Choral Evening Prayer Westminster Cathedral November, 2nd 2011

[orbis factor]

Wolsey,

Many people WILL tune in expecting to hear Choral Evensong on Wednesday at 3.30. They don't always look up the Radio Times.

If you go to St Albans you will have seen the monthly Music List so will know that there will be a service of solemn eucharist for All Souls Day. Actually, in my opinion, they have far too many eucharists at the Abbey since Jeffrey John, God bless him, became Dean, it has gone very high up the candle these days. Sanctuary bells the lot. I don't mind, I rather enjoy the bells and smells, but the needs of the middle of the road Anglican are in danger of being overlooked in this otherwise wonderfully ecumenical place.

It is only in the last couple of years that the BBC have substituted a requiem Mass for CE at All Souls-tide as far as I am aware. Why don't they do a separate broadcast?

Perhaps the BBC ought to list this slot on Wednesdays as Cathedral Worship rather than Choral Evensong in future.

A more coherent broadcast would be, as I said, Choral Evensong with appropriate music and prayers for All Souls Day.

Orbis Factor,

Compared with Evensong the RC liturgy for Vespers is manifestly awful and lets the music and the choir down to say the least.

I've often thought that it would be a nice ecumenical gesture if Westminster Cathedral did a broadcast of Choral Evensong now and again. There can be no doctrinal objection to it and their congregation would have the pleasure of hearing the incomparable liturgy of the Book of Common Prayer. I won't hold my breath though as the Roman Catholic hierarchy just do not seem to be able to give any sort of lead toward Christian unity despite the last Pope agreeing that our separation is a scandal.

VCC.

Still not getting why the RC liturgy is awful and lets the choir down..

[Miles Coverdale]

If you look even cursorily at Catholic cathedrals music lists you will very quickly see that 'Anglican' music does indeed form pretty significant parts of their lists, as indeed does 'Catholic' music in Choral Evensongs.

At Westminster Cathedral, with the exception of the psalms, which are sung in English, all the music sung by the choir is in Latin.

[Guest]

You know exactly what I mean. Or do you have a problem with inverted commas and what they indicate.

[Guest]

Please, no personal abuse. This is not a school playground.

[orbis factor]

Please, no personal abuse. This is not a school playground.

Sorry - but the business of stating that the RC liturgy is manifestly awful (with no coherent argument as to why) on a public forum is pretty offensive to some of us too.

[Simon Biazeck]

Sorry - but the business of stating that the RC liturgy is manifestly awful (with no coherent argument as to why) on a public forum is pretty offensive to some of us too.

Well, of course, I agree with you Orbis, thank you! Not only is it personally offensive but also patronising to suggest that those of us who participate regularly in Choral Vespers are unwittingly being 'let down' by it. There is no reasonable response, because Evensong, as we know is based on Catholic monastic offices. I sing and greatly enjoy both forms of worship regularly with professional choirs in London and simply cannot imagine why anyone could be so prejudiced against one or the other unless that's a cipher for some other view. Unfortunately, I am not surprised that some of this thinly disguised intolerance appears on a board devoted to liturgical music. Disappointing and frustrating, which drove my previous, now deleted, attempt at humour.

[Miles Coverdale]

You know exactly what I mean. Or do you have a problem with inverted commas and what they indicate.

Actually, I don't know what you mean. If by Anglican music you mean music in English, then Westminster Cathedral do not sing Anglican music, and they are the most obvious example in this country of a Catholic cathedral. If you look at the two music lists currently available on the Drome's web site, it's wall-to-wall Palestrina, Victoria, Tallis and Byrd, with a smattering of Howells and Elgar, all of it in Latin. One of the main points of the Anglican liturgy as originally formulated is that it was/should be in English. I think the rubrics of the BCP still specifically say that the Mag and Nunc should be in English.

So what did you mean by 'Anglican' music as opposed to 'Catholic'?

Historical point for VCC: Evensong is an amalgamation of the offices of Vespers and Compline: the Magnificat and the opening responses comes form the former, the Nunc from the latter, so Evensong is about half Vespers in any case.

[Guest]

The singing is going to be a bit of an anti-climax after so much sound and fury, isn't it? I mean, it's only Monday, 37 postings and the guys haven't even sung a note yet!

I really did think people were a bit more relaxed about who sings what in cathedrals these days, but apparently not.

Plainchant is not everyone's cup of tea, even for Catholics, and I can well see that what looks like an entire hour of it for the relatively unversed might seem a bit dull, particularly if you think that the choir doing it has a lot more colour to offer. I suspect that VCC may have intended that as the basis of his / her cry of frustration rather than to dismiss plainchant entirely. But he/she is more than capable of writing his/her own footnotes.

I like plainchant, have sung it on and off all my life since 9 yrs old, love its disciplines and appreciate them well delivered on CD / live services, and do not find it a problem, but I imagine we all know some who writhe under its straitnesses.

Tallis, Byrd and James MacMillan all set both English and Latin texts, Palestrina and Victoria used Latin because that was the lingua franca of the day so that it could safely be exported to wherever the Roman rite was celebrated. Latin and English these days are the two favoured languages for international religious / liturgical writing, and cathedrals pretty well universally sing in both languages AFAICS, no matter what their mother denomination is.

[Simon Biazeck]

No, I'm sure they will sound splendid to all with open minds and ears!

[orbis factor]

The singing is going to be a bit of an anti-climax after so much sound and fury, isn't it? I mean, it's only Monday, 37 postings and the guys haven't even sung a note yet!

I really did think people were a bit more relaxed about who sings what in cathedrals these days, but apparently not.

Plainchant is not everyone's cup of tea, even for Catholics, and I can well see that what looks like an entire hour of it for the relatively unversed might seem a bit dull, particularly if you think that the choir doing it has a lot more colour to offer. I suspect that VCC may have intended that as the basis of his / her cry of frustration rather than to dismiss plainchant entirely. But he/she is more than capable of writing his/her own footnotes.

I like plainchant, have sung it on and off all my life since 9 yrs old, love its disciplines and appreciate them well delivered on CD / live services, and do not find it a problem, but I imagine we all know some who writhe under its straitnesses.

Tallis, Byrd and James MacMillan all set both English and Latin texts, Palestrina and Victoria used Latin because that was the lingua franca of the day so that it could safely be exported to wherever the Roman rite was celebrated. Latin and English these days are the two favoured languages for international religious / liturgical writing, and cathedrals pretty well universally sing in both languages AFAICS, no matter what their mother denomination is.

Around 95% (perhaps more) of WC's sung output is Latin - save a couple of English Jubilates and carols etc. But these are a rarity.

[ardcarp]

One should point out that the vast majority of Roman Catholic worship is in the vernacular, worldwide. It is only outside the sphere of parish worship where the Latin Rite is allowed....Vatican 2 and all that. And Mrs Ardcarp has just experienced a very noisy and definitely vernacular Messe that was anything but Solennelle in France....you know the sort of thing; banal tunes being batted to and fro between someone with a mike and a quarter-tone flat congregation.

[orbis factor]

One should point out that the vast majority of Roman Catholic worship is in the vernacular, worldwide. It is only outside the sphere of parish worship where the Latin Rite is allowed....Vatican 2 and all that. And Mrs Ardcarp has just experienced a very noisy and definitely vernacular Messe that was anything but Solennelle in France....you know the sort of thing; banal tunes being batted to and fro between someone with a mike and a quarter-tone flat congregation.

True

[onemarathon]

The Office for the Dead or a Requiem Mass?

Actually the music for the Requiem Mass is just more beautiful whether it be Mozart, Durufle, Faure. And who more appropriate a composer than Victoria in this year, the 400th of his death?

One of Victoria's greatest works sung by the choir which perhaps has more Victoria through their veins then any other in the UK, in an actual liturgical setting - one can smell the incense wafting over the catafalque already...

Apart from Magnificat, I doubt most people will be too disappointed. Victoria's Requiem will be different from some of the syrupy Victoriana but then for some people, that's a good thing.

[Magnificat]

Sorry - but the business of stating that the RC liturgy is manifestly awful (with no coherent argument as to why) on a public forum is pretty offensive to some of us too.

orbis factor

I am referring to the spoken parts of Vespers in modern English which just cannot compare with the BCP Evensong versicles, responses prayers, collects etc.

I'd say the same about Cof E modern rites. There is just no poetry about them - awful.

Offensive? - plenty of RCs and fellow Anglicans I know think the same.

VCC

[orbis factor]

Which bits exactly?