set aside a chunk of life in which to be with it.”
— John Ferngrove
– Pars Altera, VII. Cadenza I :
< World Premiere >
RICHARD STRAUSS : Also sprach Zarathustra, Op. 30
Friday 27 November, 1896 – Frankfurt, Germany
Richard Strauss, cond.
< World Premiere >
WITOLD LUTOSŁAWSKI : Concerto for Orchestra
Friday 26 November, 1954 – Warsaw, Poland
Warsaw Philharmonic Orchestra, cond. Witold Rowicki
J & W Chester / Edition Wilhelm Hansen London, 1972
( JWC55276)
“... It is the music of Béla Bartók that seems the obvious point of comparison to Lutosławski’s 'Concerto for Orchestra' — its title recalling Bartók’s famous composition of a decade earlier. Disciplined style, tight formal construction, and a clear sense of logic in the development of themes are already manifest in this relatively early piece, and they would remain hallmarks of Lutosławski’s style. But here we find the composer leaning to a notable extent on folk melodies. Lutosławski protested that his flirtations with folk sources were not forced on him by the government, but his protestation had a ring of ambivalent obscurity about it: "It didn’t interest me as profoundly as it interested Bartók, for instance. . . . I used this kind of material in the 'Concerto for Orchestra' because I was not ready yet to realize what I wanted. It had nothing to do with the regime or with pressure. It’s very often misunderstood. Some people write comments in program notes that I was compelled to use folk melodies. It’s not true at all."
Direct impetus for this work came via an invitation from the conductor Witold Rowicki, who in 1950 asked Lutosławski to write a piece based on folk material for performance by the Warsaw National Philharmonic Orchestra, which Rowicki founded that year. As Lutosławski grappled with the piece, it grew into a full three-movement composition. Lutosławski would often work on pieces over long periods of time; the four-year gestation period of the 'Concerto for Orchestra' was not unusual. What Rowicki received is a brilliant orchestral showpiece that, like Bartók’s 'Concerto for Orchestra', is a virtuoso vehicle for the ensemble as a whole.”
— James M. Keller
< World Premiere >
EINOJUHANI RAUTAVAARA : Missa A Cappella
(for unaccompanied SSAATTBB choir)
Friday 25 November, 2011 – Jacobikerk, Utrecht
Netherlands Radio Choir, cond. Celso Antunes
Boosey & Hawkes Music Publishers Ltd., 2011
< World Premiere >
HERBERT HOWELLS : Mass in the Dorian Mode
(for unaccompanied SATB choir)
Sunday 24 November, 1912 - Westminster Cathedral, England
Westminster Cathedral Choir, dir. Dr. Richard Terry
Oxford University Press, 1994
“The 'Mass in the Dorian Mode' is fascinating because of the extreme purity of style. On one level it could be described as a technical exercise because Howells was obviously flexing new-found musical muscles, and yet the music itself raises it way above the level of mere academe. Howells was simply “in tune” with this style and wrote as happily in it as in any style which he was forming of a more individual hue. The polyphonic example learned from the likes of Byrd and Tallis infused his work for the rest of his life. It is interesting that in 1903 the Vatican issued a Motu Proprio encouraging composers to learn from their ancient forebears in the style and restraint of their works for the church. Howells needed no such encouragement at this time, as this Mass clearly shows.” — Paul Spicer
< World Premiere >
KAIKHOSRU SHAPURJI SORABJI : Gulistān, KSS63
Tuesday 22 November, 1977
Wigmore Hall, London, England
Yonty Solomon, Piano solo
Sorabji wrote a number of nocturnes, from the earliest stages in his development until his final years. These include some of his better-known works such as 'Le jardin parfumé' and 'Djâmi'. Several works — such as 'In the Hothouse' of 1918 and the much later 'Villa Tasca', written 1979–80 — are not designated as nocturnes, but nonetheless occupy the same languorous, exotic atmosphere that characterises 'Gulistān' (1940), arguably his most succesful essay in the genre. The poet Sa‘dī of Shīrāz (ca. 1213–92) finished the extended Gulistān in 1258, after many years of travelling. Although Sorabji’s nocturne is not a programmatic work, that the poem had significant influence on the work’s composition is undeniable.
— Jonathan Powell
< World Premiere >
HERBERT HOWELLS : Take Him Earth for Cherishing
“To the honored memory of John Fitzgerald Kennedy,
President of the United States”
(for unaccompanied SATB div. choir)
Sunday 22 November, 1964 – The National Gallery, Washington DC
Choir of the Cathedral of St. George, Kingston, Ontario
cond. George N. Maybee
H. W. Gray Co. Inc., 1964
Text : from 'Hymnus circa Excequias Defuncti'
Aurelius Prudentius (348-413) — Translation : Helen Waddell
~
Take him, earth, for cherishing,
to thy tender breast receive him.
Body of a man I bring thee,
noble even in its ruin.
Once was this a spirit’s dwelling,
by the breath of God created.
High the heart that here was beating,
Christ the prince of all its living.
Guard him well, the dead I give thee,
not unmindful of his creature
shall he ask it: he who made it
symbol of his mystery.
Comes the hour God hath appointed
to fulfil the hope of men,
then must thou, in very fashion,
what I give, return again.
Not though ancient time decaying
wear away these bones to sand,
ashes that a man might measure
in the hollow of his hand:
Not though wandering winds and idle,
drifting through the empty sky,
scatter dust was nerve and sinew,
is it given to man to die.
Once again the shining road
leads to ample Paradise;
open are the woods again,
that the serpent lost for men
Take, O take him, mighty leader,
take again thy servant’s soul.
Grave his name, and pour the fragrant
balm upon the icy stone.