Horsham Chamber Choir’s autumn concert promises a feast of spiritual and meditative compositions combining contrasting musical styles as well as an exercise in modulation by the choir.
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00:00Good afternoon, my name is Phil Hewitt, Group Arts Editor at Sussex Newspapers. It's always
00:06a huge pleasure to speak to Timothy Peters, who is the Music Director of Horsham Chamber
00:11Choir. Now Tim, you've got a fantastic sounding concert coming up, St Mary's Church in the
00:15Causeway in Horsham at 4.30 on Saturday, November the 9th. Now I know that you always like to
00:22challenge your choir, don't you? You like to push things a little bit. What are you
00:26getting them to do for this time? Well, you know me so well! I mean, yeah, I've taken
00:34the choir on quite the journey over the last couple of years and arguably we're going for
00:39something a little bit more traditional, arguably. So we've got two masses for this concert.
00:45We've got a mass by Arvo Pärt, which is the Berliner Messer, and Kodály's Miser Brevis.
00:52Can you tell me about the challenges individually of those two? Why are those good ones to do?
00:57So, well, you're right, they're challenging because they contrast so much. So if a choir
01:06just had, it's quite common for a choir to have a mass in a concert, and that means you've
01:12got the same kind of material for the entire concert, but these two are so different. The
01:17Pärt's Berliner Messer was written kind of in memory of the falling of the Berlin Wall,
01:24and it's a very, very spiritual piece. It's usually a composition style I'll talk about
01:30a bit later, but the Kodály, conversely, was written during World War Two, and it's
01:37very, I guess I could describe it as being quite cinematic. There's lots of kind of fireworks
01:43and flares and sort of deep sort of darkness in there as well, whereas the Pärt sort of
01:48sits on this ethereal plane.
01:50Sounds fantastic. Now, how long have you been the music director now?
01:56So this is the end of my second year.
01:59Wow. And is the choir going in the direction you want? It sounds like you're really enjoying
02:04it, and I'm sure they are too.
02:06Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. I mean, we've been having quite the rise. Yeah, I've been challenged
02:11with lots of different things. When I started, I was sort of getting to know what their strengths
02:16were, and they've trusted me, and we've taken them on quite some crazy journeys. But as
02:23I say, this is going for a bit more solemnity in this one, so we're not sort of going out
02:28in too many crazy directions.
02:30Absolutely. So what are the ambitions with the choir as you look ahead into 2025?
02:35Well, sadly, I don't know if anybody's told you, but I'm leaving after Christmas.
02:40I didn't know that.
02:41Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
02:42What's that?
02:43That's the headline. So my partner and I are going for a slightly slower pace of life back
02:47in Sheffield. So yeah, that's the sad news, but that's exclusive for you.
02:52So when will the last concert for you be?
02:57That'll be our Christmas concert, The Carols, in December.
03:01Right. We'll have to do the proper valedictory interview when that one comes. Sorry to hear,
03:06but it's always been great fun to speak to you about what you're doing with the choir.
03:10Yeah, well, thanks. Yeah, I've got a couple more things to say about this concert, if that's OK.
03:16Oh, please do. Please do.
03:18Yeah, yeah, sure. So we've got these two masses in there, but there's also, I alluded to earlier,
03:26but the Pet uses a compositional style that I just want to sort of highlight, because he's
03:32sort of moved away from it now a little bit. It's something called tintinabuli. It's a very
03:36exciting word. It gets you many points in Scrabble. And it basically refers to a bell-like
03:44composition style. And you essentially have two melody lines. I won't go into too much detail,
03:49but it has this, it's almost quite minimalistic and it goes throughout the entire mass.
03:54And so, as you are also alluding to, we don't always have completely normal concerts.
04:00So I've sort of responded to this tintinabuli style as well in the concert. So there's a couple
04:06of other things in there where I've responded to the tintinabuli, and I've come up with a
04:12compositional method as well. So far, I'm calling it the mantra method. And it's basically a
04:17generative style of composition, and the audience are going to be able to write the music as they
04:21come into the concert. They can contribute to the sheet as they come in, and then the choir
04:28will perform. I won't explain too much, but you'll have to be there for the concert.
04:33Something fabulously different in there, would it?
04:38Well, I'll take that as a compliment.
04:39It is intended as a compliment.
04:43Yeah, yeah. But yeah, I'm sort of trying, I'm keeping it in that sort of spiritual realm for
04:48this mantra method thing, which the audience can write. And you'll see how it works, but it,
04:56yeah, sort of evokes a sort of meditative style, and it will help sort of be a modern sort of
05:01response to that tintinabuli, because that was written in 1990, I believe, the Berliner Messe.
05:08So, well, it sounds a wonderful concert. Really lovely to speak to you,
05:11and looking forward to chatting about that Christmas one. Thank you.
05:15Thank you so much. Cheers. See you a bit later.