Love is in the air…

Our Valentine’s Day concert in Melbourne was a great success – we hope we created a romantic evening for the audience with some beautiful Renaissance polyphony, including John Wilbye’s Weep, weep mine eyes and Draw on, sweet night. American Composer Libby Larson had kindly written A Lover’s Journey for the group as a gift, and her setting of Four Valentines summed up the occasion perfectly. The end of the first half included more romantic works by Camille Saint-Saëns, Edward Bairstow and Arthur Sullivan. In the second half we performed three pieces from our latest album High Flight: Morten Lauridsen’s O nata lux, former King’s Singer Bob Chilcott’s A flower given to my daughter and Eric Whitacre’s This Marriage. It was then time to loosen our ties to sing the trademark close harmony pop fare that the group has become known for. The Beatles’ Penny Lane went down a treat! One of the highlights for us was performing two world-premiere encores of Australian favourites in new arrangements: Botany Bay and The Band Played Waltzing Matilda. The latter is a stunning arrangement of the poignant text, and a piece that we were honoured to be able to perform here. We walked offstage feeling very moved by its anti-war sentiment, which the song conveys so beautifully before ending with a hushed rendition of the original Waltzing Matilda folksong, like the ghosts of the fallen singing from their graves.

The subtle accents we added to the Australian songs were commented on favourably, so that was nice to hear. Being a Kiwi, I feel I had a head-start on the other guys and had fun playing language coach. In terms of the “English” repertoire, it’s been easier than I thought to match the vowels, since in New Zealand one is taught NOT to sing like a Kiwi – my upbringing as a Cathedral Chorister and member of both the New Zealand Secondary Students’ Choir and National Youth Choir certainly drummed that in! Not to mention a Vocal Performance degree under the watchful eye of Dame Malvina Major and Vernon Midgley, who never allowed me to get away with anything but the very best “Queen’s English”!

Melbourne, take two, was the following night and we performed an almost entirely different program. This time our theme was “Byrd to Bublé”, moving from madrigals and sacred English works to Spain and Portugal with Alonso de Alba’s La Tricotea Samartin (a sailor’s drinking song with plenty of colourful language!) and La Bomba, Mateo Flecha’s fine example of a form of humourous ballad known as the Ensalada (literally, a “mixed salad”), a hybrid of folksongs, sacred and secular influences, all mixed together to tell the story of a group of sailors whose ship is sinking… And who can’t swim!

The feeling of the group was that Melbourne was a place they could all spend more time in, and I would have to agree. It’s certainly my favourite Australian city! The weather was superb and the Southbank vibe is so infectious and positive. See you again soon, Melbourne!

The Sydney Opera House

Where does one begin? As one of the most recognisable landmarks in Australia and one of the most revered venues on the international concert circuit, I can’t begin to tell you what a privilege it was to perform there last night… Extraordinary! Arguably the highlight of the tour to date. Chris and Tim commented after the show that it was one of the finest concerts they’d ever been a part of in all their years with the group. Paul now has some admiring fans, that’s for sure!

In the second half we were delighted to present an Australian work, River’s Lament, by local composer Elena Kats-Chernin. This work in four movements, with text by the American artist and poet Charles Anthony Silvestri, tells the story of a river from its formation (“I am born where clouds descend to kiss the mountain top”) to a celebration of its life-giving wonder (“I am the thread that binds all creation”). It was a lovely moment when Elena came out to take a bow and kiss each one of us on the cheek. Then it was time to put our music stands away and sing our customary close harmony set, complete with a playful rendition of Obladi Oblada as encore.

I’m feeling really settled in the group – they’ve made it easy to fit in and the social side of things is wonderful. We all get on well and I know this journey is going to be fantastic. Bring on Brisbane!

The King’s Singers’ latest album High Flight is reviewed in the March issue of Limelight, on sale now. For your chance to win a King’s Singers 5-CD prize pack enter our competition.

The King\’s Singers in Sydney, 1972