On December 6, 2024, King's College, Cambridge announced that it had commissioned composer Grayston Ives for the 2024 new carol to be performed at its Festival of Nine Lessons and Carols. The new carol will be performed at the festival on December 24, 2024.
Here at the Christmas Carols Blog, we've long followed Grayston Ives for many years, and his selection is well deserved.
Grayston is a composer, choral director, former member of the King's Singers, and alumnus of Cambridge University.
Ives was a chorister at Ely Cathedral before studying music at Cambridge. There he took lessons in composition from Richard Rodney Bennett. After his studies, he sang as a chorister at Guildford Cathedral and later joined the King's Singers. With the King Singers he participated in many recordings and performances.
Ives directed the choir of Magdalen College, Oxford for eighteen years. The choir was nominated for a Grammy for an album that focused on Orlando Gibbons. The choir also premiered Paul McCartney's Ecce Cor Meum.
His musical publications are many and his arrangements and composition are performed widely.
Grayston's carol is "Three Points of Light" with words by Peter Cairns. It is published by: Carus-Verlag, Stuttgart.
Here are a few of Ives' Christmas works:
Sweet was the Song
"This is the Record of John"
"A Child is Born in Bethlehem"
"O Little Town of Bethlehem" (St. Louis, Arr. G. Ives)
"Nova, nova: Ave fit ex Eva!"
Published by: Oxford University Press
"Let all the world"
"Susanni"
"Little Road to Bethlehem" (arr. G. Ives)
For SSAA and piano
(1998)
For SSS and piano
Commissioned by the Farnham Festival
For unaccompanied SATB with divisions
"Silent Night"
For SATB and string orchestra
Phillip Brunnelle also did a "Musical Moment" episode on Ives:
Ives' professional website can be found at:
which includes a list and discography of his works.
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