Celebration To Commemorate St Stephen’s Church

RIDGEFIELD — The St. Stephen’s Choir and a ten-piece orchestra will present a gala concert of choral and orchestral music honoring the 275th anniversary of St. Stephen’s Church on Sunday, May 21, at 4 pm. The concert is the final offering of the church’s 1999-2000 Sunday concert series. St. Stephen’s is at 351 Main Street (Route 35).

St. Stephen’s minister of music, Dr Kristin Sponheim, will lead the 26-voice choir and soloists in a performance of music by George Frederic Handel, Johann Sebastian Bach, Antonio Vivaldi, Ralph Vaughan Williams and Anton Bruckner. The featured work will be Handel’s Utrecht Te Deum, written in 1713, just 12 years before the founding of St. Stephen’s, to celebrate the Treaty of Utrecht.

Other works by Handel will include The Trumpet Shall Sound and the “Hallelujah Chorus,” from The Messiah.

The orchestra, composed of strings, trumpets, oboes, timpani and keyboard, will be featured in a performance of the “Hornpipe,” from Handel’s Water Music Suite and the haunting “Air” from Bach’s Orchestral Suite No. 3.

The program also includes Vaughan Williams’ The Hundredth Psalm Tune, a hymn of praise with an original tune dating back to the 16th Century. The choir will perform two a cappella compositions: Bruckner’s Locust Iste (“This Place”), written for the dedication of a church, and Rejoice in the Lord Always(anon.).

The concert is free, with donations invited. For additional information, call 203/438-3789.