A Service for Advent with Carols [R] Chapel of St John’s College, Cambridge 3.xii.23

[Keraulophone]

Boys sound very different.

Please note that this choir now has a mixed front row of boys and girls, as well as female altos.

Therefore the choir is bound to sound different [IMHO - should some find this a conroversial statement!] from Andrew's or indeed George's day.

[Simon Biazeck]

This was wonderful. I listened via my mobile phone and headphones on a long train journey through bleak, wintry countryside and it lifted my spirits.

How wonderful - I must catch up.

[CallMePaul]

If you want a concert how about the Amsterdam version on 17th December, posted earlier? Otherwise I think perhaps it is fair to consider that what was broadcast today was regarded as a "service for Advent" by those participating?

I have now corrected my error - I had just returned from a concert and writing quickly. My apologies to all participants.

[CallMePaul]

Please note that this choir now has a mixed front row of boys and girls, as well as female altos.

Therefore the choir is bound to sound different [IMHO - should some find this a controversial statement!] from Andrew's or indeed George's day.

I was aware that there were plans to introduce girl choristers but did not realise that it had happened so quickly after the initial announcement. I am very surprised that it has female altos, so the sound will be very different. I have never felt that male and female voices blend well on the alto line, but forum members with direct choral experience may beg to disagree. Are female altos now common in Oxbridge college choirs? I know that many of them have (female) soprano choral scholars.

[cat]

Of the Oxbridge choirs without female sopranos, all now have female altos except for King's. It's no bad thing to have variety imo, so one Oxbridge choir remaining all-male is a good thing, and perhaps King's could do more to advocate for that given there are several female-only choirs, although keeping their head below the parapet is probably wise. People might point to their privilege of having the Christmas broadcasts when talking of equality of opportunity for girls, but perhaps it's time to distribute those broadcast opportunities more widely, although I'm not sure any of the other Oxford foundations would jump at the chance given the pressures involved.

[DracoM]

So are we seeing the slow but ever-quickening demise of one of English music's greatest glories, namely the boys upward all-male choir?
Is it institutional policy? Opportunity? DoM / clergy choice?

[cat]

With regard to SJC, AN was referring to the sound noticeably changing within a few months due to a new director, and not due to the gender of the choir members as there were female altos and girl choristers already present before he departed.

[cat]

So are we seeing the slow but ever-quickening demise of one of English music's greatest glories, namely the boys upward all-male choir?
Is it institutional policy? Opportunity? DoM / clergy choice?

It’s obviously the easier path for individual DoMs to go down when challenged on the matter, and many might think it a good thing that their particular choir should widen access. But of course there is no grand plan that ensures a certain proportion of choirs of different types remains in existence. A similar thing has happened to Oxbridge choirs in the past with children being replaced by adults on the front row, although that trend thankfully arrested itself before completion.

[DracoM]

<< that trend thankfully arrested itself before completion >>
How? Why?

[cat]

<< that trend thankfully arrested itself before completion >>
How? Why?

Interestingly the end of child choristers came before the advent of women undergraduates in most cases and was apparently due to the expense of educating them or the inconvenience of recruiting them from local schools. In Cambridge, Trinity ditched their choristers and became an adult male choir in the late 1950s. Clare College did likewise in the 1960s. Both remained without a front row for many years until women undergrads were admitted. Other colleges did similar, Queens' stopped recruiting boys in 1940, Christ's at some point before women were admitted. etc etc

John's didn't go the same way because George Guest successfully campaigned in the 1950s to stop them closing their own chorister school.

King's College School went through a rocky patch in the 1960s when some in the college opposed its existence on the grounds that unlike the college it was only accessible to the privileged, but this was resolved by the introduction of bursaries and outreach programs and the appointment of Michael Till as Dean who was a keen advocate of the school.

I'm not sure about Oxford so much, but presume it was a similar story there.

[vinteuil]

I'm not sure about Oxford so much, but presume it was a similar story there.

... I can only speak for my college (Exeter) - it was all male when I was up : boy trebles and male countertenors were replaced with female sopranos and altos in 1995

https://www.exeter.ox.ac.uk/about/choir/

.

[mopsus]

Some Oxford and Cambridge choirs admitted women before their Colleges did, and took them from other Colleges, local girls' schools (no talk of safeguarding under-18s in those days), or the general population. In Oxford, Merton had women on the top line (Emma Kirkby among them) a decade or so before the College admitted them in 1980. In Cambridge, Corpus choir also contained women before the College did, after a period when the soprano/treble line was sung an octave down by some tenors. I recall music marked up for this in the choir library and it must have sounded very odd. Both these Colleges were among the last ones to admit women.

[Wolsey]

Is it institutional policy? Opportunity? DoM / clergy choice?

Foundations with mixed choir schools are compelled to offer equality of opportunity, otherwise the school will fail its ISI inspection.

[CallMePaul]

Foundations with mixed choir schools are compelled to offer equality of opportunity, otherwise the school will fail its ISI inspection.

Surely, if a DoM or Dean wanted an all-boys treble section, he could claim a "genuine occupational qualification" as happens in other sections of society. Do I assume that is how Kings, with a mixed choir school, is able to maintain its all-male tradition?

[cat]

Surely, if a DoM or Dean wanted an all-boys treble section, he could claim a "genuine occupational qualification" as happens in other sections of society. Do I assume that is how Kings, with a mixed choir school, is able to maintain its all-male tradition?

I’m not sure that would be applicable to children’s education. King’s have complied with equality requirements by instituting a boarding, bursary and choral program for girls that hasn’t altered the college choir, and which was given the thumbs up in this year’s ISI inspection.