L’Académie du Roi Soleil opens its 2019-2020 season with a program entitled Take Him, Earth, for Cherishing: Music for Commemoration and Remembrance. Coinciding with the 80th anniversary of the outbreak of the Second World War and Veterans Day, the program reflects on loss, conflict, the trauma of war, and reconciliation, and features as its centerpieces Howells’ ravishing memorial motet Take Him, Earth for Cherishing and Parry’s Songs of Farewell. The texts and composers traverse the range of human history from the fourth century to the present day, including works by Elgar, MacMillan, Weelkes, and Vaughan Williams. L’Académie du Roi Soleil is delighted to present this music with an octet comprised of the country’s finest soloists and ensemble singers. The program will last approximately 75 minutes with a short intermission.

After an artistic residency at Davidson College, L’Académie du Roi Soleil presents this concert in collaboration with Davidson’s Collegium Musicum.

Program
Robert Ramsey - How are the Mighty Fallen
Edward Elgar - They are at Rest*
Douglas Guest - For the Fallen*
Thomas Weelkes - When David Heard*
Herbert Howells - Take Him, Earth, for Cherishing

William Henry Harris - Holy is the True Light
Cuthbert H. H. Parry - Songs of Farewell
Ralph Vaughan Williams - Valiant-For-Truth
James MacMillan - O Radiant Dawn

*In collaboration with Davidson’s Collegium Musicum

Artists
Margaret Carpenter Haigh and Madeline Healey, soprano
Kim Leeds and Ashley Mulcahy, mezzo-soprano
Steven Bradshaw and Gene Stenger, tenor
Luc Kleiner and Jason Steigerwalt, bass
Nicolas Haigh, director