Choir & Organ

Choir & Organ shines a global spotlight on two distinctive fields of creativity, celebrating inventiveness and excellence in all their forms. We aim to inspire our readers through giving a platform to conductors, organists, composers, and choirs of every kind; and showcasing the imaginative craft of pipe organ building across the centuries, critiquing new organs and tackling ethics in restoring historic instruments.

Specialist writers appraise new editions and recordings of standard repertoire and works fresh from the composer's pen, while our news and previews chart the latest developments in a changing world and present opportunities to become involved. Choir & Organ is an invitation to engage with two unique areas of music – to explore the new, and look again at the familiar.

The Winter issue of Choir & Organ has a particular focus on music for Advent and Christmas, looking across new festive releases, upcoming events and world premieres.

For our cover story, the Editor travelled to New York City to meet with Jeremy Filsell, Director of Music at Saint Thomas Church Fifth Avenue in the middle of a turbulent time for the choir, facing the potential closure of its choir school. They speak about Christmas in the city, exploring new repertoire and the significance of the choral legacy at Saint Thomas.

Elsewhere, Frank Martin’s choral music is surveyed, as 2024 marks 50 years since his death, Jeremy Summerly looks at the history of the Oxford Book of Carols and the impact on those carols today and Leah Broad introduces the work of 20th century composer Elizabeth Maconchy.

In the organ pages, Matthew Power visits a new instrument by Nicholson & Co based on pipework by T C Lewis in South London and Jonathan Ambrosino hears from the young new president and tonal director of California organ builder Schoenstein & Co. Paul Hale also heads to the workshops of Mander Organ Builders, near Canterbury, where a variety of projects add to Britain’s organ-building heritage.

We also hear from a former chorister about the joys and trials of chorister education in the back-page feature and explore Prague’s choral scene, which explodes with vibrancy at Christmastime.