New VOCES8 EP release: ‘Devotion’

After Silence is the celebration of VOCES8‘s 15th anniversary. Successive online EPs released in four chapters – Remembrance, Devotion, Redemption and Elemental – will be followed by After Silence, a double album with a beautifully produced booklet, illustrated with contemporary artworks and illuminating notes that add an extra dimension to the exploration of the themes.

Devotion has a dual aspect: religious observance or divine worship, on the one hand; the fact of being deeply attached to a beloved object, on the other. These sacred and secular passions provide inspiration for the transcendent harmonies displayed in the selection of works that make up the second part of After Silence, reflecting on love, death and the life of the spirit.

RepertoireA Boy and a Girl  Eric Whitacre
The Three Kings  Jonathan Dove
Lully, Lulla, Lullay  Philip Stopford
Lagrime d’amante al sepolcro dell’amata  Claudio Monteverdi
Jesus bleibet meine Freude BWV 147  Johann Sebastian Bach

Pre-order or stream Devotion here!

VOCES8 Foundation wins at the Music & Drama Education Awards

The VOCES8 Foundation has been awarded the Classic FM Public Choice Award at the Music & Drama Education Awards, UK. It’s given to an individual or organisation which the general public feels has had the most significant positive impact on classical music education in the UK over the past year. This is a great tribute to Apollo5, VOCES8, Paul Smith, musician, composer, public speaker and all the Foundation team.

See all the categories and winners here.

VOCES8 in USA for Winter Tour 2020

VOCES8 are in the USA again with a 16-date concert tour, with plenty of workshop activity too. Amongst events on this trip are an Instagram Live event with Eric Whitacre on Feb 16th at 1pm EST to coincide with the group’s video release of Eric’s ‘A Boy and a Girl’.

All the group’s tour dates are at www.voces8.com/tour

VOCES8 return to Moscow

VOCES8 are in Moscow again, this time to give a very special concert in collaboration with the Russian vocal ensemble Intrada.

Taking place in at St Andrew’s Anglican Church in Moscow as the opening concert of the OPERA APRIORI 7th International Festival of vocal music, the concert of mixed repertoire features 3 premieres; there are World Premieres by Ivan Moody and Russian Premieres by Alexander Levine and Thomas Tallis – whose monumental and famous 40-part motet Spem in Alium has had to wait 550 years to be heard in Russia!

Tickets are available here.

VOCES8 end of year round-up

VOCES8 is heading into a well-deserved holiday after an intense touring period. Since the start of the season in September they have been in the UK, Germany, Austria, France, Belgium, Italy, the USA, Canada, recorded for audio and video, and given workshops at practically every town or city they have appeared in. They have also enjoyed the release of 3 arrangements of music by Olafur Arnalds which has been a phenomenal success. See a video of one of the tracks, called Momentary, here. The group has also released the first of 4 recordings making up its 15th Anniversary project called After Silence, which has a microsite here.

Their last video of the year is a beautiful recording of Jonathan Rathbone’s carol The Oxen, which you can see here.

At the start of 2020 the group can look forward to much more touring and teaching – all dates appear at www.voces8.com/tour.

VOCES8 new album: After Silence

As a celebration of VOCES8‘s 15th Anniversary the ensemble has released the first of 4 EP releases which go to make up the “After Silence” project. The first release comes under the heading of Remembrance:

• Drop, Drop, Slow Tears – Orlando Gibbons

• The Deer’s Cry – Arvo Pärt

• Bring Us O Lord God – William Harris

• Ne Irascaris Domine – William Byrd

• Civitas Sancti Tui – William Byrd

• There Is An Old Belief – Charles H. Parry

• Pie Jesu – Gabriel Fauré arr. Barnaby Smith

The releases that make up After Silence are associated with the four classical elements, earth, fire, air and water:
Remembrance, invoking death, loss and the return to earth;
Devotion, focusing on the flames of love, sacred and secular;
Redemption, celebrating rebirth and the renewed breath of life;
Elemental, returning us to the ebb and flow of nature.

These successive online releases will be followed by After Silence, a double album with a beautifully produced booklet, illustrated with contemporary artworks that add a visual dimension to the exploration of the themes. Exalted, vital and freed from their original contextual restraints, the choral works showcased in this project have been carefully compiled for their thematic power and inexhaustible capacity to express the inexpressible.

Find out more at voces8aftersilence

VOCES8 Fall USA & Canada tour 2019

VOCES8 are heading to the USA and Canada to give concerts stretching from New York City to San Francisco in October and November. They will also give workshops everywhere they go in conjunction with Paul Smith, the author of the hugely popular VOCES8 Method book.

All of the group’s tour dates are on line at www.voces8.com/tour.

VOCES8’s season 2019-2020

VOCES8 has another exciting season ahead with over 125 concerts around the world (tour schedule is here), combined with extensive education work, and plenty of audio and video releases ahead. The highlights of the season are laid out below.

The group’s Foundation is now re-named the VOCES8 Foundation, alongside the VOCES8 Centre, and record label VOCES8 Records.

Reflections – new album from Paul Smith

Reflections is the new album of material composed by Paul Smith, and featuring performers Paul Smith, Clare Stewart, Neil Valentine, Apollo5, VOCES8 and the VOCES8 Foundation choir.

BBC Music Magazine has given the album a 4-star review: An immersive (and effective) endeavour, with plainsong, modern instrumental and vocal hues and early opera sitting together surprisingly comfortably. Definitely one for headphones and a darkened room.

The album launch concert is now available to watch on VOCES8’s Facebook page here.

Buy the album here.

Sheet music for one of the tracks, Nunc Dimittis, is available from Edition Peters here.

Paul’s own website is here.

VOCES8 announce Roxanna Panufnik as Composer-in-Residence

Roxanna Panufnik will be VOCES8’s Composer-in-Residence from September this year. She has written a wide range of pieces – opera, ballet, music theatre, choral works, orchestral and chamber compositions, and music for film and television – which are performed all over the world.

The position continues an already strong relationship. The album Love Abide on Signum Classics includes 2 tracks sung by VOCES8 – Love Endureth and Zen Love Song, which has a great animated video here by Mischa Ying. During the residency Roxanna will write music for the group as well as take part in workshop events. The group will perform a piece of Roxanna’s at almost every concert performance.

Jonathan Dove was the group’s previous Composer-in-Residence, and during that time he composed the work “Vertue” for them.

Read an interview from Roxanna here.