Aldeburgh Festival Singers: Sacred and Profane

Vigorous and serene; Sacred and Profane. A choral concert featuring one of Britten’s most lively and surprising works, performed at dusk in the beautiful Blythburgh Church.

The Aldeburgh Festival Singers, conducted by James Burton, explore English choral music from across both the centuries and Britten’s own composing career. His exquisite A Hymn to the Virgin was written while he was still at school, while Sacred and Profane is one of the energetic, characterful pieces from his late period, composed only a year before he died. As its title suggests, very different styles and moods jostle against each other across the piece: the sacred numbers intricate and contemplative, the earthy medieval texts sometimes startlingly profane.

This brilliant piece is matched by works from the English Renaissance by Thomas Weelkes and John Wilbye, setting words both sacred and secular.

Aldeburgh Festival Singers
Richard Gowers organ
James Burton conductor

Britten:: Festival Te Deum (6’)
Britten:: A Hymn to the Virgin (3’)
Weelkes:: Hosanna to the Son of David (2’)
Weelkes:: When David heard (5’)
Weelkes:: Hark! all ye lovely saints (4’)
Weelkes:: Death have deprived me (3’)
Britten:: Rejoice in the Lamb, Op.30 (16’)
Britten:: Antiphon, Op.56b (3’)
Wilbye:: I am quite tired with my groans (1’)
Wilbye:: There where I saw her lovely beauty painted (4’)
Wilbye:: Sweet honey-sucking bees (5’)
Wilbye:: Weep, weep, mine eyes (5’)
Britten:: Sacred and Profane, Op.91 (14’)

Surtitles are not available for this venue, but sung texts will be provided.

Refreshments will be available to purchase before the concert and during the interval, provided by our supporters The Anchor.

This year marks 70 years of the Aldeburgh Festival at Blythburgh Church. To find out more about this special connection, read more in An Angel in Blythburgh Church.