CE St Davids Cathedral [L] Wed, June 2nd 2021

[anoncoward]

I just don’t agree with that. The circumstances at the moment aren’t ideal, but we have hopefully dealt with the worst; this isn’t videos made at home anymore or endless archive repeats. There is live singing for worship going on all the time now.

The fact that women are constantly on the back foot in choral music (and numerous other parts of society) isn’t ok. Please don’t try and belittle the problem and just accept the status quo!

It seems odd then that when another gender issue was being discussed on this forum in January 2019, you considered it OK to ‘belittle’ it by asking... “Does the gender of the front row really matter?”

Come on #BasilHarwood, buck up your ideas and be consistent!

[VaughnMR192]

White, male, and stale. Come on UK cathedrals - buck your ideas up, update your music lists and diversify your composers.

Hello, thanks for your feedback. It is well appreciated.

I am a Vicar Choral at St Davids Cathedral. The choirs of the cathedral be it in the Junior Choir, Voluntary choir or the Cathedral Choir perform music all year round by a wide range of composers including those which identify as Gay, Straight, Bisexual and Transgender. Composers that are White and Black, and both Male and Female composers.

Perhaps this in particular programme from St Davids doesn’t represent a very diverse composer set; however, St Davids is the first cathedral to employ a Girls’ Choir as the main cathedral choir. The cathedral employs female organists who frequent at the cathedral regularly. They have females in each and every choir at the cathedral including the main professional choir. They have a VERY diverse staffing and are very welcoming to everyone that visits St Davids regardless of Race, Gender, Disability or Sexuality. The Dean is female, they employ a female operations manager, female altos, female Vergers... the list goes on!

If you look at the past 4 programmes of R3CE, I feel your comment about not diversifying CE is a bit of an off the cuff comment considering that either 2 or 3 week ago lots of people were annoyed that a professional female and male choir was singing/using too much vibrato in CE and that the contemporary pieces were dull and not easy to listen to (including pieces which were composed by females!) - There hasn’t been a 50/50 of male to female composers, but I feel over the past 4 programmes that female composers have not been under represented.

I do however feel that this issue of under representing female composers does need to be a LOT better within choral music industry of today. It is getting better but still not good enough.

In addition to this, we are running on limited rehearsal time at the moment. Remembering well known music after a year of the cathedral being closed has been hard enough. We’re just trying our best and we’re glad that services are back with congregations to enjoy the singing too.

I hope you enjoy the service.

All best,

Vaughn

[BasilHarwood]

Cheers everyone for your comments, all read and understood.

I wish St David's all the best with their CE and am not picking at them directly, their programming just makes me think about this entire issue. I am asking for more variation and an active attempt at diversifying liturgical music. Broadcast CEs are the most perfect outlet for this. End of rant.

[jonfan]

am not picking at them directly.

Really? #2 your first reaction and the first response to this thread. Perhaps your ‘rant’ should have been considered on a separate thread.

[Miles Coverdale]

Maybe I'm missing something, but I always thought that the idea of equality was that we should look beyond the colour of someone's skin, their sex or their (insert your characteristic of choice) and consider the individual, but now we seem to concentrate on little else, so I can't help thinking that something's gone badly wrong somewhere.

The idea that music should be programmed purely because its composer is female is, in my opinion, rather tokenistic, not to say patronising.

[DracoM]

The idea that music should be programmed purely because its composer is female is, in my opinion, rather tokenistic, not to say patronising.

Got tp say, I agree with almost every syllable. Sadly for many futures?

[anoncoward]

Maybe I'm missing something, but I always thought that the idea of equality was that we should look beyond the colour of someone's skin, their sex or their (insert your characteristic of choice) and consider the individual, but now we seem to concentrate on little else, so I can't help thinking that something's gone badly wrong somewhere.

The idea that music should be programmed purely because its composer is female is, in my opinion, rather tokenistic, not to say patronising.

Absolutely agree

[Resurgam]

[QUOTE=VaughnMR192;849668]

St Davids is the first cathedral to employ a Girls’ Choir as the main cathedral choir. The cathedral employs female organists who frequent at the cathedral regularly. They have females in each and every choir at the cathedral including the main professional choir. They have a VERY diverse staffing and are very welcoming to everyone that visits St Davids regardless of Race, Gender, Disability or Sexuality. The Dean is female, they employ a female operations manager, female altos, female Vergers... the list goes on!

The only thing you don't have by the look of it is a choir of men and boys. Shame.

[anoncoward]

[QUOTE=Resurgam;849738]

St Davids is the first cathedral to employ a Girls’ Choir as the main cathedral choir. The cathedral employs female organists who frequent at the cathedral regularly. They have females in each and every choir at the cathedral including the main professional choir. They have a VERY diverse staffing and are very welcoming to everyone that visits St Davids regardless of Race, Gender, Disability or Sexuality. The Dean is female, they employ a female operations manager, female altos, female Vergers... the list goes on!

The only thing you don't have by the look of it is a choir of men and boys. Shame.

https://www.stdavidscathedral.org.uk/discover/music

[Caussade]

[QUOTE=anoncoward;849750]

https://www.stdavidscathedral.org.uk/discover/music

If I were Oliver Waterer, I'd certainly be programming what the choir knows well and can turn around quickly in far from normal conditions. And of course he's also programming to a specific liturgical festival, so that adds another limiting element. I have no doubt that the choir keeps a substantial amount of music by female composers in its lists; but perhaps none of it fits the sweet spot in this particular Venn diagram - and this is hardly the moment to be learning new works for broadcast. Anyway, it would be a shame for spats about quotas and assorted fits of the vapours to overshadow the fact that this will be OW's last broadcast at St David's - he's off to Selby Abbey in the autumn. He's done a grand job over the last 8 years and deserves thanks and congratulations for his work. I think the boys's choir was disbanded when it became impossible to maintain. The population of the city in 2020 was just 1600 people...it's frankly a miracle that they maintain a high-quality choir at all.

[VaughnMR192]

We do have a boys’ choir.

[jonfan]

[QUOTE=Caussade;849774]

If I were Oliver Waterer, I'd certainly be programming what the choir knows well and can turn around quickly in far from normal conditions. And of course he's also programming to a specific liturgical festival, so that adds another limiting element. I have no doubt that the choir keeps a substantial amount of music by female composers in its lists; but perhaps none of it fits the sweet spot in this particular Venn diagram - and this is hardly the moment to be learning new works for broadcast. Anyway, it would be a shame for spats about quotas and assorted fits of the vapours to overshadow the fact that this will be OW's last broadcast at St David's - he's off to Selby Abbey in the autumn. He's done a grand job over the last 8 years and deserves thanks and congratulations for his work. I think the boys's choir was disbanded when it became impossible to maintain. The population of the city in 2020 was just 1600 people...it's frankly a miracle that they maintain a high-quality choir at all.

Absolutely agree about OW’s superb contribution to the music at St Davids. It’s good he’s including a third Howell’s canticle setting in this CE. There were superb performances of the the Gloucester and B minor in 2015 and 2016 that would have been the match of an Oxbridge choir.

[ardcarp]

I do however feel that this issue of under representing female composers does need to be a LOT better within choral music industry of today. It is getting better but still not good enough.

Good to have a contribution from you Vaughan...someone at the chalk face! It seems to me that women composers have contributed more in the choral field than in other musical genres. Two Elizabeths (Maconchy and Lutyens) two Judiths (Weir and Bingham)...I could go on. But let's listen to St. David's tomorrow (Wednesday) and enjoy!

[mopsus]

I'd love to hear Elisabeth Lutyens' canticles written for Coventry Cathedral, but I'm not holding my breath. Did she write anything else that might reasonably appear in a service broadcast on Radio 3 CE?

On the subject of parity, there are probably more female contributors to this forum than would appear. A wish not to be patronised causes many women to use male noms de plume (or whatever the internet equivalent is) in some subject areas.

[DracoM]

Reminder: today @ 3.30 p.m.