The CBSO Chorus is a

chorus Chorus may refer to: Music * Chorus (song) or refrain, line or lines that are repeated in music or in verse * Chorus effect, the perception of similar sounds from multiple sources as a single, richer sound * Chorus form, song in which all verse ...

based in

Birmingham Birmingham ( ) is a city and metropolitan borough in the metropolitan county of West Midlands in England. It is the second-largest city in the United Kingdom with a population of 1.145 million in the city proper, 2.92 million in the West ...

, England.

Description

It was founded in 1973 as the CBSO Chorus, with an upper age limit of 45 years old.

Simon Halsey Simon Halsey, Commander of the Order of the British Empire, CBE (born 8 March 1958) is an English choral conductor. He is the chorus director of the City of Birmingham Symphony Chorus (CBSO Chorus), a position he has held since 1983, and has bee ...

has served as Chorus Director since 1983. Between 1995 and 2009 was known officially as The City of Birmingham Symphony Chorus (CBSC). The chorus is allied with the

City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra The City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra (CBSO) is a British orchestra based in Birmingham, England. It is the resident orchestra at Symphony Hall: a B:Music Venue in Birmingham, which has been its principal performance venue since 1991. Its a ...

(CBSO), but unlike the orchestra, the singers are

amateur An amateur () is generally considered a person who pursues an avocation independent from their source of income. Amateurs and their pursuits are also described as popular, informal, autodidacticism, self-taught, user-generated, do it yourself, DI ...

. Because of its close association with the CBSO, the chorus regularly performs with the orchestra and prioritises its time to the CBSO. It has also performed with other major orchestras such as the

Leipzig Gewandhaus Orchestra The Leipzig Gewandhaus Orchestra (Gewandhausorchester; also previously known in German as the Gewandhausorchester Leipzig) is a German symphony orchestra based in Leipzig, Germany. The orchestra is named after the concert hall in which it is bas ...

, the

Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra The Vienna Philharmonic (VPO; german: Wiener Philharmoniker, links=no) is an orchestra that was founded in 1842 and is considered to be one of the finest in the world. The Vienna Philharmonic is based at the Musikverein in Vienna, Austria. Its ...

, the

Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra The Berlin Philharmonic (german: Berliner Philharmoniker, links=no, italic=no) is a German orchestra based in Berlin. It is one of the most popular, acclaimed and well-respected orchestras in the world. History The Berlin Philharmonic was fo ...

, and the

San Francisco Symphony Orchestra The San Francisco Symphony (SFS), founded in 1911, is an American orchestra based in San Francisco, California. Since 1980 the orchestra has been resident at the Louise M. Davies Symphony Hall in the city's Hayes Valley neighborhood. The San Fr ...

. The chorus has travelled and toured to all the major concert halls around the UK and has toured

Europe Europe is a large peninsula conventionally considered a continent in its own right because of its great physical size and the weight of its history and traditions. Europe is also considered a Continent#Subcontinents, subcontinent of Eurasia ...

North America North America is a continent in the Northern Hemisphere and almost entirely within the Western Hemisphere. It is bordered to the north by the Arctic Ocean, to the east by the Atlantic Ocean, to the southeast by South America and the Car ...

Asia Asia (, ) is one of the world's most notable geographical regions, which is either considered a continent in its own right or a subcontinent of Eurasia, which shares the continental landmass of Afro-Eurasia with Africa. Asia covers an area ...

and Australia. It has recorded with both the CBSO and other orchestras, mainly on the

EMI Classics EMI Classics was a record label founded by Thorn EMI in 1990 to reduce the need to create country-specific packaging and catalogues for internationally distributed classical music releases. After Thorn EMI demerged in 1996, its recorded musi ...

label. The chorus rehearses at the

CBSO Centre The CBSO Centre is the administrative home and rehearsal centre of the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra, the City of Birmingham Symphony Choruses ( City of Birmingham Symphony Chorus, City of Birmingham Symphony Youth Chorus and City of Bi ...

in Birmingham, and its home venue is Symphony Hall.

Membership

Membership of the chorus is by audition. All members are reauditioned every other year, with members over 50 year of age reauditioned annually. Members come from all walks of life; many are professionals, others are students. Long service awards are presented for 10, 20 and 30 years service. The standard is very high and with around 15-20 concerts per year. The chorus rehearses on Wednesday evenings and at other times as required for concerts, and has a full-time management of two, the Chorus Manager and Assistant Chorus Manager and one part-time Chorus Administrator.

Notable performances

The choir performed

Mahler Gustav Mahler (; 7 July 1860 – 18 May 1911) was an Austro-Bohemian Romantic composer, and one of the leading conductors of his generation. As a composer he acted as a bridge between the 19th-century Austro-German tradition and the modernism ...

’s

Symphony of a Thousand The Symphony No. 8 in E-flat major by Gustav Mahler is one of the largest-scale choral works in the classical concert repertoire. As it requires huge instrumental and vocal forces it is frequently called the "Symphony of a Thousand", although th ...

at the opening of the

Sydney Olympic Arts Festival The 2000 Summer Olympics, officially the Games of the XXVII Olympiad and also known as Sydney 2000 (Dharug language, Dharug: ''Gadigal 2000''), the Millennium Olympic Games or the Games of the New Millennium, was an international multi-sport ...

in 2000 during the chorus's World Tour. In Birmingham in October 2000 the chorus was joined by the City of Birmingham Choir for the centenary performances of

Elgar Sir Edward William Elgar, 1st Baronet, (; 2 June 1857 – 23 February 1934) was an English composer, many of whose works have entered the British and international classical concert repertoire. Among his best-known compositions are orchestr ...

The Dream of Gerontius ''The Dream of Gerontius'', Op. 38, is a work for voices and orchestra in two parts composed by Edward Elgar in 1900, to text from the poem by John Henry Newman. It relates the journey of a pious man's soul from his deathbed to his judgment b ...

. The chorus and youth chorus performed Mahler's Symphony of a Thousand on three occasions in 2002: with the

BBC Philharmonic The BBC Philharmonic is a national British broadcasting symphony orchestra and is one of five radio orchestras maintained by the British Broadcasting Corporation. The Philharmonic is a department of the BBC North Group division based at MediaC ...

and

Gianandrea Noseda Gianandrea Noseda (born 23 April 1964, Sesto San Giovanni, Italy) is an Italian conductor. Biography Noseda studied piano and composition in Milan. He began conducting studies at age 27. He furthered his conducting studies with Donato Renzett ...

at the

Bridgewater Hall The Bridgewater Hall is a concert venue in Manchester city centre, England. It cost around £42 million to build in the 1990s, and hosts over 250 performances a year. It is home to the 165-year-old Hallé Orchestra as well as to the Hallé ...

to open the

Commonwealth Games The Commonwealth Games, often referred to as the Friendly Games or simply the Comm Games, are a quadrennial international multi-sport event among athletes from the Commonwealth of Nations. The event was first held in 1930, and, with the exce ...

Festival in July 2002 (and also at Symphony Hall and the

BBC Proms The BBC Proms or Proms, formally named the Henry Wood Promenade Concerts Presented by the BBC, is an eight-week summer season of daily orchestral classical music concerts and other events held annually, predominantly in the Royal Albert Hal ...

in August). In May 2002 the chorus accepted an invitation to record live for EMI at the

Vienna Musikverein The ( or ; ), commonly shortened to , is a concert hall in Vienna, Austria, which is located in the Innere Stadt district. The building opened in 1870 and is the home of the Vienna Philharmonic orchestra. The acoustics of the building's 'Gre ...

singing in

Beethoven Ludwig van Beethoven (baptised 17 December 177026 March 1827) was a German composer and pianist. Beethoven remains one of the most admired composers in the history of Western music; his works rank amongst the most performed of the classical ...

's Ninth Symphony with the Vienna Philharmonic and Sir Simon Rattle. After two performances, the chorus received complimentary reviews such as from the

Wiener Zeitung ''Wiener Zeitung'' is an Austrian newspaper. It is one of the oldest, still published newspapers in the world. It is the official publication used by the Government of the Republic of Austria for legally-required announcements, such as company r ...

noting that "the CBSC met Rattle's demands with transparency, clarity and perfect execution". In January 2004 the chorus flew to

Helsinki Helsinki ( or ; ; sv, Helsingfors, ) is the Capital city, capital, primate city, primate, and List of cities and towns in Finland, most populous city of Finland. Located on the shore of the Gulf of Finland, it is the seat of the region of U ...

to join the

Finnish Radio Symphony Orchestra The Finnish Radio Symphony Orchestra (Finnish: ''Radion sinfoniaorkesteri'', Swedish: ''Radions symfoniorkester'') is a Finnish broadcast orchestra based in Helsinki, and the orchestra of the Finnish Broadcasting Company (Yle). The orchestra prima ...

for the Finnish premiere of Elgar's The Dream of Gerontius (they performed later in the year with the CBSO in Birmingham and

Amsterdam Amsterdam ( , , , lit. ''The Dam on the River Amstel'') is the Capital of the Netherlands, capital and Municipalities of the Netherlands, most populous city of the Netherlands, with The Hague being the seat of government. It has a population ...

). On 31 January 2004, the chorus celebrated its 30th Anniversary with a choral programme and, in June, live concert recordings for EMI of Mahler's Symphony of a Thousand with the CBSO and Sir Simon Rattle. In September 2004 the chorus performed for the first time with the

Berlin Philharmonic The Berlin Philharmonic (german: Berliner Philharmoniker, links=no, italic=no) is a German orchestra based in Berlin. It is one of the most popular, acclaimed and well-respected orchestras in the world. History The Berlin Philharmonic was fo ...

under Sir Simon Rattle at the BBC Proms and at Symphony Hall in performances of Beethoven's Ninth Symphony. In February 2006 the chorus appeared in

Hong Kong Hong Kong ( (US) or (UK); , ), officially the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region of the People's Republic of China ( abbr. Hong Kong SAR or HKSAR), is a city and special administrative region of China on the eastern Pearl River Delt ...

at the Hong Kong Cultural Festival, giving a performance of Mahler's Second Symphony with the

Hong Kong Philharmonic Orchestra The Hong Kong Philharmonic Orchestra (Cantonese: 香港管弦樂團), commonly abbreviated as HKPO or HKPhil (Cantonese: 港樂), is the largest symphony orchestra in Hong Kong. First established in 1947 as an amateur orchestra under the name Si ...

under

Edo de Waart Edo de Waart (born 1 June 1941, Amsterdam) is a Dutch conductor. He is Music Director Laureate of the Milwaukee Symphony Orchestra. De Waart is the former chief conductor of the Royal Flemish Philharmonic (2011-2016), Artistic Partner with the S ...

and performing Fauré's

Requiem A Requiem or Requiem Mass, also known as Mass for the dead ( la, Missa pro defunctis) or Mass of the dead ( la, Missa defunctorum), is a Mass of the Catholic Church offered for the repose of the soul or souls of one or more deceased persons, ...

under Simon Halsey. October 2006 saw the chorus joining the City of Birmingham Choir and the CBSO to give the Centenary performances of Elgar's The Kingdom. In June 2007 the chorus took part in the 150th Anniversary of

Edward Elgar Sir Edward William Elgar, 1st Baronet, (; 2 June 1857 – 23 February 1934) was an English composer, many of whose works have entered the British and international classical concert repertoire. Among his best-known compositions are orchestr ...

's birth by performing The Dream of Gerontius, The Apostles and The Kingdom over three days with Sakari Oramo and the CBSO. The chorus then performed The Apostles again with Oramo and the CBSO at The Proms in August and The Dream of Gerontius in St. George's Chapel, Windsor in September at the Windsor Festival with Christopher Robinson and the CBSO. The 2007–2008 season saw the chorus taking part in the reopening of the Town Hall, Birmingham. In April 2008 the chorus travelled to

Kuala Lumpur , anthem = '' Maju dan Sejahtera'' , image_map = , map_caption = , pushpin_map = Malaysia#Southeast Asia#Asia , pushpin_map_caption = , coordinates = , su ...

to perform Vaughan Williams' A Sea Symphony with the Malaysian Philharmonic Orchestra under Martyn Brabbins. In June 2008 they performed Beethoven's Ninth Symphony for the 50th time in the final concert under Sakari Oramo as music director of the CBSO. In 2013 to mark the centenary of the birth of

Benjamin Britten Edward Benjamin Britten, Baron Britten (22 November 1913 – 4 December 1976, aged 63) was an English composer, conductor, and pianist. He was a central figure of 20th-century British music, with a range of works including opera, other ...

, the CBSA chorus accompanied the orchestra and three solo singers to perform Britten's ''

War Requiem The ''War Requiem'', Op. 66, is a large-scale setting of the Requiem composed by Benjamin Britten mostly in 1961 and completed in January 1962. The ''War Requiem'' was performed for the consecration of the new Coventry Cathedral, which was b ...

'' at

Coventry Cathedral The Cathedral Church of Saint Michael, commonly known as Coventry Cathedral, is the seat of the Bishop of Coventry and the Diocese of Coventry within the Church of England. The cathedral is located in Coventry, West Midlands, England. The curren ...

Recordings

The chorus claims many recordings to its credit, including five award-winning releases: Mahler's Symphony No. 2 conducted by Sir Simon Rattle which won Gramophone Record of the Year in 1988;

Sir Michael Tippett Sir Michael Kemp Tippett (2 January 1905 – 8 January 1998) was an English composer who rose to prominence during and immediately after the Second World War. In his lifetime he was sometimes ranked with his contemporary Benjamin Britten ...

's ''

A Child of Our Time ''A Child of Our Time'' is a secular oratorio by the British composer Michael Tippett (1905–1998), who also wrote the libretto. Composed between 1939 and 1941, it was first performed at the Adelphi Theatre, London, on 19 March 1944. The work ...

'', conducted by the composer, which was awarded the

Preis der deutschen Schallplattenkritik The Preis der deutschen Schallplattenkritik ("German Record Critics' Award") was established in Germany in 1963 by publisher Richard Kaselowsky with the aim of setting the "most rigorous standards for supreme achievement and quality" in the field ...

; Szymanowski's ''

Stabat Mater The Stabat Mater is a 13th-century Christian hymn to Mary, which portrays her suffering as Jesus Christ's mother during his crucifixion. Its author may be either the Franciscan friar Jacopone da Todi or Pope Innocent III.Sabatier, Paul ''Life o ...

'' conducted by Sir Simon Rattle, which was awarded the 1995 Gramophone Best Choral Recording. At the 2000

Gramophone Awards The Gramophone Classical Music Awards, launched in 1977, are one of the most significant honours bestowed on recordings in the classical record industry. They are often viewed as equivalent to or surpassing the American Grammy award, and refer ...

the chorus was awarded Best Opera recording for its EMI release of Szymanowski's ''

King Roger King Roger (Polish: , Op. 46) is an opera in three acts by Karol Szymanowski to a Polish libretto by the composer himself and Jarosław Iwaszkiewicz, the composer's cousin. The score was finished in 1924. The opera received its world premiere ...

'' with the CBSO and Sir Simon Rattle, and Best Choral recording for its Chandos release of works by

Lili Boulanger Marie Juliette "Lili" Boulanger (; 21 August 189315 March 1918) was a French composer and the first female winner of the Prix de Rome composition prize. Her older sister was the noted composer and composition teacher Nadia Boulanger. Biography ...

with the BBC Philharmonic and

Yan Pascal Tortelier Yan Pascal Tortelier (born 19 April 1947) is a French conductor and violinist. Biography Born in Paris, Tortelier is the son of the cellist Paul Tortelier, and the brother of Maria de la Pau. Tortelier began piano and violin studies at age 4. ...

in 1999. Other recent releases include

Walton Walton may refer to: People * Walton (given name) * Walton (surname) * Susana, Lady Walton (1926–2010), Argentine writer Places Canada * Walton, Nova Scotia, a community ** Walton River (Nova Scotia) *Walton, Ontario, a hamlet United Kingdo ...

's ''

Belshazzar's Feast Belshazzar's feast, or the story of the writing on the wall (chapter 5 in the Book of Daniel), tells how Belshazzar holds a great feast and drinks from the vessels that had been looted in the destruction of the Solomon's Temple, First Temple. A ...

'', and Mahler's Symphony No. 3 with the CBSO, and choral works by Fauré with the BBC Philharmonic. In 2006 the chorus released its first completely choral CD under Halsey on the EMI label. In 2007 the chorus featured on a new recording of ''The Dream of Gerontius'' with the

CBSO The City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra (CBSO) is a British orchestra based in Birmingham, England. It is the resident orchestra at Symphony Hall: a B:Music Venue in Birmingham, which has been its principal performance venue since 1991. Its a ...

and Oramo released for the Elgar 150th birthday celebrations on the CBSO's own label.

References

External links

Choruses page of the CBSO websiteCBSC Concert History
– list of concerts given to date by the Chorus, and list of recordings {{Authority control Musical groups established in 1973 English choirs Culture in Birmingham, West Midlands