Make We Merry

for SSAA and organ, and optional brass ensemble and timpani Commissioned by Benenden School, Make We Merry is an eight-movement piece which sets texts from the 15th to 19th centuries to a variety of choral textures with a highly characterful accompaniment. A vast array of sentiments is depicted, from quiet expectance and gentle wonder to boisterous jubilation, and the different movements provide a wonderfully paced journey through these moods. The final movement brings back motifs from the opening and grows to a thrillingly climactic ending to this exciting Christmas concert work.

About the Author :
David Bednall is one of the leading choral composers of his generation. He has an extensive freelance playing and conducting career, and is Organist of The University of Bristol, Sub-organist at Bristol Cathedral, and conducts The University Singers. He won prizes in Improvisation and Performance at the examination for FRCO, and has improvised on live radio, and performed extensively in the UK and abroad. He appeared as stunt-organist on 'Dr Who. He is most prominent as a composer, and recordings of his works have been extremely well received. A number of his works have been broadcast on radio, and he has been commissioned by St Paul's Cathedral, and The Queen's College, Oxford. His 40-part motet Lux orta est iusto closed the Bristol Proms 2015 and December 2018 saw the premiere of Make We Merry for upper voices, brass, and organ, commissioned by Benenden and the recording of this has been released on Regent Records.

Review :
David Bednall's Make We Merry in particular . . . well projects the tender and comforting emotions brought on by Christmas. It's scored for organ, brass, percussion and choir, and laid-out over eight movements based on highly evocative poetry by Tennyson, Chesterton, Hopkins, etc ... The movement I constantly gravitate to is titled 'The time draws near' which speaks of a troubled soul contemplating death who, upon hearing the Christmas bells heralding the birth of Christ, feels his sorrow touched with joy. It's written in such a way that every time the bells are mentioned, the music swells and brightens. And the balance of brass, organ and voices couldn't be better. Bednall has composed an upper-voice carol-sequence that manages not to make you miss the tenors and basses, but rather to enjoy the tinselled timbre of the sopranos and altos. The sixth movement, 'Sweet was the song' . . . is an obvious stand-alone movement [available separately from OUP]. More than that, apart from being a very pleasing ballad, it is primarily a unison song. At the other end of the scale of difficulty, the movement that follows is for four unaccompanied voices and is a compelling setting of Robert Herrick's poem 'The New Year's Gift' . . . I've long admired Bednall's fast music - not that he doesn't write good slow music; he really does. But there's a lot of quite slow choral music doing the rounds these days, and when somebody is able to write quick music for choirs, it's worth pouncing on . . . The final movement does what it should and will bring any sensible audience to its feet .