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CITY PHILHARMONIC CHORAL SOCIETY

50TH ANNIVERSARY 1955-2005

So the City Philharmonic Choral Society is 50 years old! The ‘City Phil’ as it is known to its many friends, began life in 1955 at that great establishment, the City Literary Institute in Drury Lane, under the baton of Professor Stephen Rhys MBE, who has continued to conduct the choir, almost without a break, ever since - surely a unique and tremendous achievement. It met at the City Lit for 37 years, every Tuesday evening, sometimes in the summer at Keely House where the Music Department was housed until it was flattened a few years ago, but mostly in the basement of the Drury Lane Building. It always felt like descending to the bowels of an old ship, with its constant smell of new glass paint, and giant hot water pipes running round its labyrinthine corridors. The loos were always disintegrating and any refreshment available was rather on the lines of British Rail. But where the choir met, all was enthusiasm and energy, a haven for two hours at the end of the working day for all those who loved to sing and wanted to improve their musical skills and knowledge.

Through Conductor Stephen Rhys the City Phil has a close connection with Putney Choral Society, who themselves celebrated their 50^th anniversary eight years ago in 1997 with a concert including Mozart’s Requiem. The two choirs work in tandem and join together for concerts to make a very sizable chorus.

Over the last fifty years the choir has sung an ambitious and wide variety of music by all the great choral composers of the past, as well as 20^th century music and first performances, and it has given public concerts with professional soloists, such as Thomas Allen, Kathryn Harris, Kenneth Bowen, Robin Leggate, and John Noble, all over London and some time further afield, in Chichester, Brentwood, St Albans, Richmond, at Stephen’s own delightful church in East Sheen with summer music and its delicious strawberries and cream teas, and in France (more about our entente cordiale later). London concerts have been held in some of the city’s famous churches and concert halls-Wigmore Hall, Sadlers Wells, the Purcell Room, St. James’s Church Piccadilly, Holy Trinity Sloane Square, Great St. Helen’s Bishopsgate, St. Peter’s Eton Square, Southwark Cathedral, and most recently here at St John’s Church Waterloo. While it is amusing now to recall nail-biting circumstances, for instance when concerts were nearly cancelled at the eleventh hour due to a double booking with a society wedding, and on another occasion a triple booking (one of them evolving into an unauthorised gay wedding), an organ blowing a fuse and the composer re-scoring his music an hour before the concert, or another organ looking unexpectedly like a kit from IKEA on the floor of the church, disputes over the provision of refreshments and the display of posters, seating collapsing, and programmes being printed upside down, it is the choir’s many successful concerts which should really be remembered.

It is perhaps the Southwark Cathedral Concerts that stand out as the choir’s most memorable and impressive events. Over almost a decade, sometimes twice a year, the choir gave performances there of magnificent works such as Verdi’s Requiem, the Montiverdi Vespers, Bach’s St Matthew Passion, Elgar’s Dream of Gerontius, Brahms’ Requiem, Walton’s Belshazzar’s Feast and Vaughan Williams’ Sea Symphony. It was at Southwark Cathedral that in 1975 the City Phil was invited to sing the first Christmas carol concert held to raise money for Crisis at Christmas, now simply called Crisis, the charity formed to aid London’s homeless, and the choir went on to support the charity for several years.

There have been other highlights and successes. The choir is proud to have worked closely with several 20^th century composers - Alan Bush, David Fanshaw, Malcolm Williamson, Cyril Lloyd, Simon Proctor, and also sung works by Stephen Rhys himself, and his composer son, Paul Rhys. David Fanshaw’s exuberant participation at a performance of his African Sanctus, complete with background thunderstorm and the call to prayer, and Stephen submerged in giant headphones, was a most thrilling event. Memories of Malcolm Williamson and Cyril Lloyd adapting and finishing their new works at the final rehearsal also spring to mind, but it was the choir’s association with political composer Alan Bush in the seventies which gave the choir one of its most unusual and exciting challenges. Alan Bush waited nearly a quarter of a century to bring his most famous opera Wat Tyler, based on the Peasants Revolt of 1381, to the London stage, and the City Phil, with some trepidation, formed his chorus of revolting peasants at the Sadler’s Wells performances. The choir were then invited to join a concert at the Wigmore Hall to celebrate the composer’s 75^th birthday, and in 1981 again became peasants, singing to celebrate the 600^th anniversary of the Revolt, in St. Albans.

Eight years ago, the City Phil was suddenly asked to leave its home at the City Lit after a period of 37 years. This was a severe body blow, coming as it did at a particularly important moment in its musical history. The choir was about to join the Putney Choral Society in celebrating their 50^th year, and at the same time Stephen Rhys’ 50^th year of choral conducting. However, disaster was averted when alternative premises were found at nearby Conway Hall. The City Phil went ‘independent’, and survived to enjoy the anniversary concert with a new ‘French connection’, the Choeur Régional de Flandre from Dunkerque, a link initiated by Stephen Rhys especially for the event. This connection has bee enormously enjoyable, with exhilarating joint concerts taking place in London and Dunkerque, including an exiting performance of Verdi’s Requiem. This concert was given in London in the year 2000 as part of the Millenium celebrations, and took place with the financial assistance of a special Millenium Festival Lottery Award.

Over the past fifty years the City Phil has given well over on hundred concerts. Recently it has given performances of Haydn’s Creation, Duruflé’s Requiem, Poulenc’s Gloria, Bach’s Christmas Oratorio, and Vivaldi’s Gloria. The choir is somewhat smaller than in its early years but its enthusiasm and musical energy remains constant. We hope the City Phil will continue to flourish and if you have enjoyed tonight’s concert and you enjoy singing, why not come and join one of the choirs.

Celia Simpson