An award-winning choir with an unbroken tradition dating back around 140 years will be singing in Liskeard on Friday.
The concert of Truro Cathedral Choir under their director Chris Gray will start at 7.30pm in St Martin’s Church.
When the choir was first founded in the 1880’s, Truro Cathedral was under construction and services took place in a wooden shed. Today, the choir usually performs with its twelve adult professional singers made up of lay clerks and choral scholars, joined by either its eighteen boy choristers or its eighteen girl choristers.
In recent years the choir has performed live on BBC1 as well as making recordings for BBC1’s Songs of Praise programme and a BBC2 documentary The Truth about Carols.
The Liskeard programme includes choral music from Victoria to Standford, Brahms to Rutter, and solos on St Martin’s newly restored Lewis organ. St Martin’s musical director Chris Howarth said: ‘This is a rare opportunity to hear this great choir in South East Cornwall.’
Tickets are available from Liskeard Tourist Information Centre, online from Ents24, or on the door.
St Martin’s treasurer Mike Sturgess jokes that he hopes people won’t be put off by the date of the concert.
’The Victorians put these supposedly two unlucky things together. Friday was considered unlucky, because Jesus was crucified on a Friday, and it was deemed unlucky for there to be 13 people at a dinner table, with reference to the Last Supper, where Jesus and his 12 disciples ate the night before his crucifixion.
’So, with all the religious connections to Friday 13th, a concert in a church seems perfectly reasonable!’