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Founded in 1974 by Leon Lovett, the London Oriana Choir is recognised as one of the country's leading amateur choirs.
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Founded in 1974 by Leon Lovett, the London Oriana Choir is recognised as one of the country's leading amateur choirs.
In 1996, David Drummond became musical director and has re-invigorated the choir with his energy and fresh ideas so that now the choir is renowned for its youthfulness, high standards, purity of tone and the vitality of its performances.
With an average age of 30, the 100-strong choir sings regularly at the South Bank, St John's Smith Square, the Barbican Hall, the Royal Albert Hall and St James's Piccadilly. It makes frequent tours abroad and has sung at the Aix-en-Provence, Strasbourg, Aachen and Cork Festivals, as well as performing elsewhere in Hungary, Holland, France, Germany, Spain and Belgium. The choir has sung with many of the leading London orchestras and has broadcast on BBC Television and Radio France. For nine years, it was the lead choir for the annual BBC Television "Joy to the World" Christmas charity concert.
In the 1999/2000 season, the choir's 25th year, it has sung in Notre Dame and St Augustin in Paris, is planning a tour to St Petersburg in May, and has performed "Emperors and Empresses" at St John's Smith Square and "A Celebration of Christmas" at St James's Piccadilly. Other concerts are planned in St Margaret's Westminster, St Peter's Eaton Square and St Mary Abbot's in Kensington.
The choir's repertoire ranges across the centuries from Monteverdi, Mozart and Mendelssohn to Maxwell Davies and MacMillan and includes the great choral works of Verdi, Beethoven, Brahms, Haydn, Handel and Bach as well as hundreds of other pieces by composers from around the globe.
The choir has recorded two CDs &endash; one featuring music for Christmas and Advent entitled "In Dulci Jubilo" and the second a selection of previously unrecorded 20th century English choral works called "Stuff and Nonsense". The choir has commissioned a new work by the young British composer Richard Allain based on the Song of Solomon which it hopes to perform in the 2000/2001 season.
