Advent Carols in the Chapel of St John’s College, Cambridge 29th Nov 2020 [L]

[ardcarp]

for instance: "O come o come Emmanuel"

Andrew Carter's arrangement of 'O Come' is truly thrilling. I think it's on one of St Paul's/John Scott's Advent CDs.

[Quilisma]

I'm very sorry that you want to leave this forum completely, Andrew, and I hope I have not caused this. If you can turn off notifications, the best option surely is simply not to visit it, and at some point in the future you might feel inclined to drop in again. I have done this frequently for months or years at a time: it is often a very depressing place indeed. Nevertheless, athough it may not seem so, many of us share many of your feelings about the state of things, even if we can't necessarily share all of your conclusions. Having been accused of treason repeatedly since midsummer 2016 on account of daring not to concur with "the will of the people", I know exactly what it is like to feel that virtually everything I have ever valued is being permanently destroyed, with the active approval of many people whom I know personally, and to see all my most pessimistic predictions gradually coming true. But my own feeling is that simply have no right to give in: after all, if we speak of the importance of being responsible custodians on behalf of future generations, that is what we must be ourselves.

Meanwhile, having recently moved flat I have been without broadband for a while, but as soon as it is activated I shall look forward to listening to the St John's Advent Carol Service. By all accounts it was truly outstanding. (Our Advent Procession has disappeared from view on YouTube already owing to provisional time limits on viewability for different categories of service, but it is still up as a video on Facebook, I think.)

[Andrew Butler]

I'm very sorry that you want to leave this forum completely, Andrew, and I hope I have not caused this. If you can turn off notifications, the best option surely is simply not to visit it, and at some point in the future you might feel inclined to drop in again. I have done this frequently for months or years at a time: it is often a very depressing place indeed. Nevertheless, athough it may not seem so, many of us share many of your feelings about the state of things, even if we can't necessarily share all of your conclusions. Having been accused of treason repeatedly since midsummer 2016 on account of daring not to concur with "the will of the people", I know exactly what it is like to feel that virtually everything I have ever valued is being permanently destroyed, with the active approval of many people whom I know personally, and to see all my most pessimistic predictions gradually coming true. But my own feeling is that simply have no right to give in: after all, if we speak of the importance of being responsible custodians on behalf of future generations, that is what we must be ourselves.

Meanwhile, having recently moved flat I have been without broadband for a while, but as soon as it is activated I shall look forward to listening to the St John's Advent Carol Service. By all accounts it was truly outstanding. (Our Advent Procession has disappeared from view on YouTube already owing to provisional time limits on viewability for different categories of service, but it is still up as a video on Facebook, I think.)

Leaving will stop me being tempted to comment and annoy people! I assure you that you have not upset me!

[Bella Kemp]

Leaving will stop me being tempted to comment and annoy people! I assure you that you have not upset me!

Stay around Andrew. Christianity teaches us that we can never avoid the worst, but then Spring, and Easter, will always come again no matter how deep the darkness.

[mw963]

Absolutely - please don't go Andrew. Sometimes it's just best to leave a forum to stew in its own juice, and then come back a few weeks or months later. I sometimes do exactly that, not just here but elsewhere.

You've had a rotten year by the sound of it, and things you've striven for have turned to dust. It's never easy to go through that. But whilst we're quite robust on here (and I'm sorry if anything I said on a certain other matter has appeared thus, although none of it was aimed at you, quite the reverse in fact) we're largely aiming at the same goals.

Take some time away but don't leave for good.

[Vox Humana]

He's gone. This is quite expected. He has deleted his Facebook account at least three times in the past and has had at least one previous profile here. He may return in due course—or not.

[mw963]

Thanks for the update Vox Humana.

[Eine Alpensinfonie]

Andrew Carter's arrangement of 'O Come' is truly thrilling. I think it's on one of St Paul's/John Scott's Advent CDs.

It is indeed. I first sang it in its pre-publication hand-written version. The choir had to process into York Minster, singing unaccompanied, and trying not to go flat to avoid embarrassment when the organ finally entered. We tried too hard, and went a semitone sharp instead. Fortunately, the organist had perfect pitch and transposed it accordingly, so all was well.