An emotionally-charged triumph from the Oldham Choral Society

Review by Stuart Ferguson

Oldham Choral Society Armistice Centenary Concert at the Royal Northern College of Music

Sir Karl Jenkins is now the most-performed living composer, according to recent surveys and a BBC documentary.

His Mass for Peace - ‘The Armed Man’ - must surely be responsible for this.

Oldham Choral Society made it their major piece in their magnificent Armistice Centenary Concert ‘On Land and Sea’, performed in the newly-refurbished Concert Hall of the Royal Northern College of Music in Manchester.

The work was commissioned by the Royal Armouries as part of its commemoration of the Millennium and was premiered at the Royal Albert Hall on April 25, 2000.

It has been performed over 1,500 times in 20 different countries since then.

Oldham Choral Society moved straight into it with a line of bass singers marching in to the performance area to the beat of the snare drum.

We were there: right at the start, when young men scrambled to join up and proudly fight for King and Country not knowing they would be blown to smithereens in their millions as the War To End All Wars stretched to four years, three months and fourteen days.

This was not just a concert; it was far more than that.

It was a virtuoso performance that took us on a rollercoaster of emotions not only in words and music, but in movement and feelings.

When the Muezzin from a local Mosque, Hafiz Mizan, recited the Call To Prayers there was absolute stillness in the hall.

This spellbinding moment locked us all together across races and religions and became a wailing dirge in supplication for man’s inhumanity to man.

Another moment that brought tears to some was when the entire choir turned away from the audience, as if in private grief, when the Last Post was sounded.

The choir produced clear, understated singing, which, correctly for the occasion, was subdued at times, but very sweet.

All was charged with emotion and remembrance.

Musical Director and Conductor Nigel P. Wilkinson, who has completed 20 years’ service in these capacities with Oldham Choral Society, successfully melded together the choristers and the musicians of the East Lancs Sinfonia Orchestra into a cohesive whole that resonated with the mood of the day.

This was a magnificent, majestic and soul-touching experience and a wonderful and right tribute to commemorate the Centenary of the 1918 Armistice.

The second half of the evening’s performance heard Bass Baritone, Dean Robinson, solo with the choir and orchestra in presenting Sir Charles Villiers Stanford’s, ‘Songs of the Fleet’, and Sir Henry Wood’s ‘Fantasia on British Sea Songs’ to a greatly appreciative audience.

These wonderful, evocative, set pieces lifted us from the horrors of war but in no way detracted from the major work of Jenkin’s ‘Armed Man’.

Ending with an unexpected encore of Parry’s ‘Jerusalem’, this Armistice Centenary Concert will certainly be remembered. It was a triumph!