Doors & bar 6:45pm | Concert 7:45pm, ends 9:00pm, no interval

Tickets £22 / £11

www.staplefordgranary.org.uk/whats-on/events/james-gilchrist-clare-wilkinson-anna-markland

The Dance Continued walking in our fathers’ footsteps through the landscape and through song

James Gilchrist, tenor | Clare Wilkinson, mezzo-soprano | Anna Markland, piano

And there I know that you may lie

Day long and watch the Cambridge sky…

…in Grantchester, in Grantchester!

The composer Stephen Wilkinson was born into a clerical family in Cambridgeshire in 1919. Despite being very varied (and spanning 80 years) his music has a particular language which is all its own while continuing the very finest English song tradition of Finzi, Holst and Britten. The Dance Continued is a personal journey through this musical landscape, lovingly curated for us by the composer’s daughter, mezzo-soprano Clare Wilkinson; and performed by her together with tenor James Gilchrist and pianist Anna Markland.

A deep and detailed reader of poetry, Stephen Wilkinson’s music grows out of a long, intense consideration of the text. His songs on poems by Rupert Brooke, Andrew Marvell and Louis MacNeice are presented here alongside some of Gerald Finzi’s most masterful settings of Thomas Hardy; the programme seasoned with intimate miniatures for solo piano by Wilkinson, Frank Bridge and Ivor Gurney. From its contemplation of first childhood steps, and radiating out from the local countryside this recital offers a view of life and landscape as seen from Cambridge and other English skies.

Clare Wilkinson makes music with groups of different shapes and sizes – lute, piano, consort of viols, vocal consort, baroque orchestra. Many new songs have been written for Clare, including a number by her late father. She has recorded very widely, several discs receiving Gramophone awards and nominations. She has recorded with Sir John Eliot Gardiner, Andrew Parrott, Fretwork, Ensemble Plus Ultra. She is a member of I Fagiolini and performs in a duo with lutenist Jacob Heringman, exploring music old and new.

James Gilchrist began his working life as a doctor, turning to a full-time career in music in 1996. His musical interest was fired at a young age, singing first as a chorister in the choir of New College, Oxford, and later as a choral scholar at King’s College, Cambridge. James’ extensive concert repertoire has seen him perform in major concert halls throughout the world with conductors including Sir John Eliot Gardiner, Sir Roger Norrington, Bernard Labadie, Harry Christophers, Harry Bicket, Masaaki Suzuki and Richard Hickox.

Anna Markland has had a varied and happy career not only as a pianist but also as a singer for the last forty years. As a student at Chetham’s School of Music in Manchester she won the BBC Young Musician of the Year competition in 1982 and in 1984 she went to read music at Worcester College, Oxford, where she became a founder-member of I Fagiolini, thus beginning her parallel singing career as Anna Crookes. Anna also sings with Tenebrae, The Finzi Singers and Britten Sinfonia Voices.