World premiere of Alec Roth’s Jubilate in celebration of Her Majesty The Queen’s Diamond Jubilee at the Musicians Benevolent Fund’s Annual Festival
The Musicians Benevolent Fund celebrates its annual Festival of Saint Cecilia on 21 November 2012 at St Paul’s Cathedral and Merchant Taylors’ Hall. Held since 1946 as a tribute to The Patron Saint of Music, this event continues a tradition in bringing together over 1,200 people to celebrate music and musicians, making it the Fund’s biggest event of the year.
This year’s Festival is dedicated to the Fund’s Patron, HM The Queen in her Diamond Jubilee year. The Fund is delighted that she has asked HRH The Duchess of Gloucester to attend the Service on her behalf and look forward to welcoming the Duchess to the Cathedral. The Service starts at 11am and includes guest readings from Sir Michael Parkinson and Dame Kiri Te Kanawa. The Service is followed by a reception and lunch which this year, sold out months in advance, where the guest speaker will be Dame Kiri Te Kanawa.
The highlight of the Festival Service is the coming together of the choirs of St Paul’s Cathedral, Westminster Abbey and Westminster Cathedral. This year they will sing together the world premiere of a new anthem commissioned by the Musicians Benevolent Fund with support from the Ralph Vaughan Williams Trust. Entitled Jubilate the anthem celebrates the Diamond Jubilee of Fund’s Patron, Her Majesty The Queen.
Jubilate was written by Alec Roth who is probably best known for his collaborations with the Indian writer Vikram Seth which include an opera Arion and the Dolphin, large scale choral works and numerous songs and song-cycles. He is currently composer-in-residence with the Birmingham-based choir Ex-Cathedra.
Although the lunch at Merchant Taylors’ Hall is sold out, tickets for the Festival Service are available from the Musicians Benevolent Fund. Please call 020 7239 9114 or order online at helpmusicians.org.uk
Next year, 2013, the Fund is going to collaborate with the Britten-Pears Foundation and Westminster Abbey to celebrate the centenary of Benjamin Britten who was born on St. Cecilia Day.