About Cadenza

Cadenza was founded in August 1992 by a group of singers who were keen to be more than "just another Edinburgh choir". Now regarded as one of Edinburgh's leading mixed-voice choirs, with a reputation that extends throughout Scotland and into Northern England, there is no doubt that it has achieved this goal.

Cadenza with Ken Johnston at Carberry

Cadenza's first major triumph came in 1996 when it won the Scotland & North England Heat of the Sainsbury's Choir of the Year competition - a success which the choir then repeated two years later, at the 1998 competition. On the second occasion Cadenza's programme included the first performance of Daring To..., written by leading contemporary Scottish composer, Eddie McGuire. This was the first movement of Three Chorales of Struggle, a suite of three Scottish songs commissioned by Cadenza with the support of the Scottish Arts Council and Making Music. The world premiere of the full suite took place in Greyfriars Kirk, Edinburgh in May 1998, shortly after the Choir of the Year competition, both a capella and accompanied by McGuire's folk ensemble, The Whistlebinkies.

By this time Cadenza's reputation was spreading across Scotland, with performances in Glasgow, Linlithgow, Peebles, Dingwall and Perth as well as frequent concerts in Edinburgh. In 1999, the choir was invited to participate in a star-studded concert at the Glasgow Royal Concert Hall in aid of the Roy Castle Lung Cancer Foundation.

2000 was a year of major change for Cadenza. In February, the choir ventured south of the border for the first time, to the North Yorkshire market town of Northallerton, for a very successful concert in aid of the NSPCC. A few months later, Cadenza released its first CD, Choral Contrasts, which was recorded at St Michael's Parish Church in Linlithgow. The CD features a variety of classical, folk and popular music, including the McGuire commission.

Enthusiastic participants at the Weekend Workshop

The choir's founding Musical Director, Graham Lovett, bid farewell to the choir in the summer of 2000, after eight successful years. Jenny Sumerling was appointed as his successor in September 2000, and she made her debut with the choir at a series of Christmas concerts and services later that year. For the first time, this included joining the renowned actor and broadcaster, Tom Fleming, in a prestigious service at St Cuthberts Church in Edinburgh, to raise money for Edinburgh's new Erskine Hospital for Disabled Ex-Service Men and Women.

In May 2001, Cadenza was awarded the Edinburgh Evening News Trophy and two coveted Gold Certificates at the Edinburgh Competition Festival, having won both the sacred and the secular classes in the adult choirs contest. The competition was adjudicated by Ben Parry, then Choral Director of the Dunedin Consort, who described the choir's performance of Rachmaninov's Bogoroditsye Dyevo as "magical".

Cadenza's first Edinburgh Festival Fringe concert under Jenny Sumerling, in August 2001, was an outstanding success. An enthusiastic audience filled the Church of St John the Evangelist in Edinburgh's West End, to enjoy a memorable concert which included Vivaldi's Gloria and John Rutter's Requiem.

This sell-out success was quickly followed by another at Christmas - the audience were still queuing for the few remaining seats as the choir lined up to go on stage! Only two days previously, the choir had performed in the second Erskine Hospital Christmas Service, raising more than £1,700.

In February 2002, following the success of the 2000 visit, Cadenza returned to Northallerton in North Yorkshire for a sell-out concert which raised more than £800 for the NSPCC. On this occasion, the choir also visited the Bowes Museum in Barnard Castle, Co. Durham, where it had the great honour of opening the museum's "Music at the Bowes" series. Both concerts attracted outstanding reviews

Only a few months later, Cadenza's status as one of Edinburgh's leading mixed-voice choirs was cemented when it was invited to perform twice on BBC Radio 4. The first broadcast, a Sunday Service shortly after Easter which included Rachmaninov's Bogoroditsye Dyevo, encouraged a warm response from listeners across the UK, who asked to hear more. So, a few weeks later the choir was back behind the microphone, having been chosen to represent the whole of Scotland in a prestigious Morning Service marking the Queen's Golden Jubilee.

Cadenza celebrated its 10th birthday in August 2002 with a "Choral Celebration" which also marked the Golden Jubilee and the centenary of Maurice Durufle's birth. The concert featured Durufle's Requiem and Handel's popular Zadok the Priest, and was another resounding success, being virtually sold out through advance ticket sales alone. Following the concert, the birtdhay celebrations continued with a dinner for choir members, ex-members and friends in October 2002, and a Choral Workshop in March 2003. The choir commissioned Scottish composer Ken Johnston to write a celebratory work for Cadenza, once again with generous funding from the Scottish Arts Council. The commission was performed for the first time at the 2003 Festival Fringe concert, where it met with an enthusastic response from a capacity audience in Greyfriars Kirk, and it will be an integral feature of the choir's second CD, which was recorded in Spring 2004 and is due to be released at the 2004 Festival Fringe.

Part of the choir rehearses in Greyfriars Kirk

2004 was a busy and lively year for Cadenza, with a major fundrasing project to ensure the financial security of the new CD. This meant an active socal life for the choir, as various events were staged to raise the necessary finance. The CD was recorded in St. Mary's Church in Haddington at the end of March. The year saw several concerts for charities, plus two concerts in the Fringe, firstly a short one in St. John's Church at the West End of Princes Street, to act as a launch concert for the CD, and to enable Fringe audiences to sample a rather different selection from Cadenza's repertoire, and secondly, the main concert in Greyfriars Kirk on 21st August. This year Cadenza was particularly fortunate to have a sponsor for the Greyfriars concert, in Gerrard Financial Advisors who are enthusiastic about the choir and chose the Greyfriars concert to entertain some of their special clients with an evening with Cadenza.

In 2005, Cadenza had a busy year with a weekend workshop in February, several concerts for charity in the spring, and a major concert in Greyfriars Kirk on Saturday 20th August, when the programme included Rossini's 'Petite Messe Solonelle' and the final commissioned performance of Peter Maxwell Davies' work for Making Music, 'The Kestrel Road'. These were performed to a large and enthusiastic audience.

Plans were laid in 2005 for a new experience for the choir, and in March 2006, Cadenza participated in the Coleraine (International) Choral Festival in Northern Ireland. Taking the entire choir travelling was an interesting logistical experience, and the choir enjoyed a lively and sociable weekend, hearing and getting to know choirs from around the world. In preparation for this event, Cadenza returned to Carberry for a second weekend workshop. Ben Parry, who is Patron of Cadenza, flew up (very!) early on the Saturday morning, and spent the weekend working with Jenny and the choir on musical and presentation skills. Cadenza were very happy to renew their association with Ben, and hope that it will not be too long until he returns.

In addition to visiting Coleraine in March 2006, Cadenza performed a concert in Barclay Church on May 6th in aid of the Vine Trust which works with street children in Latin America, and there will be a major concert in the Edinburgh Festival Fringe in Greyfriars Kirk on Saturday 19th August. The music performed at this concert will be, firstly, Mozart's beautiful Requiem, in honour of the 250th anniversary of his birth, and the second ever performance in Scotland of Zelenka's Missa dei Filii. The choir's christmas concert will be held in Polwarth Church, Edinburgh on Saturday December 9th, and the choir will lead the music two days before that, on Thursday December 7th, for Edinburgh Erskine's Christmas Service in St. Cuthbert's Parish Church in Lothian Road, Edinburgh.

Cadenza is a member of Making Music and has received help from Awards for All and the Scottish Arts Council