Announcing a new album of choral music by James Woodhall

The spring of 2024 will see the release of a new album of choral works by British composer James Woodhall.

The recording features Cantores Lucis, a chamber choir made up of superb singers many of whom are recent graduates of the Royal Academy of Music and Guildhall School of Music, as well as a good number of more established singers.  The programme centres around Woodhall’s major work ‘The Damascus Road’ – a 30-minute, 10-section work based on Biblical texts from Acts Chapter 9. The album also contains other sacred choral works by the composer, all of which are receiving their first commercial recording.  

The soloists for The Damascus Road are Hugh Legg as Jesus and William Houghton as Saul. Hugh is an opera singer originally from Cape Town, South Africa but who has lived in the UK since 1984 and who has enjoyed a varied career in productions including the title roles in Britten’s ‘Albert Herring’ and Offenbach’s ‘Orpheus in the Underworld’. In 2012, Hugh stepped in at two days’ notice to the role of Don José in Carmen for Palace Opera. Will Houghton is a Lay Clerk at St. Albans Cathedral and has sung on broadcasts on Radio 3 and BBC 1 and on many recordings including the solo ‘Salvum fac populum tuum’ on the choir’s recent recording of Bruckner motets which was Gramophone’s ‘Editor’s Choice’. 

James Woodhall writes music in a variety of styles and genres ranging from new musicals which have been staged at the Stables Theatre, Milton Keynes and the Wycombe Swan, to music for the Cold Light Ensemble; his Jazz Trio fused with String Quartet has played at St John Smith’s Square and the legendary PizzaExpress Jazz Club in Soho. His first love, however, is choral music hence the production of this new set of sacred works which includes a joyful Jubilate Deo and a lullaby-like Ave Maria.

Album details:

Label:  Divine Art

Title: The Damascus Road and other choral works

Catalogue number:  DDX 21127

Artists: Cantores Lucis

Composer: James Woodhall

Works:

• Jubilate Deo (Psalm 100)
• Ave Maria
• The Damascus Road
• Canterbury Canticles
• Three Psalms