Mozart:  Requiem
Rutter:   Magnificat

Shrewsbury Abbey
27 June 7.30

Tickets are available on line at https://www.trybooking.com/uk/events/landing/106755?qr=true&qr=true 

In St Mary's church, Shrewsbury on 28 March 2026 at 7.30

To include:

• Finzi:
  Dies Natalis
• Patrick Hawes:
  Song of Songs 
• Kevin Puts:
  Home
• Matthew Coleridge:
  Requiem 

Please book via Ticketsource 

Bach Christmas Oratorio

with Noxwode Baroque orchestra

Shrewsbury Abbey 7.30

Tickets £20 on the door, or
£18 from:
https://www.ticketsource.co.uk/shropshirecharityconcerts

St Cecilia concert

Evensong - ‘Ancient and Modern’

Alington Hall 7.30

Tickets free, from:

https://www.ticketsource.co.uk/whats-on/shrewsbury/alington-hall-shrewsbury-school/st-cecilia-ancient-and-modern/e-qmxkmm

Sunday 23 March 2025: Mozart's “Requiem”
as part of a Mozart evening at the Alington Hall.  The school will also be performing arias and other excerpts from “The Magic Flute”. 

Tickets TBC

Messiah at Shrewsbury Abbey
21st December at 7.30

Tickets £18 from Ticketsource or £20 on the door 
supporting
The Lingen Davies Cancer Fund
Feed the Birds, addressing social isolation, loneliness, and poor mental health

To Shiver the Sky
Christopher Tin

Alington Hall

16 November 7.30pm.
Admission free, with retiring collection

Our performance of 
Brahms' German Requiem 
in Shrewsbury Abbey on 9 March. 
Ticket prices are as follows:
£15 adult, £8 under 18 – online at TicketSource, or in person*
at the Hive and the Abbey,
or from Jill A-H at rehearsals

On the day £17 adult, £10 under 18.

* by cheque (payable to Shropshire Charity Concerts), cash or online

Shrewsbury Abbey

Tickets £17 from Ticketsource:
https://www.ticketsource.co.uk/shropshirecharityconcerts/t-dvppojd
Or £20 on the door, subject to remaining availability 

Our charities supported this year will be:

• Shropshire Wildlife Trust;
• Shrewsbury Foodbank plus; and
• PALZ (a recently founded local Alzheimer’s charity)

Materna Requiem:  Rebecca Dale

Alington Hall, Shrewsbury School

St Cecilia Concert at Alington Hall - Shrewsbury School event tickets from TicketSource

Our Summer Concert will take place in Shrewsbury Abbey
We will perform an interesting range of short works:

• Esenvalds: Trinity Te Deum
• Rutter: Gloria
• Faure: Cantique de Jean Racine
• Howells:  A Hymn For St Cecilia
• Vaughan Williams: O Clap Your Hands
• Finzi: God is Gone Up
• Parry: I Was Glad

Tickets from ticketsource: 
https://www.ticketsource.co.uk/shropshirecharityconcerts/t-dvgaagr

Individual: £15.00
Under 25's: £7.00
Early Bird until May 21st: £13.00​

or on the door:  £17.00

We shall be singing Haydn's Creation, in English.
The performance will be at 7.30pm on  Saturday 11 March at St Chad's.

Tickets for Creation
Paper tickets will be on sale at rehearsals from 6 February onwards.  Cheques only please.
They are on the same basis as the Messiah  i.e. £15 (£7 under 25s). 

Tickets are also available online from Ticketsource:
 https://www.ticketsource.co.uk/shropshirecharityconcerts/t-nommago  until noon on the day of the concert.
A limited number  of reduced price Early Bird Tickets (£13/£6 under 25s) are available until 17th February, only on-line.

Tickets will also be available on the door price £17 (£8 under 25s)

Messiah at Shrewsbury Abbey, 7.30pm

Tickets are avilable from choir members or via Ticketsource:
https://www.ticketsource.co.uk/shropshirecharityconcerts/t-yaaogrm    

Please note the new pricing structure for tickets going on sale from 1st October:
- Early-bird on-line offer: £13 (applies to
  the first 100 tickets sold before 30th Nov
  from TicketSource only; no reduction
  for under 25s)
- After 30th November or when the 100
  early-bird tickets have been sold
  (whichever is the sooner) the 
  price on-line is £15 (£7 under 25s)
- Tickets can also be purchased off-line
  from choir members at the standard
  price of £15 (£7 under 25s)

Alington Hall, as part of the school's St Cecilia weekend.

We will also be performing
Elgar's O Salutaris; Vaughan Williams' Let us now praise famous men; and Let all the world in every corner sing; and Howells' Hymn for St Cecilia.

In honour of the Queen’s 70th Jubilee we will be singing a programme called English Coronation Music, including works by Handel, Parry, Britten, SS Wesley and Vaughan Williams. 

St Chad's Church, Shrewsbury  7.30 pm

Ticketing from Choir members or from Ticketsource

Following the loss to Covid of the 2020 "Messiah", and the postponement of the 18 December 2021 performance, we very much hope to see you at our 32nd annual performance of Handel's "Messiah", to raise funds for local charities, at Shrewsbury Abbey on 26th February

Tickets available from

https://www.ticketsource.co.uk/shropshirecharityconcerts/t-yrzerm

Faure Requiem at St Cecilia Concert, Alington Hall, on 13 November 2021

Tickets from Ticketsource

SATURDAY 13 NOVEMBER 7.30pm
FAURÉ – REQUIEM
WIDOR – SYMPHONY 5 (ORGAN)
SHREWSBURY SCHOOL COMMUNITY CHOIR & STRING ORCHESTRA

SUNDAY 14 NOVEMBER 7.30pm
SCHUBERT – UNFINISHED SYMPHONY
CONCERT BAND, WIND ORCHESTRA & SYMPHONY ORCHESTRA

ADMISSION Free
WWW.TICKETSOURCE.CO.UK

CANCELLED DUE TO CORONAVIRUS

CANCELLED DUE TO CORONAVIRUS

Our 31st annual performance of Handel's "Messiah", to raise funds for local charities, will be at Shrewsbury Abbey on 21st December (please note different date from previous performances)

The charities to be supported are:
The Team Cleo Fund; 
The Swan Room, Shrewsbury Hospital; and
Shrewsbury Music Therapy Unit and Trust Fund

Our performance of Bob Chilcott's Requiem will be at the St Cecilia concerts on Saturday and Sunday 16/17 November in the Alington Hall

Rossini Petite Messe Solennelle

Alington Hall, Shrewsbury School

Shropshire Charity Concerts
Choir and Orchestra
Daniel Norman (Tenor) - Evangelist
Patrick Keefe (Bass) - Christus
Andrew Randall (Bass) - Pilate
Charles Hodgkiss (Tenor)
Natalie Clifton-Griffith (Soprano)
Rebecca Afonwy-Jones (Alto)
Conductor JOHN MOORE
TICKETS £15 (Inc Programme) from
SHREWSBURY ABBEY | THEATRE SEVERN
OLD MARKET HALL BOX OFFICE - 01743 281281
SALOP SHEET MUSIC - 01743 365561 - 294 Monkmoor Road
www.ticketsource.co.uk/shrewsburyschoolcommunitychoir
In aid of AGE UK Shropshire Telford & Wrekin

Shrewsbury Abbey
Tickets are available from:
https://www.ticketsource.co.uk/boxoffice/select/hzqAFVjPcSPO

 (Mass in Time of War) - Oxford Edition, at the St Cecilia Concerts on 24th and 25th November.

English Haydn Festival

Rescheduled for Alington Hall

Our annual charity performance of Messiah, in Shrewsbury Abbey

For tickets please get further information and secure your tickets now!  -from
www.ticketsource.co.uk/shrewsburyschoolcommunitychoir
 
They will also be available in due course from Theatre Severn/Old Market Hall Box Office on 01743 281281; Salop Sheet Music, St Michael St. 01743 365561; members of the choir; or in person from The Abbey.

We performed Bach's Magnificat on 11th and 12th November, in a concert that also included Mozart's Piano Concerto in A Major; Dvorak Symphony no. 8, Movt 1; and others by the School Chapel Choir, Chamber Choir, Symphony Orchestra and Wind Orchestra.

Review by Mr Fraser-Andrews:
The control that characterised (their) performance, in many respects, floated effortlessly into the starring solo roles in the behemoth that is the Bach Magnificat in D, a monumental piece of epic proportion and fine detail. Yet despite the piece’s considerable complexities, the massed forces of the Shrewsbury School Community Choir and orchestra carried it off with indefatigable aplomb and the highest ideals of musicianship. It is a remarkable fact that all soloists were drawn from the student body (Sophia Price, Jessie Inglis-Jones, Ben Lloyd, Ngo Hin Chen, Tianci Wang, Stephanie Christenson): how often does that happen at other schools, I wonder? In any case, to hear young voices brave the currents of some of the repertoire’s trickiest writing and deliver in such fine style truly emboldens the spirit.

Et exultavit in arte spiritus meus.

Full review at: https://www.shrewsbury.org.uk/news/st-cecilia-concerts-2

As the English Haydn Festival Chorus (by invitation and/or audition), we performed Michael Haydn's C minor Requiem  in Bridgnorth on 11 June 2017 (photographs during rehearsal shown above)

Antony Hodgson's review in Classical Source:

....Traditionally on the final night a choral work is performed and John Moore was again the conductor. Michael Haydn’s Requiem was a very successful choice. Beautiful and lyrical, it has an almost symphonic shape and Moore enhanced this impression by not pausing between sections. The ‘Dies irae’ offered only moments of threat – and even then it subsided gracefully into the ‘Offertorium’; this is a Requiem of consolation. It uses four soloists in conjunction with the Haydn Festival Chorus – typically each voice will sing similar phrases in turn. Philippa Hyde had some of the more-florid moments, contralto Miranda Westcott was commanding, tenor Daniel Norman presented his part with comforting strength and Andrew Slater was the firm-toned bass with notably clear diction, but it was the moulding of all four voices within the choral episodes that greatly impressed......

- for full programme see English Haydn Festival www.englishhaydn.com

We performed Bach's St John Passion on April 22 in Shrewsbury Abbey, in aid of Severn Hospice

Listen to Ken's interview on BBC Radio Shropshire on 15 April from 2:36:19 !!

Watch St John Passion on YouTube (not by us though!)

Our annual performance of Handel's Messiah in Shrewsbury Abbey, now something of a Shrewsbury Christmas tradition - you can listen to a short extract from our performance  here   

2016's performance supported people with spinal cord injuries; riding for the disabled; Shrewsbury street pastors; and the Abbey's organ restoration fund, see:  
www.transhouse.info;  
www.cavaliercentre.org;
http://www.shrewsbury.streetpastors.org.uk/;
http://www.shrewsburyabbey.com/Organ.html

Tickets available via Ticketsource

We will perform Bach's St John Passion during Easter-tide in 2017 ~ and, further ahead still, follow this up with his B minor Mass during Easter-tide 2018.  At this early stage we anticipate another engagement as the English Haydn Festival Chorus (singing by invitation and/or audition) in Bridgnorth in June 2017 and, potentially, a light summer concert.

Review  by Antony Hodgson in Classical Source
John Moore, Director of Music at Shrewsbury School, regularly conducts the closing choral concert. This year his Haydn Festival Chorus sang with particular vividness and strength in ‘Nelson’ Mass. I understand that John Moore normally uses the original version in which Haydn uses scoring comprising three trumpets, timpani, organ and strings. Haydn permitted his colleague Johann Nepomuk Fuchs to add woodwind instruments and in 1803 Breitkopf published a questionable edition which may have been re-orchestrated by someone else. Moore returned to the Fuchs version. The ‘Nelson’ Mass has interesting features which differ from Haydn’s other ‘late’ works in this form: the chorus is used to a greater extent and the soprano is featured extensively. The bass has some individual passages but contralto and tenor are subsidiary. It is not until the ‘Agnus Dei’ that the vocal quartet is highlighted, and as the soloists stood to sing, sunlight suddenly shone through a window, brightly illuminating them. Although I question the somewhat declamatory style adopted by the male singers, soprano Natalie Clifton-Griffiths’s mellifluous singing was touchingly sensitive. The choral contribution was crisp and at-one with Moore’s convincingly direct interpretation.

(Italicisation by JND)

The Shrewsbury School Community Choir, augmented by The School's Chapel and Chamber Choirs, performed the Verdi Requiem in Birmingham Town Hall at 7.30 pm on Sunday 28 February, accompanied by the Shrewsbury School Symphony Orchestra and conducted by John Moore.  Soloists were:

Claire Morris:  Soprano
Rebecca Afonwy-Jones: Mezzo Soprano
Gareth Dafydd Morris: Tenor
Graeme Danby: Bass

“As an example of corporate music-making, this concert must surely rank as the finest ever put on by the School.” A glowing review of last Sunday’s [28 February 2016] concert by Martin Knox, who has been attending Shrewsbury School concerts for 45 years:

It was 30 years ago this month that the rapidly expanding Shrewsbury School Music Department undertook its most ambitious project to date, a performance of  Elgar’s Dream of Gerontius in Birmingham Town Hall. School choirs joined forces with the recently founded Community Choir, but, notably, it was felt necessary to engage an outside orchestra to provide the accompaniment.

In the intervening years, John Moore has not only followed his trail-blazing predecessor in taking his musicians around the country and beyond; he has gone further, developing the standard of orchestral playing to the point where last Sunday’s Verdi Requiem was almost entirely a home-grown affair. A few members of the teaching staff strengthened the orchestra and, as is usual, the vocal soloists were from the professional ranks.

From the first few bars of the opening item, it was apparent that the instrumentalists would be equal to the task. Maria McKenzie directed her Wind Orchestra in a spine-tingling account of the Grand March from Aida, the lower brass blending with admirable precision in a prelude to the glorious celebration.

Even without voices, the tune of the Va Pensiero chorus from Nabucco is a winner, as it proved to be in the full orchestra’s performance of the overture. The crisp string playing in the faster sections was appreciated and the woodwind did justice to Italy‘s second national anthem, stirringly followed by a golden-toned trumpet. If Verdi had written nothing else, his reputation would still have flourished.

As it is, he composed a great deal else in a long career, almost all of it for the operatic stage. Originally, the Requiem was going to be a joint venture with fellow composers as a tribute to Rossini. When that fell through and he took on the whole text, it is not surprising that the work is dramatic in tone. At times, one could sense that the soloists were acting parts, as when the baritone lingered with sinister relish on the word “mors”. Shades of Sparafucile plotting murder with Rigoletto. The quartet gave added lustre to the occasion, their voices filling the elegant hall.      

And so to the choir, made up of the Shrewsbury School Community Choir, the School’s Chapel Choir and young choristers from Shrewsbury High Prep and Birchfield Schools. Their first entry was appropriately reverent in tone, which rendered the power unleashed in the Dies Irae all the more shocking. Even with the brass and percussion sections going flat out, the choir summoned up a volume that was the personification of wrath, shattering in effect, yet never coarse in tone. Throughout the work, they proved capable of inspiring awe, be it fierce and threatening or quietly spiritual, and the orchestra, living up to early promise, provided worthy accompaniment.

Over the years, there have been many outstanding individual performances, but as an example of corporate music-making, this week’s concert must surely rank as the finest ever put on by the School. Singers and players alike responded to every nuance of John Moore’s direction in a manner that was a joy to behold. Much work must have gone into the preparation; much talent lies behind the achievement. As a mere bystander, one felt proud just to have been there. The participants deserve a medal.
MWK

"This year's perfomance of Messiah in the Abbey was terrific, as always"  Councillor Miles Kenny, Mayor of Shrewsbury here

The following charities were supported from the proceeds of this concert:

• Shrewsbury Ark
• Shrewsbury Hive
• Abbey Organ Restoration Appeal.

Soloists: Felicity Murphy, Barnie Smith, Richard Eteson and Alex Ashworth

With the Shrewsbury Sympony Orchestra

F J Haydn's The Seasons

Antony Hodgson writes .... "This year's festival theme of ‘The Natural World’ was probably illuminated most fully in the extensive concert featuring Haydn’s ‘The Seasons’ which was sung in English. On this one occasion the conductor was John Moore who over several years, has directed most of the choristers comprising the Haydn Festival Choir many of whose members also sing under him in the Shrewsbury School Community Choir, it was therefore not surprising that they responded with such accuracy and grace. The hall layout required the soloists to be placed to one side in front of second violins and double basses and this made precise linking of phrases against the chorus, set well back, somewhat difficult but Moore’s precise conducting technique went a long way towards solving the problem. This was an illuminating reading. Moore’s speeds tended towards swiftness and in general I found this convincing. The highlight of the music lies in the colourful and varied sequence depicting Autumn with its hunting, drinking and dancing. There was one interpretative surprise however: I certainly expected the peasant dance in the celebrations to have been far more measured and heavy-footed. This was a whirlwind of a dance – peasants would never have kept up with it and would surely have needed to discard their farming boots when attempting to do so. The vocal star of the evening was bass Andrew Slater whose powerful voice and immaculate diction made a great impact. I was pleased that the chorus did not seem to tire as the work progressed but in the excitingly-sung final chorus I was disappointed not to hear Haydn’s famous high horns in C cutting through the textures."

This is an excerpt taken from a review of this year's English Haydn Festival which will appear in due course
in the 2015 edition of the Journal of the Haydn Society of Great Britain

8 June 2014: F J Haydn's Mass in Time of War

Antony Hodgson writes .... "It is a tradition that the final concert of the Festival should include a choral work. This time it was Haydn’s ‘Mass in Time of War’ otherwise known as ‘Paukenmesse’ because of the complex timpani part towards the end. This is brilliant scoring: war is not heralded by force but by an extensive series of quiet, menacing drum strokes. The excellent principal singers Natalie Clifton-Griffiths (soprano) Daniel Norman (tenor) and Andrew Slater (bass) also sang in last year’s performance of ‘The Creation’ they were joined this year by Miranda Westcott (contralto) Once again the opening passages were greatly enhanced by the immaculate diction of Andrew Slater and the soloists blended subtly in their ensembles. These solo parts are not extensive, however, and the Mass is largely choral. The Haydn Festival Chorus sang with impressively unified tone conducted by John Moore who has directed the majority of these end-of-festival choral concerts over the years and under whose direction most members of the chorus have performed on many occasions. Orchestral detail was clearly defined and the potential problem of ensemble posed by the considerable distance between the front of the orchestra and the chorus was successfully overcome. An interesting example of co-operation between Festival musicians was indicated by its principal conductor Anthony Halstead playing the continuo part on a chamber-organ. The notable drum solo in the Agnus Dei - the very essence of the philosophy of the Mass - was all the more threatening because of the authentically dry nature of the period instruments. Altogether the Mass represented a moving experience."

This is an excerpt taken from a review of this year's English Haydn Festival which will appear in due course
in the 2014 edition of the Journal of the Haydn Society of Great Britain