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| Sunday, 7 September 2003 |
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Peradeniya Singers celebrates Jubilee The 'Peradeniya Singers' celebrates its fiftieth anniversary this year and its director Bridget Halpe, her forty first year as a choral director.
The Peradeniya Singers began life as the University Singers founded by Robin Mayhead at the University of Ceylon in 1953. Robin Mayhead came to the university's Department of English in Peradeniya from Downing College, Cambridge, where he had directed a choral group. Mayhead was committed to a capella performance, a skill he nurtured in us painlessly rehearsing just an hour twice weekly in the Art's Faculty's Room B. Fascinated by the music of the early Renaissance he gave us an enduring taste for the polyphony of Palestrina, Vittoria, Manduit, Byrd et al, taking us into musical experiences ranging from the plangent solemnity of Vittoria's O Vos Omnes to be lighthearted El Grillo in praise of the chirping of the cricket. The original group faded out after the departure of Robin Mayhead in 1958, though the impetus was carried to the SCM choir and the Newman Society choir, the latter directed by Frederic Ludowyk and then by Ray Forbes. The present director Bridget Halpe was a member of the Newman Society choir from 1956. She returned in 1962 from a two-year stint in Bristol studying music at the university. Drawing on her training and experience in Bristol's Department of Music and as a member of the University of Bristol Choir, the select Thirty-two Choir and the Paragon Singers, she took over the Newman Society choir and revived the University Singers. Both choirs met regularly and presented several programmes despite disruptions by events in this turbulent period and by the so-called university reorganization which removed the Humanities from Peradeniya and the Halpes with them. The unrest in the country in 1988-1990 led to a closure of universities for two years. Fortunately, the group already included several non-university people, and so the choir was able to continue under the new name Peradeniya Singers. Composed of students and working people, including many expatriates, the group's membership varies and fluctuates considerably. The group rehearses weekly with Bridget Halpe, nearly half the members, now working or studying in Colombo, rehearsing with her in Mount Lavinia, and members in and around Kandy at her residence at Anniewatte. Besides its own annual concerts, Peradeniya Singers has presented or participated in several special programmes, notably the concert in celebration of the Bach/Handel tricentennial (1985), the bicentennial of the French Republic (1989), the fiftieth anniversaries of university education in Sri Lanka (1992) and of the move of the university to Peradeniya (2002), the ceremonial opening of the rebuilt Central Bank building (2001), etc. It has participated on invitation in several Christmas and Easter concerts of the Symphony Orchestra of Sri Lanka under conductors Earle de Fonseka and Lalanath de Silva and in the recordings of three important and innovative Sri Lankan works: Devar Suriya Sena's Sri Lankan setting of the Anglican Eucharistic Celebration, Lalanath de Silva's Requiem Orbis Terrarum and Pradeep Ratnayake's Indrakeelaya. Peradeniya Singers was All-Island winners (choral) at the festivals in Sri Lanka of the British Federation of Festivals of Music, Speech and Drama in the first three years - 1998, 1999 and 2000 - winning the Richard Graves award. Reviewers found the choir's 2002 concert Adoramus Christum "...discerning and tasteful: extremely well performed" (Professor Timothy Scott), "...rare and sublime... great deal of dedication." (Malinie Samarajiwa) and a "... rare treat... 'the music in my heart I bore/Long after it was heard no more' " (Marjorie Peries). - H.H. |
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The group will perform two concerts to mark this occasion - one at 7
p.m. on September 12 at the Lionel Wendt Theatre and the other at 6.30
p.m. on September 14 at the EOE Pereira Theatre, Peradeniya. The
programmes will present a wide spectrum of choral music representative of
the work it has done in the past fifty years.
