CE Ely Cathedral on Armistice Day [L] Wed, November 11th 2020

**DracoM** · 11-11-20, 10:22

Reminder: this LIVE CE @ 3.30p.m. this afternoon 11.xi.20

**Quilisma** · 11-11-20, 18:35

I hope people found this satisfactory; the past few days have been very tiring, but in a good way.

**DracoM** · 11-11-20, 19:58

A real delight.
Girls in cracking form, total commitment from all, and a fine statement for this day of days.
As usual, Ely acoustic inspiring!

Liked the Patterson.

**jonfan** · 11-11-20, 20:32

Originally posted by Quilisma View Post

I hope people found this satisfactory; the past few days have been very tiring, but in a good way.

Satisfactory? It was magnificent! I wasn't able to pay close attention live but have since listened later through headphones and found it all most beautiful and involving. Lovely warm sound from the girls caressed by the enveloping acoustic of Ely, their carol CD of last year was my favourite Christmas purchase. One senses the fenland mists in the empty cathedral. Many enjoyable moments throughout but the most moving was the Patterson - heart stopping in its simple beauty. Everyone can feel proud to have offered such a moving tribute on 11/11. Thrilling Bach at the end.
I see the boys recorded a CE yesterday so look forward to that.
The sound was very good at capturing the vast space but detail was not lost. Two occasions when the right channel distorted on loud, high sounds.

**DracoM** · 11-11-20, 20:36

Hope the choir / et al get to know of our approval!!!!

**ardcarp** · 11-11-20, 20:36

The Blatchley piece (they shall not grow old) is a real stunner. It's (obviously) written in a backward-looking style, but can bring tears to the eyes, I was a member of a choir who sang it soon after its first airing (Albert Hall? St Paul's?). It was just the sops singing of course, but one of my tenor colleagues, now an internationally acclaimed tenor, played the trumpet part. I think we were all blown away by the piece. I thought Ely did a great job today, but I felt the girls might have let themselves go a bit more in the Blatchley!

GREAT TO HAVE LIVE CEs BACK!!!

**Pulcinella** · 11-11-20, 20:40

Originally posted by jonfan View Post

Satisfactory? It was magnificent! I wasn't able to pay close attention live but have since listened later through headphones and found it all most beautiful and involving. Lovely warm sound from the girls caressed by the enveloping acoustic of Ely, their carol CD of last year was my favourite Christmas purchase. One senses the fenland mists in the empty cathedral. Many enjoyable moments throughout but the most moving was the Patterson - heart stopping in its simple beauty. Everyone can feel proud to have offered such a moving tribute on 11/11. Thrilling Bach at the end.
I see the boys recorded a CE yesterday so look forward to that.
The sound was very good at capturing the vast space but detail was not lost. Two occasions when the right channel distorted on loud, high sounds.

Ely is one of the cathedral choirs to feature on the cover CD of the next BBC MM: Christmas Carols from British Cathedrals, the cover of which also shows Ely, in snow.

**jonfan** · 11-11-20, 22:02

A word of appreciation for the Guest setting of Binyon’s verse; not one note too many with a simple statement of the text and a surprise chord on ‘old’. A perfect devotion setter for a service as it was today.

**Finzi4ever** · 12-11-20, 08:18

Originally posted by ardcarp View Post

The Blatchley piece (they shall not grow old) is a real stunner. It's (obviously) written in a backward-looking style, but can bring tears to the eyes, I was a member of a choir who sang it soon after its first airing (Albert Hall? St Paul's?). It was just the sops singing of course, but one of my tenor colleagues, now an internationally acclaimed tenor, played the trumpet part. I think we were all blown away by the piece. I thought Ely did a great job today, but I felt the girls might have let themselves go a bit more in the Blatchley!

GREAT TO HAVE LIVE CEs BACK!!!

CAVE! pedant at work: no E in Blatchly. Mark wrote it when very young - the more profound for that; it captures the zeitgeist, I feel.

Well considered to plump for classical Latin pronunciation of the Horace Odes 3.2 text. I'm not sure how comfortably the 'pagan' poet's Roman Ode sentiments fit in a ecclesiastical context: if there is any sense of the Wilfred Owen disdain for the phrase intended by its use at Remembrance time then it was wholly absent in the Patterson setting. Layer upon layer: to take that one stanza out of the Ode's context is also to misunderstand it.

**DracoM** · 12-11-20, 10:12

On BBC Radio 2 'Folk Programme', Mark Radcliffe played June Tabor's unforgettable 'Flowers of the Forest' to mark Armistice Day - alias the Ballad of Young Willie McBride.
Made me think: bet no-one dared to play THAT sad, angry song loudly at any of the huge and ceremonial 'events' that were non-stop featured yesterday?

Sorry - totally off-topic, but....well, let it lie.

**Quilisma** · 12-11-20, 13:14

Delighted that people enjoyed it! We all did too, particularly because until late last week it seemed probable that both of our broadcasts would be cancelled, and not long before that it looked as if we would be lucky to be permitted to continue with any of our singing commitments at all during lockdown, whereas it has turned out that we are allowed to do all of it provided that everything is behind closed doors and is either broadcast or live-streamed. We are very well aware of just how fortunate we are to be functioning at the moment: many other places haven't been so lucky when it comes to being able to satisfy the very strict criteria.

You are right that we did another broadcast on Tuesday with the boys, which will be aired at Epiphany. It was particularly strange to experience the schizophrenic seasonal disjunct, with the perennial statues of the Three Kings brought out of storage for the occasion to stand among the scattered poppies of Remembrance, but I shall refrain from commenting on that service until it has been broadcast, of course! We're really looking forward to hearing it, and January is not THAT long to wait, I suppose... Obviously yesterday's service was with a different front row, director and organist, and the three ATB extras were different each time too, but the sixth-form choral scholars and the six lay clerks sang for both broadcasts. Suffice to say, we are rather tired now, although today has become boys-only (the typical "Tuesday" set-up) so that we can recuperate a bit!

I must concur with the prevailing view about the Patterson: I didn't quite know what to make of it at first, without the tune, but I soon came to realise that it is really effective. The decision to use reconstructed Classical Latin pronunciation (because the text is by Horace and is not ecclesiastical) was made jointly by the composer and SEAM, who likes to have a rationale and is strongly in favour of classical philology! I note, however, that if we had been more strictly observing reconstructed Classical Latin pronunciation we would have needed to do elisions and nasal vowels ("Dulce et decorum est" scans as five syllables, not seven!), but that is not how the composer sets the words... The word of the day is compromise!

It was a pity that there was distortion at a couple of points, but placing microphones and setting levels is particularly difficult in a situation where the choir is very much more spread out than usual owing to social distancing. These were the first occasions since September when we have tried having more than eight singers across the back rows of the stalls. Also, with the boys we have typically been in ATB BTA formation recently, whereas with the girls at the moment it is usually BTA ATB, because a couple of sixth-form girls often sing as alto choral scholars and this makes the formation more logical. The BTA ATB formation meant that with more singers than we have been using since September the basses in particular had to be right out in the wings on both sides, which brought all sorts of extra challenges for ensemble and audibility, and I daresay this showed at least occasionally in the playback. Incidentally, the numbers are particularly high in the girls' ranks at the moment because we are midway through a shift of age range from 13-18 to 11-16. That's a good problem to have, though!

We are also very relieved that the organ decided to behave itself. It has been distinctly temperamental over the past few weeks and months, despite repeated (expensive) visits from tuners and engineers, largely because of guidelines about keeping the doors open all the time during the day (even in a building which is enormous and notoriously draughty at the best of times). One never quite knows which bits will be not working or unusable or just hideously out of tune on any given day. As if Aaron and Glen didn't have challenging enough jobs already: I have enormous admiration for them!

P.S. Feel free to drop in our YouTube channel at any time for live-streamed services. We're definitely "open", even if only virtually for now...

**Barry Rose** · 12-11-20, 14:09

[QUOTE=Finzi4ever;815557]CAVE! pedant at work: no E in Blatchly. Mark wrote it when very young - the more profound for that;

One of my rare posts to this group.
Just to set the record straight, 'For the Fallen' was written in 1980 for a specific occasion - the Royal British Legion Festival of Remembrance at the Royal Albert Hall. The organisers asked if the St.Paul's Cathedral choristers could take part in the event (which they did for the next two years) and between us all, we came up with the idea of using the words that are proclaimed later in the evening - 'They shall grow not old, as we that are left grow old'.
Mark Blatchly had come to St.Paul's as Organ Scholar straight from school, at the age of 17, and a year later, as a leaving present, he had written us this individual and stylish setting of the Magnificat (and Nunc Dimittis) - https://www.dropbox.com/s/whyy8dybcy...80%29.wav?dl=0.
By 1980, Mark was up at Oxford, as Organ Scholar at Christ Church, and I rang him there to talk about the Festival of Remembrance, asking him, if he did agree to do a setting of the Binyon poem, to eschew his own style and write something 'very English and a bit-Elgarian' ! He met the challenge brilliantly and it was sung at the very beginning of the Festival (with Mark playing the organ), just as the Queen and Royal Family had taken their places. At the Festival we were asked to do a shortened version, with both refrains, though we did sing the complete setting in an Evensong the same week. The only recording of the event that I know of is out there on YouTube. The picture and audio are not good, so if anyone has a better copy, I, and several ex-choristers, would be delighted to hear about it. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PHZ1Vh4RRG4
As yet, I don't think anyone has mentioned the beautifully paced psalm singing in yesterday's Service. Thank you Ely for that, AND the complete psalms for the day. As I never ceased to remind my colleagues, when I was running the CE programme, it was extended from 45 minutes to an hour on the understanding that we'd have the complete psalms for the day, and the complete organ voluntary - not some over-long Introit or anthem !

**Simon Biazeck** · 12-11-20, 14:32

[QUOTE=Barry Rose;815581]

Originally posted by Finzi4ever View Post

CAVE! pedant at work: no E in Blatchly. Mark wrote it when very young - the more profound for that;

One of my rare posts to this group.
Just to set the record straight, 'For the Fallen' was written in 1980 for a specific occasion - the Royal British Legion Festival of Remembrance at the Royal Albert Hall. The organisers asked if the St.Paul's Cathedral choristers could take part in the event (which they did for the next two years) and between us all, we came up with the idea of using the words that are proclaimed later in the evening - 'They shall grow not old, as we that are left grow old'.
Mark Blatchly had come to St.Paul's as Organ Scholar straight from school, at the age of 17, and a year later, as a leaving present, he had written us this individual and stylish setting of the Magnificat (and Nunc Dimittis) - https://www.dropbox.com/s/whyy8dybcy...80%29.wav?dl=0.
By 1980, Mark was up at Oxford, as Organ Scholar at Christ Church, and I rang him there to talk about the Festival of Remembrance, asking him, if he did agree to do a setting of the Binyon poem, to eschew his own style and write something 'very English and a bit-Elgarian'! He met the challenge brilliantly and it was sung at the very beginning of the Festival (with Mark playing the organ), just as the Queen and Royal Family had taken their places. At the Festival we were asked to do a shortened version, with both refrains, though we did sing the complete setting in an Evensong the same week. The only recording of the event that I know of is out there on YouTube. The picture and audio are not good, so if anyone has a better copy, I, and several ex-choristers, would be delighted to hear about it. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PHZ1Vh4RRG4
As yet, I don't think anyone has mentioned the beautifully paced psalm-singing in yesterday's Service. Thank you Ely for that, AND the complete psalms for the day. As I never ceased to remind my colleagues, when I was running the CE programme, it was extended from 45 minutes to an hour on the understanding that we'd have the complete psalms for the day, and the complete organ voluntary - not some over-long Introit or anthem!

Thank you - what a fine setting. On the strength of the Mag., it should be taken up widely. A couple of moments ("for he-e that is mi-ighty...) remind me of Vann in C (Peterborough Service in C major, 1972?), itself such an evocative setting! Thanks for the history behind Mark Blatchly's For the Fallen - it is superb and that TV recording on YouTube is terrific.

SBz.

**Quilisma** · 12-11-20, 17:32

[QUOTE=Barry Rose;815581]

Originally posted by Finzi4ever View Post

CAVE! pedant at work: no E in Blatchly. Mark wrote it when very young - the more profound for that;

One of my rare posts to this group.
Just to set the record straight, 'For the Fallen' was written in 1980 for a specific occasion - the Royal British Legion Festival of Remembrance at the Royal Albert Hall. The organisers asked if the St.Paul's Cathedral choristers could take part in the event (which they did for the next two years) and between us all, we came up with the idea of using the words that are proclaimed later in the evening - 'They shall grow not old, as we that are left grow old'.
Mark Blatchly had come to St.Paul's as Organ Scholar straight from school, at the age of 17, and a year later, as a leaving present, he had written us this individual and stylish setting of the Magnificat (and Nunc Dimittis) - https://www.dropbox.com/s/whyy8dybcy...80%29.wav?dl=0.
By 1980, Mark was up at Oxford, as Organ Scholar at Christ Church, and I rang him there to talk about the Festival of Remembrance, asking him, if he did agree to do a setting of the Binyon poem, to eschew his own style and write something 'very English and a bit-Elgarian' ! He met the challenge brilliantly and it was sung at the very beginning of the Festival (with Mark playing the oragn), just as the Queen and Royal Family had taken their places. At the Festival we were asked to do a shortened version, with both refrains, though we did sing the complete setting in an Evensong the same week. The only recording of the event that I know of is out there on YouTube. The picture and audio are not good, so if anyone has a better copy, I, and several ex-choristers, would be delighted to hear about it. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PHZ1Vh4RRG4
As yet, I don't think anyone has mentioned the beautifully paced psalm singing in yesterday's Service. Thank you Ely for that, AND the complete psalms for the day. As I never ceased to remind my colleagues, when I was running the CE programme, it was extended from 45 minutes to an hour on the understanding that we'd have the complete psalms for the day, and the complete organ voluntary - not some over-long Introit or anthem !

Thank you very much for this background, and also for your very kind comments about our psalmody! Incidentally, the SEAM chants were written specially for this occasion, and the pointing was by Aaron, I believe. This made for interesting discussion with my esteemed neighbouring choral scholar, an ex-chorister, who was very familiar with the 11th Evening psalms as they were in PT's version of the psalter, and as we broadcast on 11th September 2013, when he was ten, and when I, and indeed EA, had been in post here for a mere ten days... We are still in the stage of trying various alternatives before settling firmly on a definitive new psalter, and we usually tend to stick fairly closely to what we used to do, but it's always good to ring the changes. (Someone recently got rather grumpy with me when I told him that we haven't kept everything exactly as it was under Sidney Campbell in about 1950, but there we are.)

Now in the Song School for the first livestreamed daily evensong by the boys: as it turns out I'm not down to chaperone today I'm strictly speaking not allowed in the Cathedral proper during the service, but I've kept the door open while doing legitimate librarian work (and will have to reload the folders after the service ready for tomorrow's early morning rehearsal). Do join us on YouTube, as and when you might so desire. Nothing unusual, just the daily round of the Opus Dei, as it comes. (And yes, some days might well be relatively less "impressive" than others.) https://www.youtube.com/c/ElyCathedralCambridge

CE Ely Cathedral on Armistice Day [L] Wed, November 11th 2020

CE Ely Cathedral on Armistice Day [L] Wed, November 11th 2020

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