Songs of Love and Death – the music of Leonhard Lechner Athesinus with Philip Thorby

Philip Thorby is one of our most popular tutors and has again found some wonderful music by a composer most of us will have never heard of. This year it is a one day workshop so that members who could previously never commit to a whole weekend can take part.

All singers and the following instruments are welcome – recorders, cornetts, sackbuts, curtals, viols, violins and continuo (with figured bass). Pitch will be A=440.

The fees are £20 for MEMF and other EMF members, £25 for others.

Music will be provided on the day. Instrumentalists please bring a labelled music stand.

The Music

The German composer Leonhard Lechner Athesinus was born in the Italian Tyrol and was a gifted boy soprano who went on to sing tenor and study composition with Orlando di Lasso. The influence of the master is evident in the pupil, but Lechner is very much his own man, as demonstrated in the wonderful pieces Philip has chosen for our workshop. These include a six-part setting of a section of the funeral sentences, a fifteen-part three-choir setting of Laudate Dominum, and the masterly and splendid 24-part setting of a Latin verse commissioned for a wedding. In keeping with the German practice of the time the singers will be supported by many varied instrumental sounds.

Directions to Solihull School

By road – leave the M42 at junction 5 and onto the A41 towards Solihull. Take the first left turning towards Solihull town centre.

Turn right at the roundabout and continue towards Solihull town centre along the Warwick Road B 4025.The school entrance is on the right at the second set of traffic lights. There is plenty of parking in front of the chapel. The David Turnbull Music Centre is a short walk beyond the car park. The barrier will be unlocked so that instrumentalists can drive to the centre to drop off instruments.

Solihull railway centre is approximately a 1km walk through the town.

Booking is now open.