The Tyndale Choral Society, conducted by Michael Power, held their Summer Serenade concert on the fifth of July in Wotton-under-Edge parish church. The first half consisted of church music, with choral pieces by Stanford, Brahms, Bach, and Elgar, and impressive organ solos played by Christopher Boodle, while after the interval, the choir sang mainly C20th songs of non-classical origin.

The evening started with Stanford’s Te Deum, a hymn of praise to God. It captures the exuberance of the words, and the choir generally performed it well, but they found some pitfalls in phrasing and rhythm. Exposed entries were weak early on, but steadily improved, and pianissimos were very good.

The first Brahms song was a contemplative German anthem in double canon. The many overlapping entries were performed very well; expression and German accent were good. A great sense of unity was achieved in this performance. It was followed by the more difficult How lovely are thy dwellings with organ accompaniment, and again the expression was good, as was the bass entry at the start of the exciting quaver passage.

Mr Boodle played two excellent organ pieces: a fugue by J S Bach, and an impressive chorale prelude by Reger. More Bach followed, with the very beautiful arrangement of King of glory, with soloist Anne Shipton and oboist Simon Fullard. Some of the marked diminuendos could have been more effective, and decorative rhythm more accurate, but the performance was generally very good, as it was also in the famous Jesu, joy of man’s desiring.

The first half ended with Elgar’s Great is the Lord, a dramatic setting of Psalm 48, the choir singing in a range of textures up to eight parts, with many changes of expression and tempo. The four part soprano and alto section was impressive, and the unison passages had very good tone, but there was not always a good balance between the voices, especially where the altos had an important phrase. The excellent accompaniment must be mentioned.

After the interval, we heard Spirituals, and Slovak Folksongs arranged by Bartok. These provided great harmonic and rhythmic contrasts to the church music. The song I got shoes was difficult, despite having a catchy melody, because the arrangement was complex, and not all of the detail came across clearly. Simon Fullard then played an oboe sonata by Bach in confident and relaxed style, with piano accompaniment played by Christopher Boodle. Pearsall’s lush but all-to-brief nineteenth century part-song Purple glow the forest mountains followed, then an interesting arrangement of Autumn Leaves, featuring an effective humming accompaniment to a sustained soprano melody lying unusually low in the register, resulting in some interesting tone colours.

The suitable and cheerful finale of the concert was a choral version of Rhythm of life, which has some difficult and fast passages. The choir maintained an accurate and steady tempo throughout, essential for its success, and the split part passages were good. It made an exciting end to a very pleasant evening, the choir showing how well they can sing in a wide range of musical styles.