Vorhalt Ensemble opens its 2026/27 season with an Advent programme bringing together music by Buxtehude and Bach, with the world premiere of a new work by Nicholas Gawley.

The concert marks the launch of The Vorhalt Cantatas, a new commissioning series for voices and period instruments. The project aims to create a new repertoire of sacred cantatas, inviting contemporary composers to approach the form in their own musical language. The first commission, Vorhalt Cantata No. 1, is by Royal Academy of Music composer Nicholas Gawley and explores humanity’s search for God through biblical texts and 17th-century devotional poetry.

The programme also includes two solo cantatas by Dieterich Buxtehude, Jesu, meines Lebens Leben (BuxWV 62), and Mit Fried und Freud (BuxWV 76), before concluding with JS Bach’s Wachet auf, ruft uns die Stimme (BWV 140).

Performed by Vorhalt Ensemble on period instruments, the concert places the first of these new commissions alongside the historical repertoire from which the project grows, beginning an ongoing series that seeks to make the sacred cantata a living form once again.

Programme:
Nicholas Gawley Vorhalt Cantata No. 1 (world premiere)
Dieterich Buxtehude Jesu, meines Lebens Leben, BuxWV 62
Mit Fried und Freud, BuxWV 76
JS Bach Wachet auf, ruft uns die Stimme, BWV 140

Performers:
Ruby Skilbeck soprano
Ruby Bak alto
Mark Wilde tenor
Tom Butler bass
Vorhalt Ensemble