Bishopwearmouth Choral Society have been rehearsing a shortened version of Handel’s Messiah since September 2021 when choirs were allowed to sing again, properly distanced in a well-ventilated space. Unfortunately Sunderland Minster is not large enough to accommodate an audience as well as the choir, musicians, and soloists so our performance on Saturday December 4^th 2021 was only available to see and hear via an online streaming available on the Minster’s YouTube channel for a short period.

A small orchestra took part with two soloists, Anna Dias – soprano and Sophie Horrocks – mezzo soprano, all conducted by David Murray.      

To mark all of the effort which has been put into rehearsing Handel’s ‘Messiah’ there will be a performance for choir members only on Saturday 4th December 2021. Unfortunately Covid precautions do not allow us to offer this as a public concert, but in all other respects we are treating as a performance with musicians, soloists and in full black concert dress.

There will be a rehearsal, as there would be for a concert, on Friday 3rd December.

The rehearsal schedule on the Saturday afternoon will be :-

2.00 to 2.30 p.m. Orchestra and soloist rehearsal.

2.30 p.m. Choir arrive and are seated. It is expected that the afternoon rehearsal will end at or before 4.30 p.m.

Evening Performance to start at 7.30 p.m.

A fully detailed schedule of times and chorus content will be provided to choir members.