PAST PERFORMANCES 2015 - 2020
2019/20 SEASON
Love’s Tempest
Friday 14th February 2020, St John’s Waterloo, London
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Londinium marked Valentine's Day in characteristically offbeat fashion with a varied and eclectic selection of music about love. From the ecstatic Song of June by Jonathan Harvey to the sardonic Love Lost by Paul Sjolund, we traversed a turbulent emotional landscape, by turns passionate, blissful, frustrated and phlegmatic. Our repertoire included classic works by Barber, Elgar, and MacMillan, Renaissance music by Tomkins and Guerrero, little-known part-songs by Pearsall and Parry, Ned Rorem's settings of lyrical poems by Sappho, and outstanding recent works by David Bednall, Howard Skempton, Gabriel Jackson, and Huw Watkins.
Andrew Griffiths conductor
O Magnum Mysterium
Friday 13th December 2019, St John’s Waterloo, London
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Londinium's festive programme brought together the very best of choral music from the Renaissance and the present day. Recent works by some of Britain's finest choral composers - Cheryl Frances-Hoad, Matthew Martin, Gabriel Jackson, John McCabe, Cecilia McDowall, and Francis Pott - were heard alongside seasonal music by Byrd, Dering, Lassus, Palestrina, Praetorius, and Sweelinck. Completing this rich tapestry were rarities by Kenneth Leighton, and two modern classics: Giles Swayne's visceral Magnificat I and Morten Lauridsen's luscious O Magnum Mysterium.
Andrew Griffiths conductor
Beyond the Night Sky
Friday 11th October 2019, St John’s Waterloo, London
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Inspired by the 50th anniversary of the Apollo 11 landing, Londinium headed for the stars, voyaging through a heady mix of music exploring the sun, moon and space. We heard the words of astronauts as set by Steve Martland and Kirke Mechem, and experienced the mystery and wonder of the stars in music by Victoria, Schumann, and Eriks Esenvalds. Particular highlights included Barnaby Martin's haunting I saw eternity, the UK premiere of Steven Stucky's Winter Stars, Ben Parry’s Sun and Moon, and Cheryl Frances-Hoad's dazzling tribute to Professor Stephen Hawking, Beyond the Night Sky.
Andrew Griffiths conductor
2018/19 SEASON
Time & Tide
Saturday 24th August 2019, Christ Church, St Leonards-on-Sea
Sunday 25th August 2019, St Augustine’s, Bexhill-on-Sea
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For its first visit to the South Coast, Londinium plotted an inventive voyage in which we encountered myths and legends, songs and shanties, ticking clocks and timeless landscapes, and our twin themes converged in words from The Tempest, as set in Vaughan Williams' stunning Shakespeare Songs. Our repertoire ranged from sixteenth-century Italy to the present day, including music by Campion, Gabrieli, Purcell, Brahms, Stanford, Grieg, Ireland and Holst, as well as the glorious Mass in Eb for double choir by Josef Rheinberger, whose irresistible melodies provided respite from the ravages of time and tide.
Andrew Griffiths conductor
The Grand Tour
Friday 12th July 2019, St John’s Waterloo, London
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Inspired by the traditional 'grand tour' made by young British aristocrats, Londinium embarked on an intrepid journey around some of Europe's foremost musical centres. Particular highlights included Clytus Gottwald's sumptuous transcriptions of Wagner and Mahler, Judith Bingham's bewitching Gleams of a Remoter World, the UK première of Matthew Recio's How to Survive Vesuvius, and - marking the quincentenary of the death of its protagonist - Eric Whitacre's Leonardo Dreams of His Flying Machine. Review: "What shone through was the intelligence of Griffiths’ sequencing and the versatility of the choir in constantly switching style” ★★★★ (Bernard Hughes, The Arts Desk) Read review
Andrew Griffiths conductor
A Mass of Masses
Thursday 4th April 2019, St Peter’s Eaton Square, London
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For its debut in the acclaimed Eaton Square Concerts series, Londinium brought together no fewer than four settings of the Mass. Two were classics of the repertoire: Josef Rheinberger's sumptuous double-choir Mass in Eb (“Cantus Missae”), Op.109, and Ralph Vaughan Williams' beloved Mass in G Minor which, in reaching back to sixteenth-century models, breathed new life into English choral music. Alongside them, we performed two shorter settings: the highly attractive Missa Brevis by Richard Rodney Bennett, and the radiant Chichester Mass by the American composer William Albright.
Andrew Griffiths conductor
The Hour Glass
Saturday 2nd February 2019, St James’s Sussex Gardens, London
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In a typically inventive and alluring programme, Londinium drew together a fascinating selection of music exploring Time and its passing. Highlights included the American Irving Fine's virtuosic suite The Hour-Glass, rarely heard on this side of the Atlantic, and the world première of I saw eternity by the award-winning young composer Barnaby Martin, alongside works by such varied figures as Byrd, Chilcott, Ligeti, Pärt and Stanford.
Andrew Griffiths conductor
Nowell Sing We
Friday 7th December 2018, St John’s Waterloo, London
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Thomas Tallis' Missa Puer natus est nobis, a sumptuous Christmas Mass probably composed for the joint choirs of the English and Spanish Chapels Royal, and first performed for Queen Mary and King Philip II of Spain at Christmas 1554, was at the heart of this festive concert, interspersed with fine recent carols by Francis Pott, Jonathan Dove, Peter Maxwell Davies, Cecilia McDowall, Gabriel Jackson, and Adrian Peacock, and classic festive works by Peter Warlock and Herbert Howells. A vibrant and diverse selection of music was capped by John Rutter's superb Hymn to the Creator of Light, a musical tribute to Howells.
Andrew Griffiths conductor
A Londinium Bestiary
Friday 5th October 2018, St John’s Waterloo, London
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Londinium presented a thrilling programme of works on the theme of weird and wonderful creatures. Kenneth Leighton's unpublished Laudes Animantium ('Praises of the Creatures') is a superb sequence of poems about animals, from Blake's Lamb and Tyger to Tennyson's Kraken, by way of Edward Lear and others. Ola Gjeilo's Unicornis Captivatur, based on 15th-century chants, introduced us to the unicorn and more. Bernard Hughes' 2011 A Medieval Bestiary explored the relationship between medieval man and the animal world in music as inventive and exhilarating as the dramatis personae, including the manticore, parander, gryphon, monoceros, dragon, panther, and scorpion.
Andrew Griffiths conductor
2017/18 SEASON
Leise Töne der Brust | The Heart's Music
Saturday 25th August 2018, Lutherkirche, Wiesbaden
Sunday 26th August 2018, Johanneskirche, Bingam am Rhein
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For its debut performances in Germany, Londinium performed Hubert Parry's highly personal Songs of Farewell, perhaps the greatest flowering of the English Romantic choral tradition, alongside Brahms' superb, autumnal Fünf Gesänge, Op.104. Brahms was an important influence on Parry, whose centenary falls this year. At Wiesbaden music by William Byrd and Charles Wood, and a modern classic by Howard Skempton, together with works by John Ireland and EJ Moeran taken from the choir's recent recording, “The Gluepot Connection”, completed the programme.
Andrew Griffiths conductor
Captured Light
Friday 6th July 2018, St Sepulchre-without-Newgate
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Marking the centenaries of the deaths of Claude Debussy and Lili Boulanger, Londinium plunged into the heady world of early twentieth-century French choral music. Lili Boulanger, the first woman to win the prestigious Prix de Rome, lived for just 24 years; her prodigious talent is nowhere clearer than in her luxuriant and often-ecstatic works for choir and piano. Debussy's classic Trois Chansons de Charles d'Orléans was paired with virtuosic transcriptions of his songs and piano music by the masterful arranger Clytus Gottwald, and the programme completed with works by Fauré and Ravel, together with the perennially popular Quatre Motets sur des thèmes grégoriens by Maurice Duruflé.
Andrew Griffiths conductor | Leanne Singh-Levett piano
Sea Change
Friday 25th May 2018, St Sepulchre-without-Newgate
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Inspired by Richard Rodney Bennett's classic Sea Change, a virtuoso evocation of the mystery and majesty of the ocean, Londinium encountered shipwreck (in Mäntyjärvi's haunting Canticum Calamitatis Maritimae), myths and legends (Coleridge-Taylor's ghoulish Sea Drift and Brahms' Vineta), folksongs and shanties, and explored sea journeys as a rich source of metaphor, both religious and secular. Our repertoire ranged from sixteenth-century Italy to the present day, and included music by Wert, Campion, Brahms, Parry, Grieg, Vaughan Williams, Holst, Gabriel Jackson and Howard Skempton.
Andrew Griffiths conductor
The Gluepot Connection
Saturday 10th March 2018, St Sepulchre-without-Newgate
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This celebratory concert marked the launch of Londinium's debut recording 'The Gluepot Connection' - a mouthwatering selection of British choral music by composers who frequented 'The George' pub in Great Portland Street in the first half of the twentieth century, released on the SOMM label. Our programme included highlights from the disc: Arnold Bax's stupendous Mater ora filium and works by Alan Bush, John Ireland, Elisabeth Lutyens, EJ Moeran, Alan Rawsthorne and Peter Warlock. Alongside this glorious repertoire we performed an underrated masterpiece: Kenneth Leighton's Mass for Double Choir, op.44.
Andrew Griffiths conductor
William Nicholson organ (Credo, Mass for Double Choir)
Long, Long Ago
Friday 15th December 2017, St Sepulchre-without-Newgate
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A vibrant and inventive selection of seasonal repertoire ranging from the Renaissance to the present day: firm favourites such as Tavener's The Lamb and Rachmaninoff's Bogoroditse Devo complemented rarities by Howells, Warlock and EW Naylor, whilst superb motets by Byrd, Weelkes, and Schütz were heard alongside contemporary classics-in-the-making by Jan Sandström, Jaako Mäntyjärvi and Jonathan Harvey.
Andrew Griffiths conductor
There is Sweet Music
Friday 13th October 2017, St Sepulchre-without-Newgate
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A celebration of the essence of music itself: from the sixteenth century to the present day, composers have risen to the challenge of setting words describing their own art, and our selection offered a feast of the finest choral music, both sacred and secular. Ethereal works by Lassus, Tomkins, and Vaughan Williams rubbed shoulders with vivacious music by Gibbons, Tippett, and Elliott Carter, while the familiar worlds of Byrd, Brahms and Elgar were offset by little-known gems by Frank Bridge, Zoltán Kodály, Howard Skempton and Arvo Pärt. The centrepiece was a dazzling evocation of music-making, Bach's most virtuosic motet, Singet dem Herrn.
Andrew Griffiths conductor
2016/17 SEASON
Resurrection Light
Friday 31st March 2017, St Sepulchre-without-Newgate
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A musical journey through Holy Week - the acclamation of the crowds on Palm Sunday, the Last Supper, the arrest at Gethsemane, the Crucifixion itself, and finally the empty tomb and risen Christ on Easter morning. Our repertoire included music by some of the greatest composers of the Renaissance (among them Taverner, Lassus and Lhéritier), works by the German Romantics and from the Russian Orthodox tradition, and English music by Herbert Howells, Charles Wood, Jim Clements and Giles Swayne. The heart of our programme was one of the finest new choral works of our time: James MacMillan's profoundly moving setting of the Miserere.
Andrew Griffiths conductor
Kensington to Bloomsbury
Friday 10th February 2017, St Sepulchre-without-Newgate, London
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During the first half of the twentieth century an eclectic and fascinating group of composers gathered in an unlikely cornerstone of London's musical culture: 'The George' pub on Great Portland Street in Bloomsbury (nicknamed ‘The Gluepot’ by Sir Henry Wood). The 'Gluepot Connection' was represented in well-loved works by William Walton, Arnold Bax, John Ireland and EJ Moeran, alongside lesser-known gems by Alan Rawsthorne and Elisabeth Lutyens. To complement this selection we looked to the Royal College of Music in Kensington, where Herbert Howells taught and several Gluepot composers were students; the concert included Howells’ masterpiece: the Requiem of 1932.
Andrew Griffiths conductor
A Light in the Darkness
Friday 16th December 2016, St Mary-at-Hill, London
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A festive programme traced the journey from Old Testament prophecy to the events of the Nativity in a superb selection of a cappella repertoire from the Renaissance to the present day. Highlights included Poulenc's lyrical Four Christmas Motets, music by Brahms, Byrd, Lassus, Mendelssohn, Mouton and Schütz, and, from our own time, works by James MacMillan and Cecilia McDowall. Londinium's programme closed with a rare performance of Schoenberg's glorious early masterpiece Friede auf Erden: an unforgettable, sumptuously-scored clarion call for harmony and brotherhood in a fractured world.
Andrew Griffiths conductor
The Seven Ages of Man
Friday 14th October 2016, St Sepulchre-without-Newgate, London
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Inspired by Shakespeare's "All the world's a stage" monologue from As You Like It, a beguiling programme of unaccompanied choral music traced a course from the cradle to the grave. An intriguing and eclectic journey began with the tender sounds of Eric Whitacre's Sleep My Child, and ended with William Harris' luscious Bring us, O Lord God, taking in music old (Dufay, Tallis, Gabrieli, Byrd) and new (Dominick Argento's There was a naughty boy, Bob Chilcott’s Even such is time), as well as evergreen works by Bruckner, Parry and Holst. The centrepiece of the programme was Thea Musgrave's 2010 Proms commission Ithaca, a celebration of life's journey in all its splendour.
Andrew Griffiths conductor
2015/16 SEASON
Perspectives Anglaises
Saturday 27th August 2016, S Matthieu, Colmar, France
Sunday 28th August 2016, Abbaye de Marbach, Obermorschwihr, France
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During its first overseas tour Londinium performed a feast of music to audiences in Alsace. From the Renaissance world of Byrd and Tallis to the Romantic works of Elgar and Stanford and the dazzling contemporary sounds of Jonathan Harvey and James MacMillan, the programme showcased the very best of British a cappella choral music. Review: 'La fraîcheur d’une performance vocale spectaculaire libérant des tessitures semblant sans limites / The freshness of a spectacular vocal performance with seemingly limitless vocal textures.' (DNA France) Read review
Andrew Griffiths conductor
Sunshine after Rain
Friday 8th July 2016, St Sepulchre-without-Newgate, London
Saturday 9th July 2016, St Paul's Beckenham, Kent
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Londinium closed its tenth-anniversary season with a delicious selection of music celebrating the great outdoors. Beautiful partsongs by Elgar, Delius, Vaughan Williams, Ireland and Sterndale Bennett rubbed shoulders with superb recent works by Nicholas Maw, Cecilia McDowall, Bernard Rose and James MacMillan. Mendelssohn's vivacious op.59 'Songs to be sung in the open air' and Britten's classic Five Flower Songs completed this delightful programme. The performance at St Paul's Beckenham raised over £1,000 for Central London Samaritans.
Andrew Griffiths conductor
In Love's Garden
Friday 20th May 2016, St Sepulchre-without-Newgate, London
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The Old Testament Song of Songs contains some of the most beautiful love poetry ever written, and its heady eroticism has inspired superb music from composers across five centuries. Londinium's programme centred on the rarely-performed, luscious twelve-voiced Le Cantique des Cantiques by Jean-Yves Daniel-Lesur, which was heard alongside sumptuous Renaissance works by Clemens non Papa, Tomás Luis de Victoria and Hieronymus Praetorius, and equally seductive works by two modern masters, Howard Skempton and Francis Grier.
Andrew Griffiths conductor
Something Rich and Strange
Saturday 13th February 2016, St Sepulchre-without-Newgate, London
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To mark the 400th anniversary of the death of William Shakespeare, Londinium presented an entrancing programme of choral music inspired by his work. Alongside such masterpieces as Frank Martin's Songs of Ariel and Ralph Vaughan Williams' Three Shakespeare Songs, we included some of the earliest surviving Shakespeare settings, by Thomas Morley and Robert Johnson, and a superb selection of recent music, including Huw Watkins' The Phoenix and the Turtle and Humphrey Clucas' Shakespeare Songs - both composers attended and spoke warmly of the performances - together with works by Judith Weir, Michael Berkeley and Jaakko Mäntyjärvi.
Andrew Griffiths conductor
I Sing of a Maiden
Friday 11th December 2015, St Sepulchre-without-Newgate, London
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Inspired by Arnold Bax's virtuosic masterpiece Mater ora filium, Londinium presented a concert of English Christmas music in praise of the Virgin Mary. The programme ranged from the shimmering, translucent world of Thomas Tallis' Videte miraculum to the majesty of Tavener's Hymn to the Mother of God, and from favourites by Howells and John Joubert to lesser-known gems by Howard Skempton and Richard Rodney Bennett. Londinium was delighted to sing Francis Pott's setting of I Sing of a Maiden; he described the performance as 'beautifully done'.
Andrew Griffiths conductor
Voices of the North: Sibelius, Nielsen & their contemporaries
Friday 23rd October 2015, St Sepulchre-without-Newgate, London
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Londinium marked 150 years since the births of two great Nordic composers, Jean Sibelius and Carl Nielsen, with a concert including Sibelius' haunting Rakastava (The Lover) and Nielsen's intense Tre Motetter together with ravishing music by Peter Lange-Müller, Wilhelm Stenhammar and Toivo Kuula - composers hardly known to UK audiences - and Einojuhani Rautavaara's classic Lorca Suite. Review: 'Londinium, conducted with great style by Andrew Griffiths, has the twin merits of balance and clarity in its projection of each work.' (Edward Clark, reviewing for 'Musical Opinion' and the UK Sibelius Society) Read review
Andrew Griffiths conductor