Stornoway Singers will be back in the Town Hall on Saturday June 24 with a celebration of music from coronations through the ages.

Choir Director Peter Moger has put together an exciting programme and discovered some treasures and interesting facts along the way.

For example, “Who was the last British monarch to be crowned in both Scotland and England?”

The answer is Charles II, whose Scottish Coronation took place at Scone Palace on 1 January 1651, but whose English Coronation had to wait until 1660!

But what music was sung at these coronations?   Come along to our concert on 24 June and find out!

Music has played a vital part in the coronations of kings and queens for many centuries.  It has helped set the tone of the ceremony, as well as give musical expression to the Biblical words which lie at its heart.  Much coronation music was commissioned and composed specially for the occasion.

The group says: “Our summer programme in this coronation year will include works both grand and intimate: from Handel’s magnificent anthem Zadok the Priest to Vaughan Williams’ beautiful reverential setting of a single Psalm verse: ‘O taste and see.’

The choir have been put through their paces working on these pieces and are looking forward to sharing them with everyone – raising the roof with Zadok and giving chills and goosebumps with ‘O taste and see’.  

They will be singing a cappella as well as accompanied by our talented local musicians for the bigger pieces.