Brighton Consort

10/10/2026

When you think of Advent, do you think of wreaths and candles and prayer? Advent is a time of urgency! Our programme title 'Veni Domine!' conveys the cry: 'Come, Lord!' While penitence and introspection are part of the season as well, so are images of the voice crying in the wilderness, wise and foolish virgins at the wedding feast, and lifting up the gates to let a triumphant king enter in. Our programme draws on music from a range of Renaissance composers (Byrd, Palestrina, Josquin, Lassus, Tallis, and more) to evoke the mystery, urgency, and power of this sometimes-overlooked season.

Full programme and tickets at brightonconsort.org.uk/next-concert

Stay tuned for more details on the pieces featuring in this concert!

If you'd like to join us, please email our Musical Director Greg Skidmore at [email protected] and we can arrange an audition.

03/10/2026

The second piece of our next concert is by Robert Ramsey, a Scottish-born composer and organist at Trinity College, Cambridge, from 1628 until his death in 1644.

Though Ramsey wrote standard English anthems for the Anglican Church, he also composed a handful of Latin motets. O Sapientia dates to the early Baroque or late Renaissance transition period (likely the 1610s or 1620s). Even though the post-Reformation Church of England had distanced itself from complex Latin monastic rituals, high-church environments like academic college chapels in Cambridge and Royal Court circles continued to value Latin sacred polyphony for its intellectual and artistic depth.

O Sapientia is the first of the seven antiphones that are traditionally sung in the final week of Advent. "O Wisdom, who proceeded from the mouth of the Most High, reaching from one end to the other and ordering all things powerfully and gently: come to teach us the way of prudence."

St Peter & St John the Baptist, Wivelsfield
Saturday, 28 November 2026 - 4:00pm

St Paul's West Street, Brighton
Sunday, 29 November 2026 - 7:00pm

St Michael's Church, Lewes
Saturday, 5 December 2026 - 3:00pm

More info and programme at brightonconsort.org.uk/next-concert

If you'd like to join us, please get in touch with our Musical Director Greg Skidmore at [email protected]

26/09/2026

The first piece of our next concert "VENI DOMINE! A cry in the wilderness" is "Audivi vocem", one of Tallis's most purely beautiful compositions. A setting of the respond at the service of Matins on All Saints’ Day, it makes use of Sarum Rite chant, which means it must have been written before 1559 when this rite was finally abandoned. The style of the music, however, suggests a date rather earlier than Mary’s reign, with its avoidance of imitation and uninflectedly modal harmonies.

"I heard a voice coming from heaven: Come all you virgins most wise. Fill your vessels with oil for the bridegroom comes. At midnight a cry went up: Behold, the bridegroom comes."

St Peter & St John the Baptist, Wivelsfield
Saturday, 28 November 2026 - 4:00pm

St Paul's West Street, Brighton
Sunday, 29 November 2026 - 7:00pm

St Michael's Church, Lewes
Saturday, 5 December 2026 - 3:00pm

More info and programme at brightonconsort.org.uk/next-concert

If you'd like to join us, please get in touch with our Musical Director Greg Skidmore at [email protected]

[Pictured: Wilhelm von Schadow, The parable of the wise and foolish virgins, 1842. Städel Museum, Frankfurt am Main]

13/09/2026

Our next concert will feature the seven "Great O Antiphons", which are Gregorian chants traditionally sung before and after the Magnificat in the Vespers of the last seven days of Advent. They are a cry for the Lord to come and they each address him with his various names taken from the Scriptures: Wisdom, Adonai, Root of Jesse, Key of David, Dayspring, King of the Nations, and Emmanuel.

We will start the concert with O Sapientia (turn on the volume and have a listen!) and sing the others throughout the programme.

Stay tuned for more insights into our current project!

More info and programme at brightonconsort.org.uk/next-concert

If you'd like to join us, please get in touch with our Musical Director Greg Skidmore at [email protected]

09/09/2026

We're back in business tonight! We're now preparing for our next concert series, featuring beautiful Advent music (and some Carols too). Check the programme and dates on brightonconsort.org.uk/next-concert.

If you'd like to join us, please get in touch with our Musical Director Greg Skidmore at [email protected] to arrange for an audition as soon as practicable. We have openings in all parts.

05/07/2026

04/07/2026

All is ready at the beautiful St John the Evangelist Church in Preston Park for our RAISED VOICES - Music of Freedom and Belongings workshop! Looking forward to welcoming you all for an afternoon of great music.

brightonconsort.org.uk/raised-voices

03/07/2026

Looking for basses at our workshop tomorrow! All other parts are nicely represented (but we very much welcome everyone still), and we're ready to go for some excellent time.

Info and tickets at
brightonconsort.org.uk/raised-voices

26/06/2026

Join Brighton Consort for a day! We are giving a public workshop on Saturday, 4 July 2026.

Time: 1:30pm to 6:30pm

Venue: St John the Evangelist Church, Knoyle Road, Brighton, BN1 6RB

We will explore choral music inspired by - or grappling with - the promise of freedom and belonging found in the American Declaration of Independence. For 250 years, these ideas have been embraced, contested, and reclaimed by different people and for different causes. What does it mean to raise one’s voice for liberty? Who is allowed to join in? And how can we do so freely and yet together? Such questions have invited musical as well as philosophical answers and we would love to consider some of them with you this Fourth of July.

Current choir members will be attending but they will not have prepared in advance, so we are all in the same boat! The pieces we will study together include the wonderful "Sleep" by Whitacre and "O Magnum Mysterium" by Lauridsen. 

Full programme and tickets at brightonconsort.org.uk/raised-voices

10/06/2026

After a break since our last concert, we're now going to spend the next few weeks working on technique and starting preparing for our next concert, which will probably happen in early Advent. Victoria's stunning Alma Redemptoris Mater at 8 voices will feature in that and it's already candidate to be one of the best pieces of the programme! (Greg said it's his favourite piece by this amazing composer.)

But before that, join Brighton Consort for a day on this 4th July for our workshop RAISED VOICES: Music of Freedom and Belonging. We'll all be there and we'll all be reading new music, so no cheating by us!

Info and tickets at brightonconsort.org.uk/raised-voices