Brighton Festival Chorus will once again launch the festive season in spectacular style with their traditional Christmas concert with the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra.
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00:00Good morning, my name is Phil Hewitt, Group Arts Editor at Sussex Newspapers. Always lovely
00:06to speak to James Morgan of Brighton Festival Chorus, and as ever, you've got something
00:10fantastically festive planned, haven't you? It's a real tradition, isn't it, the Brighton
00:15Festival Chorus Christmas Concert? It's been going for 20-odd years now, and
00:19we have a lovely partnership with the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra, who come down every
00:22year to celebrate with us before they embark on their own odyssey of 300 Christmas concerts
00:28in the Royal Albert Hall. They do one with us first, at the Brighton Dome, on the 8th
00:32of September this year. And give me a flavour of what you offer, what
00:35makes your Christmas special. So it's Christmas with a twist, if you like.
00:41So you get to sing all your favourite carols. We might mash them up with some unusual film
00:45score themes, or do some strange arrangements, just to make it a little bit more fun, a little
00:50bit more interesting. And you even get the chance to have a go at conducting. One audience
00:54member every year comes and conducts the Hallelujah Chorus, and they get their name picked out
00:57of a hat. Fantastic. And a little bit of violence to
01:00We Three Kings this year, then. Yeah, We Three Kings is going to be given
01:05an unusual cinematic twist, like you've never heard before, and may never want to hear again.
01:11Am I right in thinking you specialise in a little bit of Christmas humour as well, don't
01:16you? Well, I'm not in charge of the humour, that's
01:19the audience's job. So everyone brings their own Christmas cracker jokes, and all I do
01:23is read them out. So it's not my fault, I'm just saying that now.
01:26Right. You won't take responsibility for the jokes?
01:29Absolutely not, because they're awful, usually, but they're groan-worthy.
01:33That's what you expect of Christmas jokes. The worse, the better, isn't it? And it's
01:37been a good year for the chorus, hasn't it? You're saying you've established yourselves
01:41in London, big plans for London next year, too. It's going well.
01:45Yeah, the chorus is in rude health. Our numbers are as big as they've been for a long time,
01:51and we've just come back from a sold-out concert in Cadogan Hall in London last month.
01:57We'll be back up next year doing the Royal Festival Hall, Carmina Burana, and another
02:02concert in Cadogan Hall, and so we've got plenty to look forward to, and it's lovely
02:06to see the chorus in such great numbers. And that's worth stressing, that's a real
02:11achievement, isn't it? Because the pandemic, as we were saying, does hang over a lot of
02:15the industry, doesn't it? And I'm sure we can all think of choirs that have folded or
02:19diminished, but you are doing so well. Why is that?
02:23Do you know what? I don't really know what the tipping point was. We had a couple of
02:27years when we were a bit low on numbers, but all the old members have come back, and we've
02:32got quite a lot of new ones, and some younger members whisper it quietly, which is great.
02:37Always good to see people, you know, maybe in their 20s and 30s, joining a chorus now,
02:42which is fabulous to see.
02:44Fantastic. That's another achievement. Brilliant. Well, pleased that everything is going so
02:48well. Lovely to speak to you, and have a great Christmas when it comes.