Welcome to our 43rd season. Yes – 43! And we have an exciting programme to share with you.
We start our season with a Come & Sing Day, performing choruses from Karl Jenkins’ The Armed Man: A Mass for Peace. We sing old and new British music at Shapwick Church to mark an Autumn evening and return to Blandford Parish Church for a concert of Baroque Christmas music with the Sinfonietta Players. Our two Noël! Noël! concerts, one in Dorchester and – for the first time – the other at Clayesmore School, end the year with a festive ring.
We enjoy two collaborations with specialist period ensemble Wessex Baroque Collective. In the New Year we give the final concert of the Shaftesbury Baroque Festival, celebrating one of the greatest female composers of the era. Milton Abbey is the magnificent setting for our rendition of JS Bach’s St John Passion on Palm Sunday. Nature is the theme of our next concert in Wimborne Minster and we will be accompanied by a brass quintet. The highlight of this concert will be a performance of Seven Songs of Nature by Joseph Phibbs, premiered in 2025 in London. Following a highly successful concert in Athelhampton House in July 2025, we return there to explore more musical links with its history.
We are proud to present you with a varied and exciting programme and look forward to seeing you at our concerts.
David Gostick, Director of Music