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JOHNSTONE – Christmas Carols Concertante – STRING ORCHESTRA

Other Identification:
The Christmas Carols Concertante was written in 2005 as the result of a request from the British conductor Caroline Collier for a special Christmas work. There were three over-riding ideas in my discussions with her: firstly, not to produce merely a succession, or potpourri, of Christmas melodies strung together that one can already amply find in orchestral repertoire but to create a more subtle interaction of themes whilst not losing that ‘Christmas’ touch; secondly, a modern vibrant work with touches of real jazz present; and thirdly, a work for string orchestra where all the sections (double bass included!) have prominent moments and where the string principals also have ‘soloist’ moments – hence the inclusion of ‘Concertante’ in the work’s title.
The result is the ‘Christmas Carols Concertante’, a work lasting well over ten minutes, and which is one of those ‘cross-over’ compositions which can be programmed both on ‘serious’ and ‘lighter’ programmes. A lot of the writing, indeed the normal here, is to be played in jazz swing = inegal, except where stated “in exact time”.
Duration: about 12 mins

Movements or sections:
Potpourri as a concert work

Instrumentation:
FULL STRING ORCHESTRA (with solos for the section principals)
….
3 PDFs
1] – General Score
2] – Upper strings
3] – Lower Strings

Approximate difficulty:
Difficult

Links (Audio – Visual), and known performances given by:
The world premiere was in 2005 (Christmas!) in a concert promoted by the Town Hall of Pamplona (Spain), featuring the professional chamber orchestra ‘Camerata Cambrensis’, conducted by Caroline Collier. In the following years it has become much more well-known in the north of Spain, receiving performances in Navarre, the Basque Country and in Aragon.

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Personal

David Johnstone lives near Pamplona (Navarre, Spain) with his wife Rosa and their two “Spanglish” children, close to the Atlantic Pyrenees. The nearest international airport is Bilbao.

He is interested in world affairs, politics, animal rights, and most sports (including being a lifelong suffering Reading FC fan!). Also passionate about Celtic culture and genealogy, he has traced his ‘English’ family back to 1280, although Scotland and Ireland have also shaped his background. And yes — he is half-ashamed to admit it, he loves silly jokes!

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David Johnstone supports animal rights, he is against any form of abuse towards them, and says a loud “NO” to bullfighting, foxhunting and any other animal cruelty.

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