NEWS & FEATURES

John Nightingale and the SLS

An appreciation of John Nightingale, outgoing Director of the South London Singers, and his work with the choir appeared in the programme for his last concert, which took place on Saturday 4 May 2013 at Beckenham Methodist Church. We reprint part of it here with a few editorial amendments.

John Nightingale has conducted the SLS for 25 of Its 31 years of existence and it is probably fair to say that prior to 1988 his conducting experience had been limited to annual carol concerts with the Beckenham Chorale. He was an experienced accompanist and indeed fulfilled that role for a couple of years for the SLS before applying for the post of Director following the retirement of the Founder Conductor Derek Williams and the transfer to the north-west of England of his interim successor Ian Garden. John's conductorship has developed along with the flowering of the South London Singers as an established Chamber Choir in the Beckenham area.

Some forty professional vocal soloists have been engaged In that time but none more frequently than Julian Empett who is giving his sixteenth performance with the SLS tonight There are too many others to mention by name but several have gone on to make a reputation for themselves on the national and international scene.

Ten different organists have accompanied the 92 SLS concerts conducted by John. The first was Jane Watts who went on to become very well known. Tony Baidwin played for 38 concerts and our current accompanist David Thorne has played for 16. David had hoped to be playing tonight but has recently undergone (successful) heart surgery and isn’t quite fit enough to take part so we are very grateful to his friend Paul Isom for filling in at relatively short notice. Interestingly Paul was a pupil at Hayes School when the SLS Founder Conductor Derek Williams was Director of Music there!

Some of John's concerts have been on a grander scale, and he has developed into an accomplished conductor of small and larger orchestral ensembles as well. His association with the Hammig String Quartet has enhanced several of our concerts and on occasions we have also been joined by extra school choirs where the programme demanded. It is also worth noting that a few of our concerts have benefited from John's expertise as a musical editor and musicologist, in that during performances of a number of works by members of the Wesley family, we have sung from scholarly editions prepared by him. In addition, the choir is delighted to observe that, following the publication of John's "Catalogue of Compositions by Charles Wesley the Younger", these works now carry JN numbers!

We thank John for all that he has done for the choir in the last 25 years and wish him all the best in his retirement, although we shall be very surprised if he doesn't make further appearances on the local music scene.

If anyone would like to add a reminiscence of John to this short article, please send an email to the SLS.

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