The Senior Choir of the St. Paul?s AME Church presented its annual Christmas Concert last Sunday evening under the patronage of Clarence Corbin and Dorothy Corbin, the former director of this choir.

With the Premier and his wife in attendance, and under the direction of Cecil Smith, M.Mus, the choir and invited guests served up a satisfying programme of Christmas favourites and some special performances.

The stars of the evening were Soprano Kearstin Piper Brown, and her accompanist, Thomas Wright, Jr., and Bermuda?s own 15-year-old organ student, Cornell Fox II, and it must be said that the senior choir also gave a good account of themselves.

Cornell played ?Psalm XIX?, by Marcello. He evinced confidence and mastery and an obvious relish for this difficult instrument.

Hardly had the applause died down than he had launched into Jeremiah Clarke?s famous ?Trumpet Tune?, which brought more applause.

Later in the evening two speakers commended him and, noting that there was a shortage of organists on the Island encouraged him to continue. Cornell is a student of Ruth Henderson, having won the Warwick Academy Organ Prize.

Kearstin Piper Brown and her accompanists Thomas Wright were unquestionably the evening?s musical highlight. Their first presentation was a cantata by a little known Baptist composer, John Carter.

This was extremely challenging both to sing and to play.

The composer had the voice and piano occupying two separate, contiguous spheres, that on first hearing had little to do with each.

Especially difficult for the singer was the fact that the composer conceived of the piano part not as harmonic support, but exploited the piano?s tonal and percussive resources for onomatopoeic effect. In ?Peter Go Ring Them Bells?, especially, the melody seemed constructed around the overtones given off by the tone clusters, rather than by the tones themselves.

There is extremely difficult music to sing and play, and both Brown and Wright performed it admirably; all the more impressive when you realise the shortness of practice time available to them.

?Songs to the Dark Virgin? were in more customary harmonic territory, and again superbly sung by Ms Brown, with impeccable note placement and diction. Her final offering was ?O Holy Night?. Ms Brown is gifted with a beautiful voice which she uses with consummate artistic control.

Earlier in the evening, the Senior Choir had presented their Cantata ?Love?s Pure Light?. This work by Lloyd Larson, incorporates original text, combines with excerpts from the Old and New Testament, with original music. The readers, Twilton Hartman and Kae Thomas, read with the ability to communicate meaning with well modulated voices, and clear articulation. Sherwin Jones sang the baritone solo in ?Do Not Be Afraid?. Clearly he wasn?t and got better as he went on. A feature of this work was the congregational singing of ?O Come , O Come Emmanuel?, ?It came Upon The Midnight Clear?, ?Silent Night?, and ?Hark! The Herald Angels Sing?.

The choirs other offering, ?Mary Mary?, and ?Good News? saw them in a more gospel vein, clearly enjoying themselves and giving pleasure.

They finished with Handel?s ?Hallelujah Chorus?, a challenge foe many a choir.

All in all it was a pleasant evening. The church altar was beautifully decorated with a profusion of poinsettias. As the Rev. Guyton remarked in his closing comments, it was a fitting place to celebrate Christmas.