Indian Hill Cello Quartet Recital & Choral Evensong, May 6

The Indian Hill Cello Quartet presents a half-hour recital on Sunday, May 6 at 5 PM, followed by Choral Evensong sung by the Parish Choir (Robert Barney, director) of Trinity Episcopal Church. This takes place in Trinity's serene main sanctuary at 81 Elm Street in Concord. The event is FREE and open to all.

The Indian Hill Cello Quartet -- Cynthia Forbes, director, Jennifer Beal Cole, Julian Cole and Eric Benedict -- will perform works of Beethoven, Mendelssohn, Vaughan Williams, Reynaldo Hahn and Peter Maxwell Davies.

Following the Quartet's recital, Trinity's Parish Choir sings Choral Evensong featuring Stanford's "Magnificat" and "Nunc dimittis" in B-flat, Radcliffe's "Responses", Edwards' setting of Psalm 34, and Mendelssohn's "Verleih uns Frieden".

The Indian Hill Cello Quartet's members all have a connection to Concord. Cynthia Forbes, director and faculty member at Indian Hill Music School in Littleton, is a graduate of Concord Academy. Ms Forbes is a freelance contributor to Boston’s musical offerings including the Indian Hill Cello Ensemble, as well as a teacher who has guided hundreds of students toward musical beauty and peace.

Jennifer Beal Cole grew up singing in the parish choir of Trinity Episcopal Church in Concord and went on to Concord Academy where she continued many musical studies. Now an Episcopal priest, she serves St. John’s in Sharon.

Julian Cole began his musical studies as a pre-schooler on the lap of his recorder-playing father at about the same time he learned to read words. Julian has owned his 200-year-old Mittenwald cello for over 60 years, having acquired it from a local cellist who had it for some 40 years - only two owners in a century is unusual for an instrument. Julian was active in early music for several decades, learning, performing, and teaching viol and recorder; he has recently returned to his true love, the cello. Julian, a mathematician, is retired from software programming.

Eric Benedict is the Quartet's first cellist, and also arranges much of the Quartet's repertoire. Eric grew up in an artistic household of cellists, dancers, and singers Kalamazoo, MI. He studied cello and voice through college, and sang as a Tanglewood Music Center Fellow among other things. On returning to the cello, he took to arranging tenor repertoire for our multiple cello ensemble. Eric represents Cambrooke Therapeutics in Ayer, which provides specialized nutrition.

Eric, Julian, and Jennifer are next-door neighbors on Wedgewood Common in West Concord. One should always ask one’s neighbor if he plays the cello!

The Service of Choral Evensong is a dialogue that has been given life by singers and composers since 1549, when Archbishop Thomas Cranmer organized our liturgies into The Book Of Common Prayer. As the beauty of this experience has continued for centuries, it has fostered the creation of an immense body of music written solely for this service. A first-time participant may feel as if he or she has joined in a conversation already begun, but eventually the wash of music and liturgy carries one into a new sense of God’s presence in the rhythm of daily life. Choral Evensong is sung daily in many cathedrals and parish churches in England and throughout the Anglican Communion. Consider the possibility that at any given moment, somewhere on the earth, someone is offering up a voice of sung prayer as this miraculous conversation continues between the Creator and the created.