The Waiting Sky Anna Lapwood

• Kerensa Briggs (b. 1991): Seek Ye First the Kingdom of God:
• 1 Briggs: Seek Ye First the Kingdom of God 03:40
• James McCarthy (b. 1979): Peaceful Was the Night:
• 2 McCarthy: Peaceful Was the Night 03:31
• Owain Park (b. 1993): Cradle Lullaby:
• 3 Park: Cradle Lullaby 03:24
• Anna Lapwood (b. 1995), The Pembroke College Girls' Choir: Winter Time:
• 4 Lapwood, Choir: Winter Time 03:04
• Josef Rheinberger (1839 - 1901): Abendlied:
• 5 Rheinberger: Abendlied 02:37
• Anna Lapwood, The Pembroke College Girls' Choir: The Waiting Sky:
• 6 Lapwood, Choir: The Waiting Sky 02:46
• Total Runtime 19:02

Info for The Waiting Sky

Anna Lapwood releases her new album ‘The Waiting Sky’, along with the Pembroke College Girls’ Choir. She says:

“One of the things I love most about working with the Girl Choristers at Pembroke is that they are constantly surprising me with what we’re capable of, always encouraging me to keep pushingthem further. I remember when the choir first started, most of our repertoire was in 2 parts – very occasionally we would break into 3 parts, but those pieces were always seen as real challenges at the time. A couple of years later we had started singing music in 4 parts, and had settled into a nice routine of regular repertoire. One of the older girls then came to me and said she would really appreciate it if they could add a whole load of completely new music to our repertoire - music that stretched them further. I spent a couple of days diving into as much upper voices repertoire as I could, and tentatively started working with them on some more complex pieces, which they just ate up! Singing in 6-8 parts has become one of our favourite things; we stand in a circle, I sing with them instead of conducting, and we make music together. Initially I was worried the younger choristers would struggle to keep up, but I’ve found time and time again they have simply risen to the challenge.

The music on this recording traces this journey, ranging from Owain Park’s simple but beautiful ‘Cradle Lullaby’ through to Kerensa Briggs 7 part ‘Seek ye, first, the kingdom of God’. Nadezhda Averina’s arrangement of Rheinberger’s ‘Abendlied’ allows them to experience one of the great staples of the choral repertoire, while James McCarthy’s ‘Peaceful was the night’ provides an opportunity to delve into musical storytelling.

Winter Time & The Waiting Sky were both written by the girl choristers; we have a tradition where the last rehearsal of each term is spent composing a new piece as a group which we then sing to the parents. Winter Time was written a couple of years ago; whenever a chorister sang a solo it was because that was a bit they had written, and it was lovely to give those choristers the chance to record these solos for this EP. The Waiting Sky was written over the course of two rehearsals last year. They had just heard the Chapel Choir sing Roderick Williams’ setting of ‘O Adonai’, and it clearly made an impact on them as they drew on many of the features of Roderick’s music in their own writing, from the quasi-improvisational imitative writing to the melodic fragment sung by the angels. In this case, it was two of our youngest choristers who were so drawn to the melodic fragment, so they sang these as little solos representing ‘the shining star’.

There have been so many points over the past couple of years where the choristers and I have been chatting and one of them will say ‘can you imagine us doing this 4 years ago’?! I think this EP is all about capturing that sense of achievement, progression, and joy that comes from making music together as a group, growing together and constantly breaking through our own perceptions of what we can achieve.”

The Pembroke College Girls' Choir
Anna Lapwood, organ, direction

Anna Lapwood
is an organist, conductor, and broadcaster, and holds the position of Director of Music at Pembroke College, Cambridge.

While studying at Oxford University, Anna was the first female in Magdalen College’s 560-year history to be awarded the Organ Scholarship. Now performing multiple recitals each season, Anna released her debut solo album in September 2021 on Signum Records. The album, “Images”, features her transcription of Britten’s ‘Four Sea Interludes’ from “Peter Grimes”.

Performances have taken her across Europe on recital tours and in 2019 Anna opened the BAFTA TV awards on the organ of the Royal Festival Hall. Recent concerts include an organ recital from St David's Hall, Cardiff (broadcast on BBC Radio 3); a live audio stream from Leeds Town Hall and a webcast performance of Poulenc’s ‘Organ Concerto’ with the London Chamber Orchestra, conducted by Chloé van Soeterstède from St. John’s, Smith Square (London). In September 2021 she makes her BBC Proms debut at as soloist in Saint-Saëns ‘Organ Symphony’ with the Hallé Orchestra conducted by Sir Mark Elder, repeating the Saint-Saëns later that month with conductor Kazuki Yamada and the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra.

Anna made her TV presenting debut in 2020/21 hosting coverage of BBC Young Musician, followed by presenting a televised Prom in September 2021. As a radio broadcaster she is a regular contributor to BBC Radio 3 and Radio 4, and until July 2020 she hosted a live, weekly classical music show on Radio Cambridgeshire. She has also been featured on Classic FM and presented for Scala Radio.

Appointed Director of Music at Pembroke College at Cambridge University in 2016 aged just 21, Anna conducts the Chapel Choir and Girls' Choir. Their debut recording – “All Things are Quite Silent” - was released in 2020 to widespread critical acclaim, praised for their clarity, blend and beauty of sound. Anna’s passion to support girls and women is evident in almost every aspect of her work, especially at Pembroke. In 2018 she established the Pembroke College Girls’ Choir for girls aged 11 to 18 to inspire them to explore the world of choral music. They appeared as guest artists on “To Shiver the Sky” by American composer, Christopher Tin, for Decca US, recording at Abbey Road Studios. Anna also runs the Cambridge Organ Experience for Girls and was appointed a Bye-Fellow of Pembroke College in January 2020.

​Increasingly in demand as a guest conductor, she has also directed the BBC Singers as part of the Proms Inspire programme and has led choral workshops around the world. A strong advocate for music education at home and abroad, she specialises in bringing music to children from impoverished backgrounds. As a Trustee of the Muze Trust, a charity committed to making music accessible to children and young adults in Zambia, Anna works in Zambia regularly and leads the Muze-Pembroke Music Exchange Programme. When the Covid-19 Pandemic put a stop to much of Anna's work in this area overseas she focussed her efforts closer to home, founding and conducting the NHS Chorus-19, made up of over 1000 NHS staff from across the UK. ​

Having spent some years being encouraged to “play like a man” and with a dedication to her art and mission that belied her years, Anna is now humbled to find that she is an inspiration to many young women and proud that they have adopted her hashtag, #playlikeagirl.

This album contains no booklet.