Nobody thought that King Charles would sit back and let someone else choose all the music for his big day. The list of 12 composers he has commissioned to write new pieces – chosen himself, we are told – does indeed bear a personal stamp. Nor will anyone be surprised that he has played things safe, leaning on composers who have written for royal occasions before, and with the central new anthem assigned to Andrew Lloyd Webber.
What those choices do suggest is that he understands the importance of representation. For one thing, nearly half the composers who have written new music for Saturday’s service are women – contrast this with his mother’s coronation in 1953, when all the commissions went to men. That’s quite a sea change in itself, one that you could argue was put in motion by the royal appointment nearly a decade ago of Judith Weir, now the Master of the King’s Music. Weir’s short overture Brighter Visions Shine Afar aims, she says, to set a tone of optimism and renewal – which is about as much as she or anyone else involved has been allowed to reveal in advance. We also know that this will be the first of presumably many moments spotlighting the horns of the Coronation Orchestra – expect the brass section to be working hard for the conductor Antonio Pappano.
Despite her title, the often understated Weir is not the first composer you would think of for straightforward ceremonials, so the overture should be a good fit, rather than, say, the Coronation March. That has been assigned to Patrick Doyle, composer of film scores including Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire as well as almost anything you’ve seen involving Kenneth Branagh, from Henry V to Thor. Nor is Weir necessarily the royal favourite: in fact, you could argue that the Windsor house composer is Debbie Wiseman, who has written music for every recent royal event you can think of, as well as for the BBC coverage of the Queen’s funeral. Wiseman has a huge catalogue of TV and film music; perhaps for her two-part Alleluia, in which Andrew Nethsingha will conduct first the expanded Westminster Abbey Choir and then the gospel voices of the Ascension Choir, she’ll have taken inspiration from her score for the TV adaptation of Wolf Hall (rather than, say, her award-nominated music for the 2009 comedy film Lesbian Vampire Killers).
The inclusion of Sarah Class – whose Sacred Fire will be sung by the starry South African soprano Pretty Yende – could be seen as a nod towards an ongoing commitment to environmental issues; Class wrote music for the launch of the King’s Terra Carta Initiative at Cop26, and her music can be heard behind David Attenborough’s voice on several nature documentaries. Expect something contemplative – unlike Iain Farrington’s organ piece, which draws on traditional tunes from around the commonwealth and which its composer promises will be “joyful, jazzy and dance-like”.
The Irish traditional hymn tune Slane is the basis for Be Though My Vision – Triptych for Orchestra, split between three composers. First up will be Nigel Hess, whose work you’ll have heard if you turned on a TV at any point in the 1990s and whose piano concerto in memory of the Queen Mother has been recorded by Lang Lang. The second panel – including a musical cryptogram of the King’s name – is by Roderick Williams, one of the UK’s leading operatic baritones; he’ll be singing in the service, too. Rounding off the trio is Shirley J Thompson, whose wide-ranging credits include music for Sylvie Guillem’s revered ballet Push and the official anthem for the 2022 Women’s Euros (it wasn’t Sweet Caroline).
That leaves the three composers commissioned to write movements of the Latin Mass – these may provide some of the most intriguing music of the day. Paul Mealor made his name when his music was sung at William and Kate’s wedding; his Kyrie will be the first Welsh-language performance at a coronation. Roxanna Panufnik promises “flamboyantly colourful harmonies” in her Sanctus. The daughter of a Polish refugee (himself a composer), Panufnik is a prolific writer of choral church music, one who has recently used it to explore interfaith ideas – which will have chimed with Charles, Defender of the Faith. Finally there is Tarik O’Regan, born in Croydon and now based in San Francisco, whose setting of the Agnus Dei has, he says, been informed by his Arab and Irish heritage.
Amid this we’ll also hear music by William Byrd and Thomas Weelkes, marking their 400th anniversaries, and of course Handel’s Zadok the Priest, written for the coronation of George II and heard on every such occasion since. New music may be vital but some traditions are sacrosanct.
