Sunday 4th December 2022 Advent 2

How Beautiful Upon the Mountains   from "Awake, awake; put on thy strength, O Zion"

John Stainer 1840-1901 Words Isaiah 52 v. 7

Stainer was born in Southwark, London, the son of a cabinet maker. He was a chorister at  St Paul's Cathedral at the age of 10 and at 16, appointed organist at St Michael's College, Tenbury.  In 1960, he became organist at Magdalen College, Oxford. He was allowed to study for a degree so long as it did not interfere with his duties and in 1864 gained his BA, and 2 years later his MA.  He was eventually an examiner for Oxford music degrees.

In 1872 he was appointed organist at St Paul's cathedral, in 1877 an honorary fellow of the Royal Academy of Music, and an examiner for the Doctor of Music degrees for Cambridge and London Universities.  He received his knighthood from Queen Victoria in 1888.

John Stainer (Wikimedia Commons)

Sunday 27th November 2022 Advent 1

In Night's Dim Shadows Lying  Words Charles Coffin  Music from the Katholisches Gesangbuch  Arr George Guest

SATB Choir - accompanied or a cappella. A beautiful strophic setting of this Advent text by Charles Coffin (1676-1749). Used as an introit, an anthem, part of your Lessons and Carols service, communion music ... the possibilities abound.

In night’s dim shadows lying,

Our limbs fast lock’d in sleep,

to thee, with faithful sighing,

Our souls their vigil keep.

Desire of every nation,

Hear, Lord, our piteous cry;

Thou Word, the world’s salvation,

Uplift us where we lie.

Lord, be thine Advent hasten’d,

Lest sin thy people mar;

The gates which Adam fasten’d —

The gates of heav’n, unbar.

Son, to thine endless merit,

Redeemer, Saviour, Friend,

With Sire and Holy Spirit

Be praises without end. Amen.

Charles Coffin was born 4 October 1676 at Buzancy, Ardennes in the Duchy of Rheim and educated at College du Plessis. In 1701, he was appointed chief assistant to Charles Rollin, principal of the Collège de Beauvais. He succeeded Rollin as principal in 1712. That same year he was entrusted with the funeral oration for Louis, Duke of Burgundy, the father of Louis XV. In 1718. he became rector of the University of Paris, a post which he held until his death.

Hymns

Coffin published in 1727 some of his Latin poems, for which he was already noted, and in 1736 the bulk of his hymns appeared in the Paris Breviary of that year, an edition of which was published in 1838 at Oxford by John Henry Newman. 1736 also saw the publication of Coffin's Hymni Sacri Auctore Carolo Coffin, and in 1755 a complete edition of his Works was issued in 2 vols.

The Hymni Sacri included a poem adapted from the original chant, Jordanis oras prævia, which Rev. John Chandler later translated to the hymn On Jordan's Bank the Baptist's Cry set to the tune Winchester New for use at Matins during Advent. Chandler also translated Coffin's The Advent of Our King.

Among his other works is an ode in praise of the wines of Champagne. This work is a version of a similar poem in which Bénigne Grenan, professor at Harcourt College, praised the pre-eminence of Burgundy wine, and that one of Charles Coffin's Jansenist friends, Marc-Antoine Hersan, had had fun reciting one evening at a dinner.

Jansenism

While the papal bull Unigenitus condemned Jansenism, many in France interpreted it as an attack on the prerogatives of the French church. The University of Paris and the provincial Parlements were hotbeds of opposition. The University was known to harbor Jansenist sympathizers; the Parlement of Paris went so far as to threatened to confiscate the temporalities of the Archbishop. As rector of the University and clerk to the Parlement of Paris, even Coffin's hymns were viewed by some with suspicion.

Death

Coffin died of pneumonia in Paris 20 June 1749. Due to his persistence in appealing against the apostolic constitution Unigenitus, under instructions from the Archbishop, who wished to make an example, the parish rector of Saint-Étienne-du-Mont, refused to administer last rites to him, or give him a Christian burial Robert Darnton observed that, "To deny the final absolution of sins to Christians on their deathbed was, in the eyes of many, to send them straight to Purgatory, an unforgivable abuse of royal and ecclesiastical authority.” Four thousand Parisians joined the funeral procession. Because the crown had supported the suppression of the Jansenists, Danton notes that the religious rite took on political overtones. The Parlement of Paris subsequently issued an official and strong “remonstrance” to the king. Richard J. Janet sees the resulting popular demonstrations as contributing to the growing disenchantment with the monarchy that would later play into the coming Revolution.

Coffin left a legacy to the college of Beauvais, and founded awards at the University of Paris.

Taken from Wikipedia

George Guest was born in Bangor, Gwynedd. His father was an organist and Guest assisted him by acting as organ blower. He became a chorister at Bangor Cathedral and subsequently at Chester Cathedral, where he took organ lessons from the sub-organist, Dr. Roland Middleton. He passed the examinations for ARCO in 1940 and FRCO in 1942. By this time he had become the organist and choirmaster of Connah's Quay parish church, Flintshire.

Being proud of his Welsh roots, from the 1970s onwards, Guest took a personal interest in the Cambridge University Welsh Society (Cymdeithas Y Mabinogi), sponsoring many of its events and providing a welcome face for Welsh students away from home.

At the age of 18 he was called up for military service, and joined the Royal Air Force, being posted to India in 1945. On leaving the services in 1947 he took up the post of sub-organist at Chester Cathedral. The cathedral organist, Malcolm Boyle, encouraged him to apply for the organ scholarship at St John's College, Cambridge, for which he was successful.

At Cambridge he studied under Robin Orr, who had served as organist and choirmaster at St. John's College since 1938. In Guest's final year as Organ Scholar, Robin Orr announced that he intended to retire, and the College Council offered the post to Guest, who took over the position in 1951.

Within five years of Guest becoming organist and choirmaster, the whole future of the choir at St. John's College came into question, with the proposed closure of the day school which provided the choristers. Guest, with the support of his predecessor, persuaded the College to fund a Choir School.

Under George Guest's direction, the choir built up a formidable reputation, challenging the supremacy of the choir of King's College, Cambridge. Guest introduced a more "continental" tone into the choir, as George Malcolm was doing at Westminster Cathedral.

The choir began broadcasting on the BBC in the early 1950s and started making recordings in 1958. By the time of Guest's retirement in 1991, the choir had recorded sixty LPs or CDs under his direction.

For many years from 1972 the BBC broadcast Evensong from St. John's College on every Ash Wednesday, and the Advent Carol Service each year since 1981. During George Guest's tenure, the choir undertook many overseas tours.

In 1987 Guest was appointed Commander of the Order of the British Empire (CBE) in the Queen's Birthday Honours.

Herbert Howells and Michael Tippett are among the many composers who wrote liturgical settings for the St. John's College choir whilst George Guest was organist and choirmaster. They also include the French composer Jean Langlais, who wrote a setting of the psalm Beatus vir for the choir: a rare occurrence of a Continental composer writing for the English cathedral tradition.

Organ Scholars who studied under George Guest include:

Sir David Lumsden (Southwell Minster, New College, Oxford, Principal of the Royal Academy of Music, London)

Brian Runnett (organist, Norwich Cathedral)

Jonathan Bielby (organist, Wakefield Cathedral)

Jonathan Rennert (St Michael's, Cornhill)

David Hill (choral director) (sub-organist, Durham Cathedral; organist, Westminster Cathedral; organist, Winchester Cathedral; organist and choirmaster, St John's College, Cambridge; now Chief Conductor, BBC Singers)

Robert Huw Morgan (University Organist, Stanford Memorial Church)

Adrian Lucas (organist, Worcester Cathedral)

Andrew Lumsden (Southwark Cathedral, Westminster Abbey, Lichfield Cathedral, Winchester Cathedral)

Sir Stephen Cleobury (King's College, Cambridge)

John Scott (St Paul's Cathedral, London, and subsequently St Thomas Fifth Avenue, New York City)

Andrew Nethsingha (Truro Cathedral; Gloucester Cathedral; Organist and Director of Music, St John's College, Cambridge)

Preceded by

Robin Orr

Director of Music, St John's College, Cambridge

1951–1991 Succeeded by

Christopher Robinson

George Guest was a guest on Desert Island Discs in 1976 (http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio4/features/desert-island-discs/castaway/a5168c08#p009n0jz). He was a lifelong supporter of Chester City FC. The famous British baritone Simon Keenlyside was a chorister and subsequently a choral scholar in the choir of St John's College, Cambridge while George Guest was the choirmaster there. Actor Clive Mantle was another chorister at St. John's.

Taken from Wikipedia

George Guest on Desert Island Discs

Sunday 20th November 2022 Christ The King

Above All Praise And Majesty   Felix Mendelssohn (1809 - 1847)

Above All Praise And Majesty is a joyful,majestic piece suitable for Christ The King, Ascension and Easter. 

This is the third of six anthems for 8 part chorus (Opus79) written for the Domchor, Berlin.

Felix Mendelssohn is a German born composer, organist, conductor and pianist. He was a grandson of the philosopher, Moses Mendelssohn and so born into a prominent Jewish family.  However he was brought up without religion until the age of seven when he was baptised as a Reformed Christian. he was recognised early as a musical prodigy, but his family did not seek to capitalise on his talent. Mendelssohn revived interest in the music of J S Bach. He had quite conservative tastes in his composition which set him apart from his contemporaries, such as Liszt, Wagner and Berlioz. He founded the Leipzig Conservatoire.

From Wikipedia

Sunday 13th November 2022 Remembrance Sunday

My Soul, There is a Country,  from Songs of Farewell by C H H Parry (1818-1918)  Words Henry Vaughan (1622-1695)

This is the first of Parry's "Songs of Farewell" written about the needless suffering in war. It changes tempo from slow and somber to a more lilting, uplifting, dance like quality, back and forth during the piece. The choir sang it accompanied by our Director of Music.

C H H Parry was born in Bournemouth in 1848 into a rich family and was educated at Eton where he also gained his music degree.  He went to study further at Oxford.  His music influenced other great English composers such as Elgar and Vaughan Williams.  He wrote his best music in his later years and this include his Songs of Farewell.  He died in Rustington in 1918, just before the end of the Great War.

Sir Charles Hubert Hastings Parry
From Wikipedia

Henry Vaughan (17 April 1621 – 23 April 1695) was a Welsh metaphysical poet, author and translator writing in English, and a medical physician. His religious poetry appeared in Silex Scintillans in 1650, with a second part in 1655. In 1646 his Poems, with the Tenth Satire of Juvenal Englished was published. Meanwhile he had been persuaded by reading the religious poet George Herbert to renounce "idle verse". The prose Mount of Olives and Solitary Devotions (1652) show his authenticity and depth of convictions. Two more volumes of secular verse followed, ostensibly without his sanction, but it is his religious verse that has been acclaimed. He also translated short moral and religious works and two medical works in prose. In the 1650s he began a lifelong medical practice.

It was not until the writing of Silex Scintillans that Vaughan received significant acclaim. The period shortly preceding the publication of the first volume of the work (1650) marked an important period of his life. Certain indications in the first volume and explicit statements in the preface to the second volume (1655) suggest that Vaughan suffered a prolonged sickness that inflicted much pain. Vaughan interprets this experience as an encounter with death that alerted him to a "misspent youth". Vaughan believed he had been spared to make amends and start a new course not only in his life but in the literature he would produce. He described his previous work as foul and a contribution to "corrupt literature". Perhaps the most notable mark of Vaughan's conversion is how much it is credited to George Herbert. Vaughan claims he is the least of Herbert's many "pious converts". It was during this period of Vaughan's life, around 1650, that he adopted the saying "Moriendo, revixi" – by dying, I gain new life.: p132 

The first volume of Silex Scintillans was followed by The Mount of Olives, or Solitary Devotions (1652), a prose book of devotions providing prayers for various stages in the day, for prayer in church and for other purposes. It appears as a "companion volume" to the Book of Common Prayer, to which it alludes frequently, although it had been outlawed under the Commonwealth. The work was also influenced by Lancelot Andrewes's Preces Privatae (1615) and John Cosin's Collection of Private Devotions (1627). Flores Solitudinis (1654) contains translations from the Latin of two works by the Spanish Jesuit Juan Eusebio Nieremberg, one by a 5th-century Bishop of Lyon, Eucherius, and by Paulinus of Nola, of whom Vaughan wrote a prose life.

Vaughan practised medicine, perhaps as early as the 1640s. He attached to the second volume of Silex Scintillans (1655) a translation of Henry Nollius's Hermetical Physick. He went on to produce a translation of Nollius's The Chymists Key in 1657.

Taken from Wikipedia.

Henry Vaughan

Saturday 29th October 2022 Mass for All Souls

 Requiem Gabriel Fauré (1845-1924)

Taken from the service sheet.

Gabriel Fauré, born in 1845, was appointed titular organist a La Madeleine, Paris, in 1896 and director of the Paris Conservatoire in 1905.

Fauré started to think about the composition of a requiem in 1885 after the death of his father.  Unlike Berlioz and Verdi he removed the Dies Irae sequence, which he considered over theatrical.  Hence the Offertorium comes up much sooner than is usual in a requiem mass setting.  He permits himself only a brief reference to the “day of wrath” in the Libera me baritone solo.

Gabriel Faure
Gabriel Fauré by John Singer Sargent [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons"

Fauré’s Requiem happily lends itself to a liturgical performance by amateur choirs, being particularly popular with English choirs, with the organ taking the place of the orchestra. This seems to have been recognised early on its life, coinciding as it did with liturgical experimentation in the Church of England in the late 19th and early 20th centuries – experiments now adopted and sanctioned for universal use with the introduction in 1980 of the Alternative Service Book and more recently the Common Worship services. These owe their formation to the proposed 1928 Prayer Book and the English Missal (1933) and their structure, including additions to the Book of Common Prayer, fit best with Fauré’s arrangement of sections. The 1928 Prayer Book and English Missal largely formalised a variety of liturgical practices which had been used in sung Communion services previously. 

The service is an act of worship, to include remembrance of the departed, and may sound something like a similar service in an English church at about the time of Faurés death in November 1924, when sections of his requiem were sung at his funeral at La Madeleine.

Faure in 1907 from Wikipedia

Our baritone soloist for this service was Martin Elliot.

Sunday 23th October 2022 Trinity 19

Lord For Thy Tender Mercy's Sake  Music could be by either Farrant or John Hilton.  Arrangement by Anthony Green. Words from J Bull, Christian Prayers and Holy Meditation (1568)

Henry Bull died in 1577.  He was an eminent theological writer.  In 1553 when Mary I came to the throne, he with the help of a conspirator snatched a censer from the hand of an officiating priest and was expelled from Magdalen. He was quiet during the rest of her reign, but came back to prominence on the ascension of Elizabeth I. He was also the editor of Christian Praiers and Holy Meditacions which appeared first by 1570, from which the text of our anthem today was taken.

Sunday 16th October 2022 Trinity 18

O Lord, Increase Our Faith  H. Loosemore

Henry Loosemore was born in Devon.  He was a chorister and afterwards a lay clerk in one of the Cambridge colleges. At some time he was organist at King's College. In 1660 he became organist at Exeter Cathedral.  He died suddenly in 1670 whilst in Exeter. 

O Lord Increase Our Faith has incorrectly been attributed to Orlando Gibbons in the past, and in Gibbon's version, has the word "our" replaced by "my".  However a manuscript was found of Loosemore's which allowed the correct attribution and also the correction of the text.

 

Sunday 9th October 2022 Trinity 17

Litany To The Holy Spirit   Peter Hurford

An anthem written for unison voices.

In the hour of my distress,

When temptations me oppress,

And when I my sins confess, 

Sweet Spirit, comfort me!

When I lie within my bed,

Sick in heart and sick in head,

And with doubts discomfited,

Sweet Spirit, comfort me!

When the house doth sigh and weep,

And the world is drowned with sleep,

Yet mine eyes the watch do keep, 

Sweet Spirit, comfort me!

Peter Hurford was born in Minehead, Somerset, to Gladys Hurford (née James) and Hubert Hurford, a solicitor. He was educated at Blundell's School in Tiverton, Devon. He later studied both music and law at Jesus College, Cambridge, graduating with dual degrees, and afterwards obtained a reputation for both musical scholarship and organ playing. Hurford subsequently studied in Paris under the French organist André Marchal, exploring music of the Baroque period.

He made interpretations of Bach, and recorded the complete Bach organ works for Decca and BBC Radio 3. His expertise also encompassed recordings of the Romantic literature for organ, performances notable for attention to stylistic detail. His playing style is noted for clean articulation, beauty of expression, and a sense of proper tempo.

Hurford was appointed organist of Holy Trinity Church, Leamington Spa from 1956 to 1957. For the same period, he was Music Master at Bablake School, Coventry, and Musical Director of the Royal Leamington Spa Bach Choir. He was then appointed organist and choirmaster of St Albans Cathedral in 1958, serving in this post for twenty years. He conceived the idea of an organ competition in 1963, partly to celebrate the new Harrison & Harrison organ designed by Ralph Downes and himself. This venture was successful mainly because of the young Hurford's rapidly growing stature in Britain and overseas as a result of his refreshing notions of the "authentic performance style". This has grown into the biennial St Albans International Organ Festival, a world-renowned festival of organ music with competitions whose past winners include many of the great names in modern organ music including Dame Gillian Weir, David Sanger, Thomas Trotter and Kevin Bowyer.

Hurford travelled extensively for both his performance and recording career. He was artist in residence at Cincinnati, Ohio University (1967–68), Toronto, Canada (1977), and consultant for the Sydney Opera House organ. He held a number of Honorary Doctorates, was appointed an Honorary Fellow of Jesus College, Cambridge in 2006, was a past President of the Royal College of Organists and received its Medal in 2013, and has been appointed an Officer of the Order of the British Empire (OBE). He wrote a book: Making Music on the Organ (1998, Oxford University Press, ISBN 0-19-816207-3) and published a great deal of choral music for the Anglican liturgy, much of it issued by leading publishers such as Novello and Oxford University Press. His Litany to the Holy Spirit, to a famous text by Robert Herrick, is sung worldwide.

Hurford suffered a minor stroke in 1997, but recovered enough to resume his performing career seven months later. In 2008, he was diagnosed with Alzheimer's Disease, and subsequently retired formally from performing in 2009.

Taken from his obituary notice in The Guardian.

Hurford died on 3 March 2019, aged 88.

Litany to the Holy Spirit was written in 1958, set to a text by Robert Herrick (1591-1674) 

Born in Cheapside, London, Robert Herrick was the seventh child and fourth son of Julia Stone and Nicholas Herrick, a prosperous goldsmith. He was named after an uncle, Robert Herrick (or Heyrick), a prosperous Member of Parliament (MP) for Leicester, who had bought the land Greyfriars Abbey stood on after Henry VIII's dissolution in the mid-16th century. Nicholas Herrick died in a fall from a fourth-floor window in November 1592, when Robert was a year old (whether this was suicide remains unclear).

The tradition that Herrick received his education at Westminster is based on the words "beloved Westminster" in his poem "Tears to Thamesis", but the allusion is to the city, not the school. It is more likely that he, like his uncle's children, attended The Merchant Taylors' School. In 1607 he became apprenticed to his other uncle, Sir William Herrick, a goldsmith and jeweller to the king. The apprenticeship ended after only six years, when Herrick, aged 22, gained admission at St John's College, Cambridge. He later migrated to Trinity Hall, graduating in 1617. Herrick became a member of the Sons of Ben, a group centred on an admiration for the works of Ben Jonson, to whom he wrote at least five poems. Herrick was ordained into the Church of England in 1623 and in 1629 became the vicar of Dean Prior in Devonshire.

In 1647, in the wake of the English Civil War, Herrick was ejected from his vicarage for refusing the Solemn League and Covenant. He returned to London to live in Westminster and depend on the charity of his friends and family. He spent some time preparing his lyric poems for publication and had them printed in 1648 under the title Hesperides; or the Works both Human and Divine of Robert Herrick, with a dedication to the Prince of Wales.

When King Charles II was restored to the throne in 1660, Herrick petitioned for his own restoration to his living. He had obtained favour by writing verses celebrating the births of both Charles II and his brother James before the Civil War. Herrick became the vicar of Dean Prior again in the summer of 1662 and lived there until his death in October 1674, at the age of 83. His date of death is unknown, but he was buried on 15 October.

Herrick was a bachelor all his life. Many of the women he names in his poems are thought to be fictional. He is buried in the churchyard of St George the Martyr parish church, Dean Prior.

Biographies taken from Wkipaedia.

The anthem was "The Lord Hath Been Mindful Of Us" from "Ascribe Unto The Lord" by Samuel Wesley

This is the final part of Ascribe unto the Lord which is a setting of Psalm 96, verses 7-10, 2, 3 and 5 and Psalm 115, verses 4-8, 3,and 12-15.

The LORD hath been mindful of us: he will bless us; he will bless the house of Israel; he will bless the house of Aaron.
He will bless them that fear the LORD, both small and great.
The LORD shall increase you more and more, you and your children.
Ye are blessed of the LORD which made heaven and earth.

Samuel Sebastian Wesley (1810 - 1876) was the illegitimate son of Samuel Wesley and Sarah Souter, and grandchild of Charles Wesley. 

After singing in the choir of the Chapel Royal as a boy, Samuel Sebastian embarked on a career as a musician, and was appointed organist at Hereford Cathedral in 1832. While there he married the sister of the Dean, John Merryweather. S.S. Wesley was, like his father Samuel Wesley, a Freemason. He was initiated in Palladian Lodge No.120 in Hereford on 17 September 1833. He moved to Exeter Cathedral three years later, and joined St George's Lodge No.129 Exeter on 10 December 1835. He subsequently held appointments at Leeds Parish Church (now Leeds Minster) (from 1842), Winchester Cathedral (from 1849), Winchester College and Gloucester Cathedral (1865-1876). In 1839 he received both his Bachelor of Music degree and a Doctor of Music degree from Oxford. He became a Professor of Organ at the Royal Academy of Music in 1850. He died at his home in Gloucester on 19 April 1876 aged 65. He is buried next to his daughter in St. Bartholomew's Cemetery in Exeter by the old City Wall. There are memorial tablets to him in Exeter Cathedral and Winchester Cathedral, and his memorial at Gloucester Cathedral is in stained glass.

Famous in his lifetime as one of his country's leading organists and choirmasters, he composed almost exclusively for the Church of England, which continues to cherish his memory. His better-known anthems include Thou wilt keep him in perfect peace and Wash me throughly. He also wrote several rather late examples of verse anthems, which contrast unison and contrapuntal sections with smaller, more intimate passages for solo voice or voices. Blessed be the God and Father, The Wilderness and Ascribe unto the Lord are of considerable length, as is his Service in E.

The popular short anthem Lead me, Lord is an extract from Praise the Lord, O my soul. Several of his pieces for solo organ have enduring value and continue to be played in recitals now and then.

Of his hymn tunes the best-known are "Aurelia" and "Hereford." "Aurelia" has been widely adopted in the United States, and is regularly heard there. Usually now sung to the words "The Church's One Foundation", Wesley composed the tune for the hymn "Jerusalem the Golden", hence the name "Aurelia".

One notable feature of his career is his aversion to equal temperament, an aversion which he kept for decades after this tuning method had been accepted on the Continent and even in most of England. Such distaste did not stop him from substantial use of chromaticism in several of his published compositions.

While at Winchester Cathedral Wesley was largely responsible for the Cathedral's acquisition in 1854 of the Father Willis organ which had been exhibited at The Great Exhibition, 1851. The success of the Exhibition organ led directly to the award of the contract to Willis for a 100-stop organ for St George's Hall, Liverpool built in 1855. Wesley was the consultant for this major and important project, but the organ was, arguably, impaired for some years by Wesley's insistence that it be tuned to unequal temperament.

Wesley, with Father Willis, can be credited with the invention of the concave and radiating organ pedalboard, but demurred when Willis proposed that it should be known as the "Wesley-Willis" pedalboard. However, their joint conception has been largely adopted as an international standard for organs throughout the English-speaking world and those exported elsewhere.

Samuel Sebastian Wesley picture and words taken from Wikipedia

Sunday 25th September 2022 Trinity 15

  Ave Verum  Charles Gounod (1818-1893)

"Ave verum corpus" is a short Eucharistic chant that has been set to music by many composers. It dates to the 13th century, first recorded in a central Italian Franciscan manuscript (Chicago, Newberry Library, 24). A Reichenau manuscript of the 14th century attributes it to Pope Innocent (variously identified as Innocent III, Innocent IV, Innocent V, or Innocent VI)

During the Middle Ages it was sung at the elevation of the Eucharist during the consecration at Mass. It was also used frequently during Benediction of the Blessed Sacrament.

Latin

Ave verum corpus, natum

de Maria Virgine,

vere passum, immolatum

in cruce pro homine

cuius latus perforatum

fluxit aqua et sanguine:

esto nobis prægustatum

in mortis examine.

O Iesu dulcis, O Iesu pie,

O Iesu, fili Mariae.

Miserere mei. Amen.

 

Hail, true Body, born

of the Virgin Mary,

having truly suffered, sacrificed

on the cross for mankind,

from whose pierced side

water and blood flowed:

Be for us a foretaste [of the Heavenly banquet]

in the trial of death!

O sweet Jesus, O holy Jesus,

O Jesus, son of Mary,

have mercy on me. Amen.

Taken from Wikipedia

The prayer is a meditation on Jesus's Real Presence in the Blessed Sacrament, and ties it to the redemptive meaning of suffering in the life of all believers.

Gounod was born in Paris,  his father an artist and his mother a pianist and also his first piano teacher.  He showed an early aptitude for music.  He studied at the Paris Conservatoire and won the Prix de Rome in 1839 for his Cantata Fernand.  He contemplated taking holy orders but went back to composition before taking his vows.  In 1854 he competed a Messe Solennelle also know as St Cecilia Mass.
The sister of Felix Mendelssohn, Fanny, introduced Gounod to the works of JS Bach, in particcular he admired The Well-Tempered Clavier  and it inspired him to write a melody to the Prelude in C major, later adding the words "Ave Maria" and it became a success. in 1859 he wrote Faust for which he is best remembered.
Between 1870 and 1874, Gounod lived in London, becoming conductor the Royal Choral Society. Much of his music at this time was choral.
As he grew older his music became more sacred. He was made a Grand Officer of the Légion d'honneur in 1888 and died of a stroke in 1893.

Taken from Wikipedia

Sunday 18th September 2022 Trinity 14

The anthem was "Turn thy face from my sins" by Thomas Attwood (1765 - 1838)  based on Psalm 51 vv 9-11.

Attwood was born in London, the son of a musician in the royal band. He became a chorister in the Chapel Royal by the age of nine.  He was sent abroad to study at the expense of the Prince of Wales (later George IV) who was impressed by his skill at the harpsichord.  He was a favourite pupil of Mozart. He returned to London in 1787.

In 1796 he was made organist of St Paul's and the same year composer of the Chapel Royal.  For George IV's coronation he wrote the anthem "I was glad".

Much of his work is forgotten, only a few anthems regularly performed including "Turn thy face from my sins".e from thy sins    Thomas Attwood  (1765-1838)

Attwood was born in London, the son of a musician in the royal band. He became a chorister in the Chapel Royal by the age of nine.  He was sent abroad to study at the expense of the Prince of Wales (later George IV) who was impressed by his skill at the harpsichord.  He was a favourite pupil of Mozart. He returned to London in 1787.

In 1796 he was made organist of St Paul's and the same year composer of the Chapel Royal.  For George IV's coronation he wrote the anthem "I was glad".

Much of his work is forgotten, only a few anthems regularly performed including "Turn thy face from my sin

Thomas Attwood from Wikipedia

Sunday 4th September 2022 Patronal Festival. Welcome to Fr Chris

Ave Maria  Opus 67, No 2   Gabriel Fauré

This is a setting of "Hail Mary, full of grace" by Gabriel Fauré. It is written for boys or female voices with organ or piano. It is sung in unison, with a lot of dynamic change to emphasise the words, but mostly piano or softly. It is also sung at a gentle pace reflecting that this piece is a musical prayer.

Gabriel Urbain Fauré 12 May 1845 – 4 November 1924) was a French composer, organist, pianist and teacher. He was one of the foremost French composers of his generation, and his musical style influenced many 20th-century composers. Among his best-known works are his Pavane, Requiem, Sicilienne, nocturnes for piano and the songs "Après un rêve" and "Clair de lune". Although his best-known and most accessible compositions are generally his earlier ones, Fauré composed many of his most highly regarded works in his later years, in a more harmonically and melodically complex style.

Fauré was born into a cultured but not especially musical family. His talent became clear when he was a small boy. At the age of nine, he was sent to the Ecole Niedermeyer music college in Paris, where he was trained to be a church organist and choirmaster. Among his teachers was Camille Saint-Saëns, who became a lifelong friend. After graduating from the college in 1865, Fauré earned a modest living as an organist and teacher, leaving him little time for composition. When he became successful in his middle age, holding the important posts of organist of the Église de la Madeleine and director of the Paris Conservatoire, he still lacked time for composing; he retreated to the countryside in the summer holidays to concentrate on composition. By his last years, Fauré was recognised in France as the leading French composer of his day. An unprecedented national musical tribute was held for him in Paris in 1922, headed by the president of the French Republic. Outside France, Fauré's music took decades to become widely accepted, except in Britain, where he had many admirers during his lifetime.

Fauré's music has been described as linking the end of Romanticism with the modernism of the second quarter of the 20th century. When he was born, Chopin was still composing, and by the time of Fauré's death, jazz and the atonal music of the Second Viennese School were being heard. The Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians, which describes him as the most advanced composer of his generation in France, notes that his harmonic and melodic innovations influenced the teaching of harmony for later generations. During the last twenty years of his life, he suffered from increasing deafness. In contrast with the charm of his earlier music, his works from this period are sometimes elusive and withdrawn in character, and at other times turbulent and impassioned.

Taken from Wikipedia

Ave Verum Corpus  Mozart

Ave Verum Corpus (Hail, true body) is a setting of the Latin Hymn, in D major.  It was written for Anton Stoll, a friend and church musician of St Stephen, Baden.

It was composed in 1791 whilst visiting his wife Constanze who was pregnant with their 6th child and staying at the spa Baden bei Wien.  It was composed for the feast of Corpus Christi.  Mozart's manuscript has only "Sotto voce" marked at the beginning with no other markings.

Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (1756 - 1791)

Mozart was a child prodigy competent on keyboard and violin.  He began composing at the age of five. He performed around Europe for royalty.  At the age of 17 he was engaged as a musician at the Salzburg court but was restless and travelled looking for a better position.  Whilst visiting Vienna he was dismissed from his position in Salzburg.  He remained in Vienna, where he gained fame but no financial security.

He composed more than 600 works, many acknowledged as the finest in symphonies, concertante, operatic, chamber and choral music.  He remains one of the best loved classical composers, whose work influenced many composers.  Joseph Haydn said of Mozart "Posterity will not see such a talent again in 100 years."

W A Mozart from Wikipedia

Sunday 10th July 2022 Sea Sunday

 Crossing The Bar  Sir H Parry   Alfred Lord Tennyson

The Anthem was the famous poem by Alfred Lord Tennyson, put to music by H Parry.

Sunset and evening star,
And one clear call for me!
And may there be no moaning of the bar,
When I put out to sea,

But such a tide as moving seems asleep,
Too full for sound and foam,
When that which drew from out the boundless deep
Turns again home.

Twilight and evening bell,
And after that the dark!
And may there be no sadness of farewell,
When I embark;

For tho' from out our bourne of Time and Place
The flood may bear me far,
I hope to see my Pilot face to face
When I have crost the bar.

Alfred Lord Tennyson (1809-1892) was a British poet, and for much of Queen Victoria's reign was Poet Laureate

Alfred Lord Tennyson, from Wikipedia

C H H Parry was born in Bournemouth in 1848 into a rich family and was educated at Eton where he also gained his music degree.  He went to study further at Oxford.  His music influenced other great English composers such as Elgar and Vaughan Williams.  He wrote his best music in his later years and this include his Songs of Farewell.  He died in Rustington in 1918, just before the end of the Great War.

Sir Parry from Wikipedia

Saturday 9th July 2022

The Lord is my shepher (Psalm 23)  Howard Goodall

Personal life

Born in Bromley, Kent, Goodall was educated at New College School, where he was a chorister in the Choir of New College, Oxford. He then went on to Stowe School and Lord Williams's School. He read music at Christ Church, Oxford, where he gained a first-class degree.

He is married to Val Fancourt, who is a classical music agent, and they have two daughters.

Works

Popular music

In the late 1970s, Goodall was a member of the band Half Brother with his friend Jonathan Kermode. They produced an eponymous LP album, Half Brother, in 1978.

Musical theatre

Goodall's 1984 musical The Hired Man, an adaptation of the novel by Melvyn Bragg, won an Ivor Novello award (1985) and TMA Award (2006) award for Best Musical. Professional revivals of The Hired Man in recent years include a UK tour by the New Perspectives Theatre Company in 2008 and a production directed by David Thacker and Elizabeth Newman at the Octagon Theatre, Bolton in June 2010.

A Winter's Tale, commissioned for the opening of the Sage Gateshead in December 2005 was presented during 2009/10 by Youth Music Theatre UK. In 2011 its London professional premiere at the Landor Theatre won the Off west end award for Best New Musical.

Love Story, based on the novella by Erich Segal, premiered in 2010 at the Minerva Theatre, Chichester.

Bend It Like Beckham: The Musical, written with Gurinder Chadha, Paul Mayeda Berges and Charles Hart began previewing at the Phoenix Theatre, London, in May 2015.

Other musicals include Girlfriends (1986), Days of Hope (1991), Silas Marner (1993), The Kissing-Dance (1998), The Dreaming (2001) (both with Charles Hart), A Winter's Tale (2005) and Two Cities (2006).

Television

Goodall has composed the main themes and incidental music for UK comedy programmes including Red Dwarf, Blackadder, Mr. Bean, The Thin Blue Line, The Vicar of Dibley, The Catherine Tate Show, 2point4 Children, Words and Pictures and QI, on which he has also appeared twice as a panellist. A single "Tongue Tied" from Red Dwarf reached no. 17 on the UK charts.

As an undergraduate at Christ Church, Oxford, Goodall met actor Rowan Atkinson and writer Richard Curtis, his collaborators on several of these projects, including his first break into TV, Not the Nine O'Clock News.

Choral works

Goodall has a body of choral music to his name, including "In Memoriam Anne Frank" (2001), "O Lord God of Time and Eternity" (2003) and settings of Psalm 23 (used as the theme tune to The Vicar of Dibley) and "Love Divine". In September 2008, his Eternal Light: A Requiem was premiered by Rambert Dance Company to choreography by the company's artistic director, Mark Baldwin. The result of a commission from London Musici to celebrate its 20th anniversary, Eternal Light: A Requiem was commissioned as both a choral-orchestral-dance piece and a choral orchestral work. The London premiere took place on 11 November 2008 at Sadler's Wells with Rambert Dance Company, London Musici, The Choir of Christ Church Cathedral, Oxford, Finchley Children's Music Group and soloists, conducted by Paul Hoskins. Also in September 2008, EMI Classics released the premiere recording of Eternal Light: A Requiem, with soloists Natasha Marsh, Alfie Boe and Christopher Maltman joining London Musici, The Choir of Christ Church Cathedral, Oxford, and conducted by Stephen Darlington. Eternal Light: A Requiem has now had over 400 live performances across the world.

In March 2009, Classic FM released Howard Goodall's Enchanted Voices, a modern exploration of ancient chant, scored for upper voices, cello, organ, handbells and synthesiser. The disc marks Goodall's position as Classic FM's Composer-in-Residence for 2009. A month after its UK release, it became the best-selling specialist choral CD of 2009. It subsequently earned a nomination for Classical Brit Album of the Year. Howard Goodall's Enchanted Voices was followed by Howard Goodall's Enchanted Carols (November 2009) and Pelican in the Wilderness (March 2010).

Goodall arranged an orchestral and choir score for Psalm 122 for Tonbridge School to commemorate their chapel which burnt down in the 1980s. Goodall was also commissioned by Truro Cathedral to write a new work for all four of the Cathedral's choirs: Truro Cathedral Choir (boys and men), St Mary's Singers (mixed adults), Cornwall Youth Choir and Cornwall Junior Choir. The piece, entitled A New Heart, A New Spirit, sets a text from Wisdom and Ezekiel in four languages (English, Latin, French and Cornish).

The 45-minute oratorio, Every Purpose Under the Heaven (The King James Bible Oratorio), was premiered in Westminster Abbey in November 2011 (conducted by the composer). It was commissioned as a gift to the United Church Schools Trust and United Learning Trust from Sir Ewan and Lady Harper, to mark the 400th anniversary of the King James Bible. Every Purpose Under the Heaven was recorded and released on the Decca Classics/Classics fm CD Inspired in 2012.

Goodall's commission Rigaudon was part of Queen Elizabeth II Diamond Jubilee Regatta and he was musically responsible for Rowan Atkinson's performance at the Opening Ceremony of the 2012 London Olympics.

I am Christmas Day premiered at Southwark Cathedral as part of the Mercy Ships Charity annual Carol Service on Wednesday 5 December 2012. Commissioned by Mercy Ships UK, the work was performed by Southwark Cathedral Girls Choir, conducted by the composer.

Goodall contributed two choral items for the August 4th commemoration of the beginning of the First World War at St Symphorien Military Cemetery near Mons, Belgium, broadcast live in BBC2. He arranged British and German soldiers' songs into a suite with band accompaniment (The Band of the Coldstream Guards) and composed an entirely new work in English and German, "Sure of the Sky, Sure of the Sun – Des Himmels sicher, der Sonne sicher", performed jointly by the London Symphony Chorus and the Schleswig-Holstein Festival Choir, conducted by Simon Halsey, based on the poems "May, 1915" by Charlotte Mew (1869–1928) and "An einen vermißten Freund!" by a German soldier killed in action on the Western Front, Goldfeld (discovered by Peter Appelbaum). Present at the event, alongside members of the UK Government, were the presidents of Germany and Eire, the King and Queen of the Belgians, and Prince William and Catherine and Prince Harry.

Steadfast, with music and lyrics by Goodall, was released on 14 October 2014, in aid of Global's Make Some Noise, a charity that helps disadvantaged children in the UK. Steadfast included performance contributions from Katherine Jenkins, Laura Wright, Milos, Charlie Siem, Alfie Boe, Myleene Klass and Alexander Armstrong.

More Tomorrows was commissioned by Classic fm for Cancer Research UK and premiered by the Philharmonia Orchestra at the Royal Albert Hall on 25 April 2013, conducted by the composer.

Invictus: A Passion, a 55-minute work for soloists, chorus and small orchestra, was commissioned by St Luke's United Methodist Church in Houston, Texas, and premiered there under the composer's baton in March 2018, with the UK premiere following in May 2018, given by the Choir of Christ Church Cathedral, Oxford and Stephen Darlington.

Awards

Goodall has been awarded honorary Doctorates of Music from Bishop Grosseteste University College in Lincoln, the University of Bolton, Mountview Academy of Theatre Arts with the University of East Anglia and Doctor of Literature (Education) from the Institute of Education, University College London. The British Academy of Songwriters, Composers and Authors (BASCA) gave him its Gold Badge Award for exceptional work in support of his fellow British composers. In 2007, he received the Making Music/Sir Charles Groves Prize for Outstanding Contribution to British Music and was appointed by the UK Government as England's first ever National Ambassador for Singing, leading a 4-year programme (Sing Up) to improve the provision of group singing for all primary-age children.

In April 2009, Goodall was nominated for The Classical BRITs "Composer of the Year" award for Eternal Light: A Requiem, which he won in May 2009, and in July 2009 he was nominated for an Emmy Award in the category "Music Composition for a Miniseries, Movie, or Special (Dramatic Score)" for his work on the Winston Churchill biopic Into the Storm; which he went on to win on 12 September at a ceremony in Los Angeles.

In 2009, Goodall received the Karl Haas Prize for Music Education, awarded by the Klassix Society–Friends of 88.7KXMS / Fine Arts Radio International of Missouri Southern State University.

Additional awards include the Naomi Sergeant Memorial Award for Outstanding contribution to British Music, the MIA/Classic fm award for Outstanding contribution to Music Education and a Primetime EMMY award for Original Dramatic Score for the score of the HBO film Into the Storm.

In January 2011, Goodall was appointed Commander of the Order of the British Empire (CBE) in the 2011 New Year Honours for services to music education.

Taken from wikipedia.

Psalm 23 is well known and has many settings as both motet and hymn. Howard Goodall's version was written in 1994 and first performed by the Choir of Christ Church Catherdral, Oxford. It is readily recognised as the theme tune for The Vicar of Dibley. Our arrangement was by Howard Goodall, copyright 2000.

Sunday 19th June 2022 Trinity 1

"Never Weather Beaten Sail " music by Charles Wood, poem by Thomas Campion.

“Never Weather beaten Sail” uses the poem from the renaissance by Thomas Campion (1567- 1620) who wrote both poetry and music during the reigns of Elizabeth I and James I. The storm tossed boat and its tired sailors are a metaphor for the soul’s journey. As they seek for a harbour and anchor from the restless sea, so does our soul seek refuge and peace. Wood successfully transformed a renaissance poem into a song which does not have the over sentimental feel of much Victorian music.

Life

.Campion was born in London, the son of John Campion, a clerk of the Court of Chancery, and Lucy (née Searle – daughter of Laurence Searle, one of the Queen's serjeants-at-arms). Upon the death of Campion's father in 1576, his mother married Augustine Steward, dying soon afterwards. His stepfather assumed charge of the boy and sent him, in 1581, to study at Peterhouse, Cambridge as a "gentleman pensioner"; he left the university after four years without taking a degree. He later entered Gray's Inn to study law in 1586. However, he left in 1595 without having been called to the bar.

On 10 February 1605, he received his medical degree from the University of Caen.

Campion is thought to have lived in London, practising as a physician, until his death in March 1620 – possibly of the plague. He was apparently unmarried and had no children. He was buried the same day at St Dunstan-in-the-West in Fleet Street.

He was implicated in the murder of Sir Thomas Overbury, but was eventually exonerated, as it was found that he had unwittingly delivered the bribe that had procured Overbury's death.

Poetry and songs

A Book of Ayres, 1601, with words by Campion and music by Philip Rosseter

The body of his works is considerable, the earliest known being a group of five anonymous poems included in the "Songs of Divers Noblemen and Gentlemen," appended to Newman's edition of Sir Philip Sidney's Astrophel and Stella, which appeared in 1591. In 1595, Poemata, a collection of Latin panegyrics, elegies and epigrams was published, winning him a considerable reputation. This was followed, in 1601, by a songbook, A Booke of Ayres, with words by himself and music composed by himself and Philip Rosseter. The following year he published his Observations in the Art of English Poesie, "against the vulgar and unartificial custom of riming," in favour of rhymeless verse on the model of classical quantitative verse. Campion's theories on poetry were criticized by Samuel Daniel in "Defence of Rhyme" (1603).

In 1607, he wrote and published a masque[6] for the occasion of the marriage of Lord Hayes, and, in 1613, issued a volume of Songs of Mourning: Bewailing the Untimely Death of Prince Henry, set to music by John Cooper (also known as Coperario). The same year he wrote and arranged three masques: The Lords' Masque for the marriage of Princess Elizabeth; an entertainment for the amusement of Queen Anne at Caversham House; and a third for the marriage of the Earl of Somerset to the infamous Frances Howard, Countess of Essex. If, moreover, as appears quite likely, his Two Bookes of Ayres (both words and music written by himself) belongs also to this year, it was indeed his annus mirabilis.

In 1615, he published a book on counterpoint, A New Way of Making Fowre Parts in Counterpoint By a Most Familiar and Infallible Rule,[8] a technical treatise which was for many years the standard textbook on the subject. It was included, with annotations by Christopher Sympson, in Playford's Brief Introduction to the Skill of Musick, and two editions appear to have been published by 1660.

Some time in or after 1617 appeared his Third and Fourth Booke of Ayres. In 1618 appeared the airs that were sung and played at Brougham Castle on the occasion of the King's entertainment there, the music by George Mason and John Earsden, while the words were almost certainly by Campion. In 1619, he published his Epigrammatum Libri II. Umbra Elegiarum liber unus, a reprint of his 1595 collection with considerable omissions, additions (in the form of another book of epigrams) and corrections.

Legacy

Minutes of the examination of Thomas Campion on the 26th Oct. 16 15, prior to the arrest of Sir Thomas Monson for complicity in the Overbury murder.

Campion made a nuncupative will on 1 March 1619/20 before 'divers credible witnesses': a memorandum was made that he did 'not longe before his death say that he did give all that he had unto Mr Phillip Rosseter, and wished that his estate had bin farre more', and Rosseter was sworn before Dr Edmund Pope to administer as principal legatee on 3 March 1619/20.

While Campion had attained a considerable reputation in his own day, in the years that followed his death his works sank into complete oblivion. No doubt this was due to the nature of the media in which he mainly worked, the masque and the song-book. The masque was an amusement at any time too costly to be popular, and during the commonwealth period it was practically extinguished. The vogue of the song-books was even more ephemeral, and, as in the case of the masque, the Puritan ascendancy, with its distaste for all secular music, effectively put an end to the madrigal. Its loss involved that of many hundreds of dainty lyrics, including those of Campion, and it was due to the work of A. H. Bullen (see bibliography), who first published a collection of the poet's works in 1889, that his genius was recognised and his place among the foremost rank of Elizabethan lyric poets restored.

Early dictionary writers, such as Fétis, saw Campion as a theorist. It was much later on that people began to see him as a composer. He was the writer of a poem, Cherry Ripe, which is not the later famous poem of that title but has several similarities.

In popular culture

Repeated reference was made to Campion (1567-1620) in an October 2010 episode of the BBC TV series, James May's Man Lab (BBC2), where his works are used as the inspiration for a young man trying to serenade a female colleague. This segment was referenced in the second and third series of the programme as well.

Occasional mention is made of Campion ("Campian") in the comic strip 9 Chickweed Lane (i.e., 5 April 2004), referencing historical context for playing the lute.

Charles Wood was born in Vicars' Hill in the Cathedral precincts of Armagh, Ireland, Charles was the fifth child and third son of Charles Wood Sr. and Jemima Wood. The boy was a treble chorister in the choir of the nearby St. Patrick's Cathedral (Church of Ireland). His father sang tenor as a stipendiary 'Gentleman' or 'Lay Vicar Choral' in the Cathedral choir and was also the Diocesan Registrar of the church. He was a cousin of Irish composer Ina Boyle.

Wood received his early education at the Cathedral Choir School and also studied organ with two organists and masters of the Boys of Armagh Cathedral, Robert Turle and his successor Dr Thomas Marks. In 1883 he became one of fifty inaugural class members of the Royal College of Music, studying composition with Charles Villiers Stanford and Charles Hubert Hastings Parry primarily, and horn and piano secondarily. Following four years of training, he continued his studies at Selwyn College, Cambridge, through 1889, where he began teaching harmony and counterpoint. In 1889 he attained a teaching position at Gonville and Caius College, Cambridge, first as organ scholar and then as fellow in 1894, becoming their first director of music and organist. He was instrumental in the reflowering of music at the college, though more as a teacher and organiser of musical events than as composer. After Stanford died in 1924, Wood assumed his mentor's vacant role as Professor of Music at the University of Cambridge.

According to his successor at Cambridge, Edward J Dent, as a teacher of composition, Wood "was surpassed only by Stanford himself [and] as a teacher of counterpoint and fugue he was unequalled". His pupils at Cambridge included Ralph Vaughan Williams, Nicholas Gatty, Arthur Bliss, Cecil Armstrong Gibbs and W Denis Browne. Dent says that, because Stanford did not reside in Cambridge, Wood took on the real burden on teaching for many years before his own election as Professor of Music, by which time his health was already undermined. He died in July 1926 after only two years in the post.

Personal life

He married Charlotte Georgina Wills-Sandford, daughter of William Robert Wills-Sandford, of Castlerea, County Roscommon, Ireland, on 17 March 1898. They had two sons and three daughters, including Lieutenant Patrick Bryan Sandford Wood R.A.F. (1899-1918), who was killed in an aircraft accident during the First World War and is buried at Taranto, Italy. The family's address in Cambridge was 17, Cranmer Road. He is buried at the Parish of the Ascension Burial Ground in Cambridge, together with his wife. There is a memorial to him in the north aisle at St Patrick's Cathedral, Armagh.

Music

Like his better-known colleague Stanford, Wood is chiefly remembered for his Anglican church music. As well as his Communion Service in the Phrygian Mode, his settings of the Magnificat and Nunc dimittis are still popular with cathedral and parish church choirs, particularly the services in F, D, and G, and the two settings in E flat. During Passiontide his St Mark Passion, written in 1920 for Eric Milner-White, the then Dean of King’s College, Cambridge, is sometimes performed. It demonstrates Wood's interest in modal composition, in contrast to the late romantic harmonic style he more usually employs.

Wood's anthems with organ, Expectans expectavi, and O Thou, the Central Orb are both frequently performed and recorded; as are his unaccompanied anthems Tis the day of Resurrection, Glory and Honour and, most popular of all, Hail, gladdening light and its lesser-known equivalent for men's voices, Great Lord of Lords. All Wood's a cappella music demonstrates fastidious craftsmanship and a supreme mastery of the genre, and he is no less resourceful in his accompanied choral works which sometimes include unison sections and have stirring organ accompaniments, conveying a satisfying warmth and richness of emotional expression appropriate to his carefully chosen texts.

After the fashion of the time Wood composed a series of secular choral cantatas between 1885 and 1905, including On Time (1897-8, setting Milton), Dirge for Two Veterans (1901, setting Walt Whitman), and A Ballad of Dundee (1904, setting W.E. Aytoun). There were also madrigals (including If Love be Dead, setting Coleridge), partsongs (such as Full Fathom Five) and solo songs, one of which, Ethiopia Saluting the Colours (setting Walt Whitman) attained high popularity.

Of the orchestral works, both the Piano Concerto (1886) and the Patrick Sarsfield Variations (1899) remained unpublished, although the Variations received a performance at the Queen's Hall Beecham Concerts in 1907. Walter Starkie said the work "shows his power of creating what may be called the Irish atmosphere in music".[9] It has been revived in modern times by the Ulster Orchestra, conducted by Simon Joly. However, Wood appears to have lost confidence and abandoned the orchestral medium after 1905. Three symphonies and an opera remained uncompleted.

He also composed eight string quartets (six numbered, plus the Variations on an Irish Folk Tune and a first movement fragment in G minor), spanning 1885 to 1917. The early quartets show the influence of Brahms, but from No. 3 in A minor (1911) a more personal voice emerges, partly through the use of Irish folk melodies and dance tunes as thematic material. There is a modern recording of No. 3 by the Lindsay Quartet. The quartets were edited after the composer's death by Edward Dent and published in a collected edition by Oxford University Press in 1929.

He is remembered for his Anglican Church music.

Both biographies taken from Wikipedia.

Sunday 12th June 2022 Trinity Sunday

I Will Sing With The Spirit     John Rutter

"I will sing with the spirit" is a sacred choral composition by John Rutter. The biblical text is taken from 1 Corinthians 14:15, adding to the second half of the verse an often repeated "alleluia". Rutter scored the piece for four vocal parts (SATB) and organ, adding other versions. He composed it in 1994 for the Royal School of Church Music in England.

The work was published by Oxford University Press in 1994. Marked "Brightly and serenely", the music is in A major and common time, and takes about three minutes to perform. Rutter also wrote a version for two upper voices and piano, and orchestral accompaniment for both versions. It is included in the collection John Rutter Anthems.

It was recorded several times, for example ending a collection of Rutter's choral works performed under his direction by the Cambridge Singers and the City of London Sinfonia, featuring his Mass of the Children. It is part of the 2008 Anniversary Collection of the Mormon Tabernacle Choir.

Text and music

The text, with its juxtaposition of "spirit" and "understanding", interpreted also as "heart" and "mind", has been used by church musicians to reflect the synthesis of the two elements needed in good church music. Rutter chose the text, "mingling the heart and mind of worship music", well for a school of church music. In the four-part version, the soprano alone presents the first part of the text. "I will sing" leaps up a sixth to a long note on "sing", in a first repeat even up an octave, followed by a sequence of "alleluia". In a third repeat, all voices sing the first version in unison, then they perform in homophony the second version and the alleluia. In a middle section, the second part of the biblical text is sung three times, marked three times dolce e legato. The soprano, the alto, finally the men sing "with understanding also", culminating in a four-part lively alleluia. In a reprise section, the first line is repeated by all voices, with imitation of motifs. A coda repeats alleluia two more times, rallentando to Lento, and gradually softened to pp, ending on a soft six-part long note.

Taken from Wikipedia.

John Rutter was born in London in 1945 and had his first musical training at Highgate School as a chorister. He studied music at Clare College, Cambridge where he wrote his first published music and had his first recording whilst still an undergraduate.

John Rutter [Wikimedia Commons]

His compositions cover a wide variety of musical genres but he is well know by all choirs who must have some Rutter in their repertoire. He formed the Cambridge Singers and spends his time composing and conducting.

He was awarded a CBE for services to music in the 2007 Queen's New Year Honours List.

Thursday 25th May Ascension Day

 Lift Your Heads   Anthem for Ascension  J S Bach

This comes from The Royal School of Church Music, words adapted by C S Phillips and the mean parts added by P C Buck. It is an anthem in 2 sections, it starts as a sedate 4/4 largamente passage 

"Lift your heads, ye gates eternal, 

Welcome your returning King:

 Angel choirs, with loud Hosannas 

make the courts of Heav'n to ring." 

Then we move to a swifter and dance -like 3/4 section, 

"For swift as an eagle that soareth on pinion, 

The son cometh home to the Father's dominion. 

His sorrows are ended, His lifework is done: 

Victorious He mounteth to take back His throne."

Johann Sebastian Bach (1685 – 1750) was a German composer and musician of the Baroque period. He was a highly respected organist in his lifetime, although not recognised as a composer of magnitude (possibly one of the greatest) until a revival of his works in the first half of the 19^th century. He showed considerable skill in counterpoint and harmony. He was able to adapt rhythm, form and texture from abroad. He was a prolific composer of church music due to the demand for huge numbers of cantatas over the Christian year.  It is thought her wrote over 300 with only around 200 surviving. He also wrote many other works sacred and secular.  It is now agreed that his music has technical command, intellectual depth and artistic beauty.