In this Musical Moment, VocalEssence artistic director and founder Philip Brunelle shares insider information and beautiful music by the composer John Joubert.
John Joubert
1927-2019
Born in Cape Town in 1927, John Joubert’s compositional career stretched over 70 years. His schooling took place at an Anglican foundation run on the lines of an English public school. At school, Joubert started composing and was very fortunate to have been able to study composition with WH Bell, a distinguished English composer who had been the Principal of the South African College of Music and a pupil of Frederick Corder, the teacher of Bax, Bantock and Holbrooke. In 1946 he was awarded a scholarship by the Performing Right Society to the Royal Academy of Music. Here his principal teachers in composition were Theodore Holland and Howard Ferguson, as well as with Alan Bush. He was awarded both the Frederick Corder and Royal Philharmonic Society prizes for composition, and in 1991 he was awarded an honorary doctorate in music by Durham University. In addition to numerous smaller works, he composed the opera Jane Eyre, the full-length oratorio Wings of Faith, and An English Requiem for soloists, chorus and orchestra. His catalog includes over 180 opus numbers, ranging from operas, major orchestral works, concertos for oboe, bassoon, violin, cello and piano, chamber and instrumental music, as well as short carols and anthems and a series of major choral-orchestral pieces that place him at the forefront of composers of the generation after Britten and Tippett.
Suggested Choral Works:
- O Lorde, the Maker of al thing (Novello AP19)
- Coverdale’s Carol (Novello 707) https://www.sheetmusicplus.com/title/coverdale-s-carol-sheet-music/18933848?aff_id=672721
- Rorate Coeli (Novello 29-0619)
For more information about Joubert or his works, visit https://johnjoubert.org.uk/.