The Armed Man

7 February 2022

Back in 2020 we were schedule to sing Sir Karl Jenkins’s The Armed Man: a Mass for Peace with the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra, but it was a casualty of Covid. We were reschedule for 2021, and it was cancelled by Covid once again. So last night we were thrilled to be able to finally stage this concert, with our great friend Adrian Partington at the helm, and Northampton’s own Rebecca Bottone as our soloist. Putting this performance together only five weeks after returning from our Christmas break was challenging, but the choir rose to the occasion and thrilled a large audience in Derngate. It was such fun to be performing again with such a large orchestra, and with an immense battery of percussion.

The Rehearsal in Full Flight

A Bird's Eye View of the Rehearsal

Covid continued to make its presence felt, and nearly 30 choir members were absent from the performance with either positive Covid tests or with symptoms which might have been Covid, and our muezzin, Naeem Mamood, was also unwell. Nevertheless, we were able to field a choir of just short of 100 members (thanks in no small part to our Musical Director’s #22for22 initiative which has seen over thirty new members join the choir in recent months) - and 35 tenors and basses (were it not for Covid it would have been 48!) showing that we are fielding a very balanced choir indeed.

Save me from Bloody Men

The View from the Basses

Before the choir sang The Armed Man we were spellbound by the orchestra’s rendition of Elgar’s Introduction and Allegro and - a work which many of us didn’t know - Walton’s Portsmouth Point Overture. We have an invitation to join the RPO for another concert (19 May 2024 - keep the date in your diaries), and are hugely looking forward to it already!