Cantamus are a very special group of singers. Small wonder that the Mansfield-based teenagers brought a special package of carols and stage music to their first city concert since visiting Malaysia.

The wonderment lay in their varied re-creations of the Christmas story, the joy of the medieval Gaudete launching their first half. Here, we were treated to some of John Rutter's finest carols, from Shepherds' Pipe Carol to Tomorrow Shall Be My Dancing Day.

Directed by Ann Irons, the junior section of Cantamus claimed the platform in pieces arranged by Michael Neaum. Emulating their elders, the different soloists in each one added assured contributions.

An ensemble drawn from the main choir followed with a scintillating version of the Sussex Carol, one of numerous gems from the new Cantamus album.

Like that album, the evening was graced by Philip Robinson's pianistic skills and the instrumental imagination of Alistair Parnell. His saxophone solo in Let All Mortal Flesh Keep Silence came close to upstaging the singers – no mean feat.

Both choirs showed their thespian talents in a second half which began with Nativity pictures. Even in the artless-seeming Away In A Manger, conductor Pamela Cook was the magician summoning the mystery behind the notes.

The piety of the Evening Prayer from Hansel and Gretel prefaced two cheerful final explosions of music and movement: the training choir in a Mary Poppins sequence, the older girls in My Fair Lady.

Peter Palmer