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The NCEM is delighted to be able to welcome back participants for Cuppa and a Chorus! Led by experienced community musician Chris Bartram, sessions will give you the chance to sing some of the songs you know and love and explore new ones from around the world. You don’t need to have sung before or consider yourself musical, just enjoy taking part and singing with other like-minded people.

Prior to the release of Kind of Blue, the best-selling jazz album of all time, Miles was busy in the studio, working with the same line-up of musicians: Cannonball Adderley, John Coltrane, Bill Evans, Wynton Kelly, Paul Chambers and Jimmy Cobb. In 1958, the year before Kind of Blue, the album called ’58 Miles was released and set the stage for the birth of world’s greatest jazz album of all time the following year. These albums defined the ground-breaking approach to the art of improvisation.

What began in 1995 as a ground-breaking union of musicians and instruments, has continued as a unique musical offering through one live album, four studio albums and countless outstanding performances. A new recording is due for release in early 2025. After 30 years Flook show no sign of letting-up in their brilliance, their dynamism, or their inventive flair.

Rossini’s Petite Messe Solennelle is neither small nor solemn but instead a fascinating late work from a composer who had stopped composing operas three decades previously. The ‘petite’ of its title does reflect the circumstances of its first performance in a Paris salon with two pianos and a small group of singers. Rossini, then in his late seventies, galvanised himself for one final and powerfully direct musical statement that is both optimistic and filled with faith and sincerity. Beneath its curious title lies a religious setting of the mass that mixes anxiety and seriousness with a sense of joy and musical bravado. As you would expect, the vocal writing is melodic, sometimes playful, and sometimes operatic, creating a work filled with drama and colour.