Paul McCartney's "Ecce Cor Meum (Behold My Heart)," a new classical work for chorus and orchestra, will premiere at Royal Albert Hall on Nov. 3.
The concert will feature soprano Kate Royal and the Academy of St. Martin-in-the-Fields Orchestra; London Voices; the boy singers of Magdalen College Choir, Oxford; and the boys of King's College Choir, Cambridge, conducted by Gavin Greenaway — the same cast that appears on the studio recording, to be released Tuesday by EMI Classics.
Anthony Smith, president of Magdalen College from 1998-2005, asked the former Beatle to compose a work celebrating the opening of the college's new concert hall.
In a statement Friday, McCartney, 64, said this early performance taught him a great deal. "If it had been a Beatles song, I would have known how to do it. But this was a completely different ballgame."