SouthseaScene

Development funding of £32,100 has been awarded by the Heritage Lottery Fund to help St Mary’s Church progress its plans to apply for a full National Lottery grant in 2019. Come along for a glass of wine, a chat about The Organ Project and a tour of the Walker organ at  St Mary’s Church , Fratton Road, Portsmouth, PO1 5PA on Thursday 10 January 2019 from 1930 to 2130. The event is free with a retiring collection in aid of  The Organ Project . The Organ Project celebrates the heritage associated with 125 years of music making in St Mary’s Church, Portsea. The unique 1889 Walker pipe organ is at the heart of life within the Parish, but is now in a critical condition where interim repairs are no longer sufficient to keep the nationally significant instrument from being lost. The project will engage with local communities, develop volunteer skills and enthuse visitors with an exciting activity and education programme, interpret the organ’s history, science, sound and functi...

The award-winning University of Portsmouth Choir will be singing the Chichester Psalms to celebrate 100 years since Leonard Bernstein’s birth. The Choir, who recently scooped the Best Classical award at The News Guide Awards for their performance of The Messiah in March last year, will pay tribute to the legendary composer with a rendition of one of his greatest works. The concert, which takes place in St Mary’s Church, Fratton on Saturday 17th March at 7:30pm, will also feature Janacek’s Otcenas in its original Czech and Karl Jenkins’ The Armed Man as the Choir sings an exciting array of choral repertoire. Choir conductor, Dr George Burrows, says the four psalm texts of the Chichester Psalms, which is sung in Hebrew is “at once modernistic, powerful, dance-like, melodic and beautiful.” Comparatively Janacek’s setting of the Lord’s Prayer Otcenas is just as distinctive and modern but was written some 60 years before Bernstein’s work and the musical language is more sparse and mo...