A NEW work by Salisbury-based composer, opera singer and teacher Simon McEnery will première in London before heading to Salisbury.

Written for chorus, piano and percussion, Space Time Matter Energy represents a new take on the traditional religious oratorio.

It sets to music words by physicists, astronomers, mathematicians and philosophers, covering some of the fundamental aspects of existence, but from a secular perspective.

McEnery describes himself as “something of a musical jack-of-all-trades”. As a composer, his oratorio The Resurrection (with text by his husband, Jeremy Davies, the former precentor of Salisbury Cathedral) was premièred in Salisbury Cathedral in 2005, and subsequently recorded by Salisbury Cathedral Choir under David Halls.

Since then he has published a volume of songs, and also written a Requiem for his choir, the Salisbury Chamber Chorus.

“I’ve wanted to write a big work about big stuff that wasn’t religious for years,” he says, “And the very kind committee of the choir have agreed to let me loose on something.”

That work is Space Time Matter Energy, a kind of secular oratorio, set to words by eminent physicists, astronomers and thinkers, like Stephen Hawking, Carl Sagan, Albert Einstein and Astronomer Royal Sir Martin Rees.

“It seemed to me that there were plenty of big choral pieces about where we come from or who we are, but they always seem to come from a religious perspective,” he continues.

“What I wanted to write was something about the universe and our place in it: from the big bang, through our insignificance in the vastness of it all, our need for exploration and where space travel will take us, to the nature of light or the make-up of electrons, and finally ideas about multiverses and infinity.’

He added: “It’s been a lot of fun putting it together. All the physics stuff sounds like it might be a bit heavy, but I really want this piece to be entertaining as well as thought-provoking or informative, and even, I hope, moving. I think people who don’t know me might be surprised by the odd reference to seventies disco.”

After it premieres in London on June 10 it will be performed in Salisbury on June 17 at Godolphin School’s Blackledge Theatre.