‘A Seasonal Round’ is a concert of music and poetry readings which covers all four seasons of the year and will include a passage and a beautiful piece ‘They are at rest’ by Elgar to mark the time of Remembrance . The programme as a whole however is not sombre and will appeal to garden lovers, musicians, poetry enthusiasts and more. It also includes two excerpts from Winnie the Pooh which might well appeal to children and families.
The Saint Martin Singers engage professional readers who very kindly read for them on a voluntary basis. This time it will be Karen Archer, who has performed for them regularly and has a really excellent touch, and Donald Macleod from Radio 3 who should be well known to music lovers – he is an enthusiastic reciter will be a real asset to the concert.
All The Saint Martin Singers concerts are in aid of charity, this time the proceeds will be split between Holy Trinity Church and EMAT. The choir has an interesting history, for more information on the choir and the readers, please notes below.
Donald Macleod (from the BBC site)
Donald explores in depth the life and works of a composer each week in Composer of the Week.
Donald Macleod was educated in Glasgow and at St Andrew’s University where he studied psychology. His musical education is fairly rudimentary: his piano teacher gave up on him at the age of 8, telling his parents that he was wasting their money! Listening to Radio 3 became a habit early on.
Donald had envisaged a career working with an assortment of exotic creatures in the BBC’s Natural History Unit, but they wouldn’t have him. An alternative path opened up when he got a job at the BBC creating often outlandish sound effects in plays for the Radio Drama department. Never imagining that he would find himself rubbing shoulders with his broadcasting heroes, he began his career as a presenter in 1982 on BBC Radio 3 and for BBC1’s 60 minutes as a TV reporter and newsreader.
Karen Archer
Karen is delighted to be reading once again with the Saint Martin Singers, an experience she has enjoyed intermittently for almost 40 years.
Karen’s theatre work includes The Other Place (Park Theatre, London); Hamlet, All’s Well That Ends Well, A Midsummer’s Night Dream, The Gods Weep, Nicholas Nickleby (Royal Shakespeare Company); Mourning becomes Electra (National Theatre).
Elsewhere, Ghosts, The Mousetrap, An Inspector Calls, among others.
TV and film appearances include: The Chief, Casualty, Eastenders, Plays for today, and more recently, Call the Midwife, Doctors and The Gold.
Karen has twice been a member of the BBC Radio Drama Company and has made numerous broadcasts for radio drama, the most recent being Jane Morgan’s production of George Gissing’s The Odd Women.