Living Voices: ten new choral works by Russell Hepplewhite setting contemporary poetic responses to our world today

I first came across Russell Hepplewhite‘s work in 2013 when English Touring Opera (ETO) performed the award-winning Laika the Spacedog. He went on to write more for ETO and for companies such as London Youth Opera, whilst Laika the Spacedog went on to have productions in Switzerland and at the Opera Comique in Paris. More recently, in February 2024 his first opera for adults, The Crash premiered in Oldenburg, Germany.

Now Hepplewhite has a new choral project, Living Voices; ten choral pieces each setting a contemporary poet commissioned to create poetic responses to our world today. The idea for Living Voices originated with Hepplewhite, who invited the poets to offer their diverse reflections on the nuances of modern life. The resulting poems explore a wide spectrum of human experience – birth and death, youth and age, sickness and health, landscape and memory. The emotional scope of the collection is equally varied, encompassing pieces that are light-hearted and comic alongside those that are profound and moving.

The choruses are being premiered around the country by selected choirs, beginning tomorrow in Devon when Exeter Festival Chorus performs Hepplewhite’s setting of Wendy Cope’s I Wake.

Full details of all performances from the Stainer & Bell website.