Francis Pott

• Biography

  

  Francis Pott [b.1957] began his musical life as a chorister at New College, Oxford. He was a Music Scholar first at Winchester and then at Magdalene College, Cambridge, where he studied composition with Robin Holloway and Hugh Wood while also pursuing piano studies with Hamish Milne in London. From 1992 to 2001 he was John Bennett Lecturer in Music at St Hilda's College, Oxford, and also a member of the Choir of Winchester Cathedral under Dr David Hill. In 2001 he became Head of Composition at London College of Music, Thames Valley University, later heading Research Development across its Faculty of Arts on and in 2007 being appointed to the University's first Chair of Composition. He also holds a Ph.D. In frequent demand as a pianist and accompanist, Francis Pott has received many national awards as a composer and in 1997 gained First Prize in the second S.S.Prokofiev International Composing Competition in Moscow. In 1999 his choral and orchestral oratorio A Song on the End of the World was the nationally acclaimed Elgar commission of the Three Choirs Festival in Worcester. His works have been heard in over twenty countries worldwide, broadcast in Canada, the USA and the Irish and Czech Republics, issued extensively on CD and published by four major houses in the UK. Francis Pott lives with his wife and two children just outside Winchester.

  Balulalow
  The words of Balulalow have been appropriated by numerous composers, including Benjamin Britten and Peter Warlock, and are a translation into Scottish dialect of the great Lutheran Christmas hymn Von Himmel hoch. The result is a tender cradle song from the Virgin Mary to the infant Jesus.

  More like this: Kenneth Leighton - Lully, lulla thou little tiny child, Coventry Carol
  A lone soprano voice rising over a choir: the treble solo is a prominent feature of much Christmas music, most famously the solo verse which begins "Once in Royal David's City". In Leighton's haunting setting of the Coventry Carol the soloist weeps over the choir, who rise up for the central section.

• More Carols

  • David Briggs - Adam lay y-bounden
  • Carl Rütti- O patre unigenitas
  • Hermione Roff - The Virgin's Song
  • Andrew Simpson - I saw three ships
  • arr Malcolm Archer - Angels from the realms of glory
  • Sir Richard Rodney Bennett - The Holly and the Ivy
  • Sir John Tavener - Cradle Song
  • arr Sir David Willcocks - I saw three ships
  • arr Bob Chilcott - Sussex Carol
  • Richard Lloyd - St Joseph's Carol
  • Alexander Campkin - Sleep, holy babe
  • Bernard Hughes - I am Christmas
  • Peter Cornelius - The Three Kings
  • Kristina Arakleyan - New Year!