JOHN JOUBERT ALBUM CROWDFUNDER
© Graham Boulton
The first ever recordings of wonderful, neglected choral music!
“I was delighted when Andrew Griffiths suggested that he and the excellent and enterprising Londinium record some of my father’s lesser known choral music. When I last looked there were 46 different recorded versions of Dad’s setting of ‘There is no rose’. Lovely as that is, many of his other works more than merit a hearing and this project will bring some of these out into the light. It will make a wonderful centenary tribute and carry forward the Londinium partnership with SOMM which has proved so successful in the promotion of British choral music of real quality. Thank you very much for your support and contributions. Dad would have been thrilled.”
The Project
We are excited to record our third album, this time exploring the wonderful music of John Joubert, for release on the SOMM Recordings label. Joubert's choral reputation is based on a few fine Christmas carols and anthems, but his prolific output is far more varied, ambitious and rewarding than these would suggest, and has been unjustly neglected for much too long, as Andrew Griffiths explains in this video.
Our disc will bring together a selection of works which are mostly unrecorded, including pieces already familiar to our audiences from recent concerts: the impressive Rorate Coeli (a set of Advent Propers), Lines from ‘The Youth of Man’ by Matthew Arnold, reflecting on aspects of nature, and Let There Be Light, written in memory of JF Kennedy, Martin Luther King and Robert Kennedy. In our October concert, ‘The Garden of Earthly Delights’, we performed another work to be recorded, the beautifully contrasted Four Motets, composed for the Edington Festival. The disc will also include Christmas music (some of which is programmed for our concert ‘Hidden Light’ on 19 December), including Three Carols and a little-known version of There is no Rose, arranged by Joubert for soprano and alto voices.
The release is planned for 2027, marking the centenary of Joubert’s birth, and it is a wonderful opportunity to bring his work to wider attention. We are delighted that, following the critical success of both our Kenneth Leighton album Every Living Creature, and The Gluepot Connection, this will also appear on the SOMM label.
We are thrilled that Rebecca Lea and Nick Pritchard, who were the soprano and tenor soloists on our Leighton album, will be singing for us, including in The Sleep Canticle, an atmospheric setting of words by Sir Thomas Browne and Julian of Norwich. We will once again benefit from the famed expertise of Adrian Peacock and David Hinitt as our producer and engineer, and will record the disc in June 2026, in the splendid acoustic of St Alban’s Holborn.
The process of preparing, recording, editing and mastering a disc becomes ever more expensive, and the total cost will be approximately £20,000. We are able to meet a significant proportion of this, but now need to raise the final £8,000. Please do explore the rewards available for donors and help us make this exciting project happen!
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CD / two tickets / reception
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CD / two tickets / reception / recording
The CD, 2 tickets to the launch concert, interval reception with the conductor, invitation to attend a recording session.
Crowdfunding Target £8,000
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The Music
Rorate Coeli *
Introit: Lord, in the Strength of Grace *
Lines from 'The Youth of Man' *
There is no Rose arr. Joubert for SSAA *
Three Carols op.102 *
Sleep Canticle
The Christ Child *
Love Came Down at Christmas *
Let there be light
Four Motets op.89 *
* Premiere recordings