Performance on 3 - King's Easter Festival - Fri, 10th April 2009 - Part 1

Presented by Petroc Trelawny. From the chapel of King's College, Cambridge, Stephen Cleobury conducts the BBC Singers in a special concert for Good Friday. This most solemn day of the church year is marked with Poulenc's four motets for penitential seasons, composed on the eve of the Second World War, followed by three dances for solo organ, depicting life's joys, sadnesses and struggles, by the young organ virtuoso Jehan Alain, who was killed in action in 1940. There is also the first performance of a new work by Judith Bingham which explores ideas about betrayal and loyalty to the faith, placing Biblical texts alongside words by the Elizabethan diplomat, explorer and spy-master Sir Francis Walsingham - a former student at King's College. Guy Johnston (cello) Daniel Hyde (organ) BBC Singers Stephen Cleobury (conductor) Francis Poulenc: Quatre motets pour un temps de penitence Jehan Alain: Trois danses Judith Bingham: See and keep silent (BBC commission; world premiere).