Elin Manahan Thomas - soprano
Elizabeth Kenny - lute & theorbo
NOW WINTER COMES SLOWLY
To warm your hearts during Advent, this is a programme which welcomes festivities with delicious music from all around Europe. From Handel’s merry arias to Bach’s more contemplative hymns, we bring you a collection of seasonal and celebratory songs. Elin Manahan Thomas is one of the most exceptional sopranos of her generation. Since releasing her début album “Eternal Light in 2007, with the OAE, she has performed at many of the world’s most prestigious venues and festivals, and with leading orchestras and conductors, including the Edinburgh, Canterbury and Lufthansa Festivals, at the World Première of Sir John Taverner’s Requiem and in 2018 she was honoured to perform at the Royal Wedding of Prince Harry and Meghan Markle. (Ravishing simplicity, The Times). She is joined by Elizabeth Kenny, one of Europe’s leading lute players. Equally at home in solo. chamber music and the opera house, she combines a love of the lute repertoire with a flair for imaginative collaborations that enrich an unusually varied performing life. In twenty years of touring she has played with many of the world’s best period instrument groups and experienced many different approaches to music making. She played with Les Arts Florissants 1992-2007 and with the Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment 1997-2015 and still returns to initiate seventeenth century projects such as The Hypochondriack and A Restoration Tempest. (Indecently beautiful, Toronto Post – Radical, The Guardian).Handel So shall the lute and harp awakeMonteverdi Exulta FiliaMerula Canzonetta spiritual sopra alla nannaJ.S.Bach Ich freue mich in dir Ich steh an deiner Krippen hier O Jesulein süssA. Scarlatti Fortunati pastori…Tocco la prima sorteCampion Now winter nights enlargePurcell Scenes from King Arthur and the Fairy QueenSequence of traditional Christmas songs:Trad. French A minuit fut fait un reveilTrad. English The truth sent from aboveAdam lay yboundenGabriel’s messageTrad. Welsh Carol y PlygainHandel Or let the merry bells ring roundSaturday 14th December 2019 - 7pmTickets: £21.00 / £18.50 / £16.00