Drawing upon sources in the Library of Congress the repertoire for this programme comes from a remarkable series published in Boston during the 1860s. It is well known that during the nineteenth century the dissemination of much music was thanks to wind and brass ensembles performing transcriptions and arrangements of new works to ever greater audiences. Vocal works by Felix and Fanny Mendelssohn and many other German composers featured heavily in John F. Stratton’s serial publication of works for small brass ensembles of cornets and saxhorns, instruments noted for their similarity in sweetness of timbre to the human voice. The choral nature of this programme is further amplified by its setting in a building described by Pevsner as “Victorian cathedral of ironwork”.

This concert has been made possible thanks to the generous support of the Continuo Foundation.