Bangkok Music Society presents "All Beauteous Things", a choral concert featuring music inspired by the natural world at Christ Church, Convent Road, on Sunday at 6pm.
Much orchestral music has been written depicting the natural world; instruments often imitate birdsong, wind, rain or thunder. The relatively few similarly themed choral works are mostly settings of poems describing humanity's fear but, more often, our joy and love of nature.
Dame Judith Weir's I love All Beauteous Things is one such work. She wrote this choral piece to celebrate the 90th birthday of Queen Elizabeth II in 2016 at London's St Paul's Cathedral, for which she chose a poem by Robert Bridges, a former royal Poet Laureate. Since then, this has been a popular song for many British choirs.
Continuing the British thread will be An Oxford Elegy, an unusual and rarely-heard secular choral cantata composed by Ralph Vaughan Williams in around 1949 based on The Scholar Gipsy by British poet Matthew Arnold.
Another British composer, Edward Elgar loved the natural beauty of the English countryside, where he grew up and mostly lived. His choral depiction of My Love Dwelt In A Northern Land by Andrew Lang is masterfully brought to life by its vivid harmony.
Other varied works in the programme include Samuel Barber's Under The Willow Tree, Charles Stanford's The Blue Bird, Ola Gjeilo's Northern Lights, interspersed by English madrigals.
Under the baton of Simon Green, with piano and organ accompaniment by Morakot Cherdchoo-ngarm, the BMS Choir presents a fascinating mix of choral style while, in unity, expressing love and admiration for the world we call home.
Tickets cost 800 baht (400 baht for students and seniors) and can be purchased from ticketmelon.com/bms and at the door.
Visit bangkokmusicsociety.com.
