Wonderland / The King's Singers

Wonderland is full of magic and myth. Containing exclusively works commissioned by The King’s Singers across their 55 years; the album celebrates their trademark musical storytelling; with no shortage of comedy. György Ligeti’s six Nonsense Madrigals; each setting playful children’s poetry or extracts from Lewis Carroll’s Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland; provide a musical spine to the album; commemorating 100 years since the composer’s birth in 1923. From just over 50 years ago; the fairytale The Musicians of Bremen (1972) – set to music by the Australian composer and Master of the Queen’s Music Malcolm Williamson – sits alongside Time Piece (1972) by Paul Patterson; which tells an eccentric alternative creation story. These myth-based works have recent companions such as Judith Bingham’s extended work Tricksters (2019); which unearths what could happen if miscreants from different world mythologies could come together for the first time; and Ola Gjeilo’s A Dream within a Dream which questions the very nature of perception and reality. The album also features the legendary Japanese film and game composer Joe Hisaishi’s first ever choral work; I was there (2022); focussing on the cultural memory of tragic events such as 9/11 and the 2011 Japan Earthquake. Themes of hope and positivity; centred on the natural world; emerge in Makiko Kinoshita’s Ashita no uta (Song for tomorrow) (2020) and Francesca Amewudah-Rivers’ Alive (2022).