Preview: Memorial Concert for Thomas G Duncan

Holy Trinity Church, St Andrews. Sunday 3rd November 2024 at 7.30pm.

Remembering Tom Duncan

‘Remembering Tom Duncan’ will be a fantastic concert in Holy Trinity Church in St Andrews at 7.30pm on Sunday 3rd November 2024 (free with retiring collection). Thomas Gibson Duncan, who died last year at the age of 86, was a towering figure in St Andrews over the last 60 years, a senior lecturer in the English Department of the university since 1962, specialising in mediaeval literature and Anglo-Saxon, organist of Holy Trinity Church and the St Andrews Renaissance Group, and charismatic conductor of the Holy Trinity Augmented Choir, which later morphed into the St Andrews Chorus. This choir, open to students, staff and townspeople, brought the whole town together in a way that few other institutions could do. I joined in my first undergraduate year in the autumn of 1973, and was soon singing solos, starting with Handel’s Messiah, which became an annual ritual in December each year. I returned many times once I had become a professional singer to sing in such great works as Bach’s Mass in B Minor, several Haydn masses, Brahms Requiem, Beethoven’s Missa Solemnis and Mozart’s Requiem, all conducted with flair and elan by Tom, a brilliant choir trainer and inspirer.

This concert, put together and conducted by Gillian Craig, will feature many works that were dear to Tom and will also feature several singers who worked with him over the years. Gillian and I met on our first day at St Andrews in autumn 1973 and have been good friends ever since. She chose to stay in the town and make her life there, as a clarinettist, teacher, choir trainer and conductor. She founded the Heisenberg Ensemble in 1988, and the orchestra has been a fixture of musical life ever since. With Gillian conducting, I have returned many times to sing with the orchestra, notably a Verdi Requiem, with a star-studded solo quartet including the fabulous Judith Howarth.

For this concert, lots of St Andrews’ alumni are assembling from all over to sing in the chorus, sing solos and play with the orchestra. There will be some Orlando Gibbons and some Palestrina, a movement from a Brandenburg Concerto by Bach, with a solo by Tom’s daughter Julie, among others, and the Quoniam and Cum Sancto Spiritu from Bach’s B Minor Mass, with Ben McAteer as bass soloist, a St Andrews graduate who will be singing baritone in ‘Carmina Burana’ this season with the RSNO. I will be singing the beautiful middle movement of Bach’s solo cantata, Ich habe genug, ‘Schlummert ein’ and after the interval we will all be performing Haydn’s glorious Nelson Mass, a work much loved by Tom. A glittering array of soloists will sing in the mass, as Ben and I are joined by more alumni from the last 50 years, including the fantastic young soprano, Caroline Taylor, a fairly recent graduate who was also a recipient of a choral scholarship set up by Tom Duncan.

He was a great character and is much missed. Please come if you can to what will be an emotional evening of great music making.