CE Salisbury Cathedral Wed, 11th March 2015

[Magnificat]

[QUOTE=Quilisma;474002.
Now I must actually listen to the Salisbury broadcast! It's a great music list, and a wonderful choir and cathedral, so I'm sure I'm in for a treat. Besides, we really like Salisbury here. Our Dean was there before he came here, and he is an excellent advert for the place.[/QUOTE]

Q

He was also previously Precentor at St Albans during BR's time so he will know a good choir of men and boys when he hears one. Should keep you all on your toes!!

VCC

[Magnificat]

But that answer simply leads to the next ‘why?’. If, as was found at York, the boys’ services prove more popular despite the boys’ and girls’ sounds being virtually indistinguishable, what is it that makes the boys’ contribution more appealing in the main?.

decantor,

I think we are safe with York next week judging by the anthem chosen. They wouldn't give that iconic solo to a girl would they? But who knows these days when nothing is sacred anymore including church music!!

VCC

[W.Kearns]

decantor,

I think we are safe with York next week judging by the anthem chosen. They wouldn't give that iconic solo to a girl would they? But who knows these days when nothing is sacred anymore including church music!!

VCC

You only do it to annoy because you know it teases.

[terratogen]

decantor,

I think we are safe with York next week judging by the anthem chosen. They wouldn't give that iconic solo to a girl would they? But who knows these days when nothing is sacred anymore including church music!!

VCC

Would that they did! York's girls are tremendous and make a sound more than appropriate to this or any other treble holy grail; I would love to hear one or two of them on that solo. In this case, though, I do know that York's likewise tremendous boys did the Mendelssohn 'Hear My Prayer' in a recent Evensong, so I'd bet that it's boys we'll be hearing next week.

[Vox Humana]

I think we are safe with York next week judging by the anthem chosen. They wouldn't give that iconic solo to a girl would they?

Actually, the last thing Hear my prayer needs is a boy soloist - or a cathedral choir, for that matter. Give the solo to the fruitiest, most operatic soprano you can find - and preferably sing it in German. It's high time the mould was broken and the piece heard with some real, blood-curdling drama. To be fair, I've heard performances that come very near, but I'm not sure the boy has yet been developed who can imbue the solo with quite the terror it requires. As for that cuddly, white dove in the last movement, can someone shoot it, please? Dear old Felix should have focused less on the "be at rest" and more on the "get me out of here" that the psalmist clearly intended.

[ardcarp]

My own daughter sang it very beautifully at a cathedral evensong aged about 12. She did sound then and does now, aged 40-ish, rather like a boy chorister though. And I disagree with you, Vox. Mendelssohn (as Handel had done some 150 years earlier) knew the prevailing taste in English choral music and just did it better! Uber-Romantic (sentimental?) music sung in a cool fashion is all the more powerful!

[Vox Humana]

This is the sort of thing I had in mind. I really like this interpretation (even though I can't warm to the box organ or the placing of the microphone right in front of it). Incidentally, I appreciate that the English text has precedence, the piece having been commissioned for an English concert. Not that that's any reason why cathedral choirs shouldn't sing it - I don't really object. :)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H_Y38au5tOs

[ardcarp]

Great stuff, Vox. Lovely soloist. Maybe the choir lacked her passionate warmth. Ernest Lough did not, of course, have a 'straight' chorister's voice.

[Magnificat]

Great stuff, Vox. Lovely soloist. Maybe the choir lacked her passionate warmth. Ernest Lough did not, of course, have a 'straight' chorister's voice.

ardcarp

Barry Rose said at a talk I heard him give that Hear My Prayer was not a piece he particularly liked and I can only remember him doing it once at Evensong in St Albans.

The Archdeacon was due to give the sermon afterwards but was too overcome to preach.

VCC

[ardcarp]

Hear My Prayer was not a piece he particularly liked

I think it went heavily out of fashion between, say, 1960 and 1990 when many musicians were sniffy about Victorian music. It disappeared almost completely from cathedral music lists. I'm not sure it's scheduled that often nowadays. S.S. Wesley seems to have been represented continuously, though; maybe because he was a 'mainstream' cathedral organist...so mainstream in fact he held a post almost everywhere!

[Magnificat]

I think it went heavily out of fashion between, say, 1960 and 1990 when many musicians were sniffy about Victorian music. It disappeared almost completely from cathedral music lists. I'm not sure it's scheduled that often nowadays. S.S. Wesley seems to have been represented continuously, though; maybe because he was a 'mainstream' cathedral organist...so mainstream in fact he held a post almost everywhere!

ardcarp

And, of course, you need a boy with an exceptionally good voice, if not the 'Golden Voice,' to do it and they are few and far between. Obviously York have one at the moment and I am very much looking forward to hearing him sing.

VCC

[Hawker]

I don't catch every single CE but of the ones I have over the last few years this has to have by far the best psalm accompaniment-it was like a symphony, perfectly capturing the text. Bravo Mr Challenger

Bravo, indeed! We were there and can confirm the all girls top line. The BBC's producer and engineer were saying JC's accompaniment of the psalms was one of the highlights for them, too. There were speeches and a presentation afterwards as it was the engineer's last CE after 35 years and he was obviously very highly regarded.