Christmas Music

We've put together some new Christmas repertoire ideas for your Christmas concerts.

Also visit our brand new Christmas Gift Pages - click here!

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To help give you a taste of the wide range of new material on offer we've created a free Christmas sampler booklet containing excerpts from the following works:

Jonathan Dove - Star Song, The Three Kings; Judith Bingham - A Winter Scene from A Cold Spell; Patric Standford - a Heavn'ly Song, This Day; Jonathan Rathbone - Corpus Christi, Carol Medley, O Come o Come Emmanuel, Jingle Bells; Roxanna Panufnik - Angels Sing, Sleep Little Jesus Sleep; Sandra Milliken - Dormi Jesu; Stephen McNeff - A Dickens Christmas

Christmas Truce, an oratorio by the composer Jonathan Rathbone and the writer Graeme Curry, explores one of the most remarkable and poignant stories of the war – the spontaneous ceasefire at the front line in France on Christmas Eve 1914.

Christmas Truce draws on the writing of the soldiers who were there – from details of the gifts they exchanged to accounts of joint burial services in no man's land. For more details and to view the score online - click here

Download the Christmas Choral Sampler, view an excerpt of Jonathan Dove's The Star Song (for Epiphany), and explore the vocal score of Jonathan Rathbone's new work - The Christmas Truce by clicking on the scores below.

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On-line scores provided by Peters Edition are designed for PERUSAL USE only

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Traditional Christmas festivities are inextricably linked with the works of one of England's greatest novelists - Charles Dickens. Tuneful, flexible and easily slotted into any christmas concert, these two Dickensian settings are a very useful addition to the Christmas repertoire.

Jonathan Rathbone:

Mr Fezziwig's Christmas Party

SATB Chorus, Baritone Solist, optional Children's Choir and small Orchestra
1. Let Christmas Cast its Spell 2. Hilli ho! 3. The Guests at the Ball 4. The Groaning Board 5. The Dance 6. A very, Very Small Matter 7. Finale

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Stephen McNeff: A Dickens Christmas

Baritone Solo, SATB Chorus and Orchestra
Texts by Charles Dickens, William Blake and others
1. All Hail to the Days 2. King of the Seasons 3. Christmas Far Away 4. Chorale (Little Lamb) 5. Catch (The Carnal & the Crane) 6. Finale (Mr Fezziwig’s Party)

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Jonathan Rathbone has orchestrated all the essential carols for your annual carol services with sumptious and innovative new arrangements for choir and flexible orchestral ensembles. Complete with many glorious new descant lines and deftly orchestrated to make the most of small ensembles, why not consider trying something new this year?

Click here to see the selection currently available

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Lighten up christmas proceedings with some of the best close harmony christmas arrangments from ex-swingle singers Jonathan Rathbone and Ben Parry.

Enjoy the great range of Swingle styles - from Ben's sizzling 8 part arrangement of Jingle Bells, to the poignant harmonies of Jonathan's simple take on Coventry Carol.
Recorded by the Swingle Singers on CD: The Story of Christmas

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Camille Saint-Saëns: Oratorio de Noel, Op.12 (NEW URTEXT EDITION)

This delightful work is finally establishing itself as a christmas repertoire favourite.

Available here for the first time in an impecably researched Urtext Edition by Edward Blakeman.
Soli: Sopr.Mez.Sop.Alto.Ten.Bar—Chorus—Harp—Org—Str

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Click here to browse the latest christmas publications from our contemporary composers - including Jonathan Dove, Judith Bingham, Sandra Milliken, Jonathan Rathbone, Patric Standford and others.

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Errollyn Wallen

Peace on Earth - Unison Voices

ERROLLYN WALLEN 'renaissance woman of contemporary British music' is as respected as a singer-songwriter of pop influenced songs as she is a composer of contemporary new music. Her choral output includes When the Wet Wind Sings for 40 voices, premièred by the Tallis Scholars in 2003 alongside Tallis’ 'Spem in Alium', the work that inspired it. A maritime theme can also be found in Errollyn Wallen’s choral commission from BBC Radio 3 – Our English Heart – a cantata to mark the 200th anniversary of Trafalgar Day and the death of Admiral Lord Nelson; the piece was first performed in Portsmouth Cathedral on 21 October 2005 by the joint forces of Catherine Bott (soprano), the male voices of the BBC Singers and the BBC Concert Orchestra conducted by Stephen Cleobury.  In 2008 a major new work for the Chorus and Orchestra of Welsh National Opera and local community groups was premiered in Cardiff.  'Carbon 12' is a 'choral symphony' depicting the history of Welsh Coalfields.  WNO toured the work in 2009 also. 

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