The London Oratory School Schola is a choir for Catholic boys of the London Oratory School established in 1996 by John McIntosh CBE. [1] The current director of the Schola is Charles Cole. The choir's patrons are Princess Michael of Kent, barrister Cherie Blair, actor Simon Callow and composer James MacMillan. [1]
The choir's founding director was Michael McCarthy. After seven years with the Schola, McCarthy moved to the US to become the Director of Music at Washington National Cathedral. [2] He was succeeded by Steven Grahl, who is now Organist of Christ Church Cathedral, Oxford. [3] He was followed by Lee Ward, who combined work as Director of the Schola with his duties as Director of Music at the London Oratory School. Lee Ward left the school in July 2012 to take up a new post in São Paulo, Brazil before returning to the UK as Director of Music at Liverpool Cathedral. Since September 2012 the Director of the Schola has been Charles Cole, formerly director of the Schola Cantorum at the Cardinal Vaughan Memorial School in London.
An annual performance is the Schola Foundation Concert. This concert featured the world premiere of Roxanna Panufnik's "Schola Missa de Angelis" – a work written for the choir. The London Oratory Schola Foundation is a charity set up to help finance the Schola and its work. Past concerts have included Panufnik's Westminster Mass, Britten's St Nicholas, Jenkins' Armed Man, Haydn's Missa in tempore belli and many sacred choral works.
Other recent Schola concerts include the 2009 and 2010 performances at the Royal Albert Hall of The Lord of the Rings Fellowship of the Ring and The Two Towers soundtracks. The Schola has also performed with 'The Priests' in Dublin's St Peter's Cathedral and in London's Cadogan Hall, the former being broadcast on BBC Radio Ulster. In November 2008 the choir performed in a concert for Save the Children at St Paul's Cathedral. On 7 July 2007 the Schola performed a concert in Rome, backed by the Vatican, with the Orchestra Philarmonia Di Roma. The concert, written by Michael D’Alessandra, aimed to recall the glory of Rome. [4] [5] [6] [7]
The choir's concert for World AIDS Day took place at the Cadogan Hall in London on 1 December 2007. . All proceeds from the concert went to the SURF Fund (a campaign which works in Rwanda campaigning for free anti-retroviral treatment for survivors of the genocide, and provides medical support to reduce the effect of opportunistic infections) and SOS Children's Villages (a charity working in Swaziland to provide resources for those living with AIDS and to help prevent family abandonment). [8] [9]
The schola was involved in some controversy in November 2007. For its performance for a World AIDS Day concert, the beneficiary, the Terrence Higgins Trust, was abruptly dropped one month before the concert was to take place.
David McFadden, the Headmaster of The London Oratory School, claimed that the nominated charity did not support Christian values so the school could not support the charity from the proceeds of the concert. [10] [11]
In response, Actor Simon Callow threatened to resign as patron of a choir at the school in protest. He was also a patron of the Terrence Higgins Trust. [12]
The choir has also featured on many film soundtracks including Fantastic Mr. Fox, The Lord of the Rings film trilogy, The Phantom of the Opera , The Golden Compass , The Brothers Grimm and Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban . [13]
The Schola released a recording of Ave Maria's on the Regent record label in 2008, with a recording of the music of contemporary British composer Roxanna Panufnik due in November 2009. The choir recorded an album of Christmas Carols, 'Songs of a Shepherd' in 2001, released on the Herald AV record label. [14]
In 2007 the Schola worked with the choir of an orphanage in Harare, Zimbabwe, to record a version of the popular Christmas carol Silent Night. The orphanage cares for children who were abandoned or whose parents died, largely due to AIDS. This recording supported, and was launched on, the World AIDS Day. [15] Over 50% of the purchase price goes directly to the orphanage in order to assist it with its work. [16] In 2008 The London Oratory School Schola recorded with Icelandic band Sigur Rós on their song Ára Bátur for their new album Með suð í eyrum við spilum endalaust, recorded on the Christmas album of Faith Hill and Andrew Johnston, runner-up from Britain's Got Talent, in 2009 the choir featured on albums of 'The Priests' and Camilla Kerslake.
Simon Phillip Hugh Callow is an English actor. Known as a character actor on stage and screen, he has received numerous accolades including an Olivier Award and Screen Actors Guild Award as well as nominations for two BAFTA Awards. He was made a Commander of the Order of the British Empire (CBE) for his services to acting by Queen Elizabeth II in 1999.
The London Oratory School, also known as "The Oratory" or "The London Oratory" to distinguish it from other schools, is a Catholic comprehensive secondary school for boys aged 7–18 and girls aged 16–18 in West Brompton. Founded in 1863 by The Fathers of The London Oratory then in Chelsea, London, it is historically linked to two fellow Oratorian institutions: the nearby Brompton Oratory and The Oratory School in Oxfordshire. The school is known for the quality of its choral and instrumental music and is one of England's oldest Catholic schools. The London Oratory School was named in The Sunday Times as one of the 'Top 10 Comprehensive Schools in the UK' for both 2022 and 2023.
Michael McCarthy is an English choir director who served as Canon for Music at Washington National Cathedral from 2003 to 2024. Previously, he was the founding director of the London Oratory School Schola at the London Oratory in London. In addition to liturgical duties, the Schola recorded for the film scores of Sleepy Hollow, The Lord of the Rings film trilogy, and the Harry Potter series. McCarthy also worked with The Sixteen, the Gabrieli Consort, The Cardinall's Musick and the Monteverdi Choir.
The Sistine Chapel Choir, as it is generally called in English, or officially the Coro della Cappella Musicale Pontificia Sistina in Italian, is the Pope's personal choir. It performs at papal functions in the Sistine Chapel and in any other church in Rome where the Pope is officiating, including St. Peter's Basilica. One of the oldest choirs in the world, it was constituted as the Pope's personal choir by Pope Sixtus IV. Although it was established in the late 15th century, its roots go back to the 4th century and the reign of Pope Sylvester I.
London Gay Men's Chorus is a gay choir that was founded in 1991 by a group of nine gay men. The group now has around 200 singing members at any one time and over 300 members in total.
Roxanna Panufnik is a British composer of Polish descent. She is the daughter of the Polish composer and conductor Sir Andrzej Panufnik and his second wife Camilla, née Jessel.
Brompton Oratory, also known as the London Oratory, is a neo-classical late-Victorian Catholic parish church in the Brompton area of the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea, neighbouring Knightsbridge, London. Its name stems from Oratorians, who own the building, live nextdoor at the London Oratory, and service the parish. The church's formal title is the Church of the Immaculate Heart of Mary.
Philip Edmund Duffy is a British musician. He was the Master of Music at the Liverpool Metropolitan Cathedral from 1966 to 1996 and a Principal Lecturer at Liverpool Hope University from 2000 to 2008. Duffy is also the founder and director of the Liverpool Bach Collective.
Andrew Carwood is the Director of Music at St Paul's Cathedral in London and director of his own group, The Cardinall's Musick.
The Metropolitan Cathedral Church of St David, also known as St David's Cathedral, Cardiff, is a Catholic cathedral in the city centre of Cardiff, Wales, and is the centre of the Archdiocese of Cardiff.
Jeffrey Skidmore OBE is the conductor and artistic director of Ex Cathedra, a choir and early music ensemble based in Birmingham in the West Midlands, England. An active participant in musical education and a pioneer in researching and performing neglected choral works of the 16th to 18th centuries, he has worked with leading musicologists to prepare new performing editions of French and Italian music. In particular, his recordings of French and Latin American Baroque music with Ex Cathedra have won wide acclaim.
The Heptavium concert, representing also the Live Earth concert in Rome, took place on 7 July 2007 at the Basilica of St. John Lateran, the Cathedral of Rome and subject to the extraterritorial jurisdiction of the Holy See. It was part of a series of high-profile concerts organised by Kevin Wall, which took place across the globe to raise awareness about climate change. Jonas Lauren Norr of Ethos Investments was responsible for the collaboration of Live Earth with the Heptavium concert as a producer of the event. The concert was masterminded and written by composer and researcher of philosophy Michael I.D'Alessandra. The concert was officially backed by the Vatican, thus being the Catholic Church's autonomous presence at the Live Earth events.
The Cappella Giulia, officially the Reverend Musical Chapel Julia of the Sacrosanct Papal Basilica of Saint Peter in the Vatican, is the choir of St. Peter's Basilica that sings for all solemn functions of the Vatican Chapter, such as Holy Mass, Lauds, and Vespers, when these are not celebrated by the Pope. The choir has played an important role as an interpreter and a proponent of Gregorian chant and sacred polyphony.
The Bach Choir is a large independent musical organisation founded in London, England in 1876 to give the first performance of J. S. Bach's Mass in B minor in Britain.
London Concert Choir (LCC) is one of London's leading amateur choirs. The choir was formed in 1960, and the full-time membership consists of ca 150 singers of a wide range of ages.
The Exultate Singers is a choir based in Bristol, UK, made up of 40 adult singers. It has mostly specialised in Christian sacred music.
Bath Bach Choir, formerly The City of Bath Bach Choir (CBBC), is based in Bath, Somerset, England, and is a registered charity. Founded in 1946 by Cuthbert Bates, who also became a founding father of the Bath Bach Festival in 1950, the choir's original aim was to promote the music of Johann Sebastian Bach via periodic music festivals. Bates – an amateur musician with a great love and understanding of this composer's works – was also the CBBC's principal conductor and continued in this role until his sudden death, in April 1980. This untimely exit pre-empted his planned retirement concert performance of J. S. Bach's Mass in B minor, scheduled for July of the same year, and effectively ended the first period of the choir's history.
St Albans Bach Choir is an amateur choir based in the English cathedral city of St Albans. Since its founding in 1924 it has performed a wide range of choral music including but by no means limited to the great Bach masterpieces. It strives for the highest possible standards of music making, employing soloists of the highest calibre and professional orchestras. Performances are normally held in St Albans Cathedral. Currently, the Musical Director is William Fox, Director of Music at the Cathedral.
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Twickenham Choral Society is a large, auditioned, mixed-voice, choir based in Twickenham, considered to be South West London's premier amateur choir. Twickenham Choral is best known for the excellence and frequency of its performances, which it has been delivering to local community and international audiences for over 100 years.
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