Christmas with Southern Voices
Saturday 13th December, 2025 at 7:30pm
Chapel of St Cross, Winchester SO23 9SD
£20 (age 21 and under £10)
Bringing our concert season to an end, we hope that you have been able to join us on at least part of our journey through the year exploring four pillars of human existence: HOPE, FAITH, LIFE, LOVE. This, our final concert in the year, is our ever-popular Christmas with Southern Voices in probably our favourite venue, the ancient Chapel of St Cross in Winchester. Book early to avoid disappointment, we have sold out all tickets for this concert over the past couple of years.
A word from our Musical Director...
Southern Voices are delighted to be returning, once again, to the stunning surroundings of the Hospital of St Cross, and very much looking forward to bringing you Christmas with Southern Voices from the beautiful Chapel.
This year’s programme is centred around Francis Poulenc’s Quatre motets pour le temps de Nöel, composed in 1952 and painting four very colourful scenes from the Nativity story. Southern Voices perform the motets in order whereby we journey from the awe and mystery of the birth proclaimed in the first motet through to the exclamations of joy in the fourth. Neatly fitting around these four motets, spread through the programme as they are, and continuing to tell the story are settings of more familiar texts set to music by a variety of composers. Some are firm favourites, including a nod to Winchester composer Malcolm Archer; other composers offer familiar melodies and texts but perhaps not quite in the harmonic or melodic language you might expect. We are delighted to further promote the work of young composer Lucy Walker, one of Classic FM’s rising stars. Appointed composer in residence with professional consort St. Martin’s Voices in 2024, she has won numerous high-profile commissions with groups such as the BBC Singers, VOCES8, The Sixteen and various UK Cathedral Choirs.Christmas with Southern Voices promises to take you on a journey through the wonder of the Christmas story with beautiful music of some of our most loved composers at this time of year. Eric Whitacre, Bob Chilcott and Andrew Carter all feature and, coupled with the opportunity to sing your favourite carols, the evening promises to be a most special one to celebrate a special time of year.
Conductor: Jamal Sutton
Programme:
| Audience | Once in Royal David's City | |
| Choir | O magnum mysterium | Poulenc |
| A maiden most gentle | Carter | |
| I sing of a maiden | Matthew Martin | |
| Audience | O come, O come Emmanuel | |
| Choir | Quem vidistis | Poulenc |
| There is no rose | Lucy Walker | |
| Organ | TBC | |
| Audience | In the bleak midwinter | |
| Choir | Tomorrow shall be my dancing day | Gardiner |
~ Interval ~ |
||
| Choir | Weinacten | Mendelssohn |
| Audience | O little town of Bethlehem | |
| Choir | Videntes stellam | Poulenc |
| Sussex Carol | arr. Bob Chilcott | |
| Lux aurumque | Whitacre | |
| Audience | O come all ye faithful | |
| Organ | TBC | |
| Choir | Hodie Christus natus est | Poulenc |
| Audience | Hark! The Herald Angels sing | |
| Choir | Where do Christmas songs begin | Archer |
| Shepherd’s Pipe Carol | Rutter |
