How shall I keep from singing?

A half-term break and a change of musical scene. Sunday morning saw us in the ancient university chapel of St. Salvator, St. Andrews. A rather loud organ (too large for the building, with a strident sound) was played expertly, and it was heavenly to sit back and listen to the choir of young student voices. Being Church of Scotland, there were also plenty of hymns for the congregation to join in as well, mostly with a distinct Iona emphasis.
Thursday’s Compline was held in the not-quite-but-almost-as-old chapel of St. Leonard. An equally good student choir – a different one from the Sunday choir – sang an introit, the psalm and Panis Angelicus by Saint Saens. Most of the service of Compline was said rather than sung, with a chance for the congregation to join in ‘Before the ending of the day’. A 10pm candlelit service will always have a special atmosphere, but nothing could beat the 5 minute silence at the end. It was easy to see how the monks would then depart in silence and hasten to bed. I fear the students had a more important appointment with the local hostelry.

The final Sunday of half-term was spent in Cardiff, at a rather different church: St. Teilos. A small congregation and an even smaller choir sang three traditional hymns and psalm together with a Eucharistic setting composed in-house, to the accompaniment of a fine organ played alternately by the resident organist and an organ scholar. Only a few (mostly musical) students had managed to find this warm-hearted congregation in a gem of a 19th century church, now partly reordered as a music and arts centre. I hope a few more do so soon.

There was no choir practice on Friday due to there being a concert in church. So we had to make do with a hurried practice of ‘the Heavens are Telling’ for ten minutes before the service, much to the consternation of the soloists. It was rather a rant but passed off well enough, although I think we could have done with a run-through of the final two pages which can tend to sound ragged. The soloists (or ‘augmented’ trio) sounded wonderful, with well-balanced voices.

There was no evensong so we enjoyed a rare break, although some of us attended a ‘Come and Sing Evensong’ workshop at another Creamtealand Church the day before. So many people are not used to singing Evensong at all any more, so we count ourselves very fortunate.

We sang for our supper again today – for it was the town church Harvest Lunch. It was also the 50th anniversary of one of our choristers being made priest, so he celebrated and preached and at special request asked us to sing Psalm 122 (a capella) as well as ‘Lead me Lord’ by Wesley. It is very rare for us to sing two anthems in one service but as he treated us to drinks on Friday after choirpractice, we agreed unanimously.

After a blow-out lunch of beef in ale and summer berry cheesecake, it was surprising how many people stayed awake in order to sing Evensong. The decision to sing a two-part anthem (‘I give you a new commandment’ by Aston) was probably a wise choice given the danger of a snooze seeming more preferable. We sang SA top line, TB lower line for a change (normally ST, AB), which sounded rather bare when unaccompanied during rehearsal but sounded fine with organ accompaniment on the night.

The name of our new vicar was announced at the start of both services – I only hope that the poor chap, coming from Oxford, is not expecting Oxford college standard singing every week. For a parish church we don’t do badly, but there is always room for improvement.

Today the death of one of our choristers was announced. It was a sad day.

Rather more children than normal came to the morning Eucharist, with the opportunity to present their harvest gifts. The music and liturgy were geared accordingly, with the choir singing Rutter’s ‘Look at the world’, a pleasant enough part-unison, part-harmony ditty. I just wish everyone could agree on the penultimate interval at the end of each verse.

Instead of evensong there was a USPG service – a reading and hymn sandwich. Fortunately, we still had a psalm, sung by the choir (Psalm 121, Walford Davies). The choir were excused from sounding wobbly today, in the light of the above news. And, my goodness, the visiting preacher turned up, which made a change from last week!