One of the country's most electrifying vocal projects and Müpa Budapest's current Ensemble of the Season, the Cantemus Choir will at this concert be performing purely religious work under the direction of Dénes Szabó, who founded it four decades ago, and his son, Soma Szabó. The programme is compiled from two eras - the Classical Viennese and the present - and three geographic areas: Mozart was, of course, Austrian, while 43-year-old Levente Gyöngyösi, although he has lived in Hungary for decades, was born in Kolozsvár (Cluj-Napoca). At the age of 73, John Rutter is the pride of Britain's musical culture.
Mozart's composition - Vesperae solennes de confessore - is a vespers or evening prayer of praise. The composer wrote the uniquely beautiful six-movement work in 1779, when he was 23 and nearing the end of his service in Salzburg. The works by Levente Gyöngyösi and John Rutter are related in that both composers are aiming for simplicity and ease of understanding. In te Domine speravi is the part of the 70th Psalm that sings of hope in God. Familiar from the mass cycle and its many sung versions, no Christian text has been set to music as frequently. Rutter's work, The Mass of the Children, also fits the concert programme because the composer wrote it for several choirs of different configurations. Rutter also embellished the Latin text of the non-liturgical mass with settings of English poems.

The concert will be preceded from 6.30 pm by a conversation entitled Prelude, where ticket holders will be invited to get to know the performing musician and the works to be performed more closely.

Presented by: Müpa Budapest