Art Nouveau Apéro
with the Goylants Chamber Choir conducted by Bas Groenewoud & wind ensemble Alta Capella Vianensis

Saturday, 31 March - Monastery church - 11am

‘Eens meienmorgens vroe’
‘Eens meienmorgens vroe’ is the first sentence of a song by Jan van Brabant, and the title of this concert on the very last day of May. For this occasion, the Goylants Chamber Choir has selected songs appropriate to spring, the time of budding greenery, and of budding love - sometimes with a melancholic touch. We travel back and forth through time in this programme, from the 16th century to the late 19th and back again. We close with four songs from the 20th century, including one by the Fleming Vic Nees. For his ‘Aloeette voghel klein’, he used a medieval roundel. This multicoloured range of a cappella songs is interspersed here and there with atmospheric music by the horns of Alta Capella Vianensis.

The Goylants Chamber Choir
In 1967, a ‘cantorij’ was formed in the Protestant church in Hilversum to encourage and support congregational singing. After the cantorij gradually became redundant, the group developed over time into a full-fledged chamber choir, with a broad repertoire of secular and church music. The Goylants Chamber Choir gives one or two concerts a year, and it is now tradition to perform a Ceremony of Lessons & Carols in the time before Christmas. The choir is a close-knit group of between 20 and 25 practised singers. For special projects - such as our musical visit to Mechelen, of which this concert is also a part - we seek additions from a pool of project singers.

On the website www.goylantskamerkoor.nl you will find some music clips from previous performances.

Conductor Bas Groenewoud
Since September 2023, Bas Groenewoud has been conducting the Goylants Chamber Choir. Bas was no stranger to the choir; for many years he was one of the two organists who regularly accompanied the choir. Bas studied organ at the Utrechts Conservatorium, where he graduated in 1997. He then followed that study in choral conducting at the Fontys Hogeschool in Tilburg and then at the Utrecht Conservatory. From 1991 to 2016, Bas was permanent organist of St Willibrord Church in Utrecht and from 2014 to 2020 he conducted the Willibrord Chamber Choir. From 1 January 2016, Bas was appointed conductor/organist of St John's Basilica in Laren. Since January 2023, he has been conductor of the concert choir of St John's Basilica, the St John's Schola.

Wind ensemble Alta Capella Vianensis
An ‘alta capella’ or ‘alta musica’ (Italian), ‘haute musique’ (French) or simply ‘alta’ was a type of wind orchestra that was common in cities all over continental Europe from the thirteenth to the eighteenth century. Usually, such an ‘alta’ consisted of shawms, slide trumpets and/or trombones. Alta Capella Vianensis is a young ensemble, founded in 2020 in Vianen. The core consists of a zinc player and 3 trombonists - alto, tenor and bass. It plays on (copies of) historical instruments. The ensemble focuses on music from the Renaissance and early Baroque period - about 1450 to 1650. But the ensemble also regularly plays in larger ensembles, then supplemented by strings, theorbo and organ, among others.