Advent Service from St John's: 2 December, 4pm

[mangerton]

[QUOTE=Caliban;228309][COLOR="#0000FF"]Looking forward to this - it's the cue to start on the Christmas cards, get the foreign ones all written, at least, for early sending... Shall make sure to be in and get scribbling after 'Veni Emmanuel'... What a great tune that is (and the Ord 'Adam' to follow ). Not so sure about the rest...


Thanks for posting. I'm looking forward to this too. Agree your two "likes" at the start. I could well do without the Rutter. Helmsley though is a great tune, and the excerpt from Rachmaninoff's Vespers is very moving.

It seems to have been a few years since they did Gibbons' This is the record of John, which is a pity.

[Simon]

If they can't or won't do it live, then the broadcast should be given to a foundation that can.

I've always been a fan of John's, ever since the wonderful GG, but there are several cathedrals around the country that could make an equally good job of such a service.

Re Record of John, I think there will be many that agree with you, Mangerton. But they have a target for the new and the trendy, so such great works are pushed out, I'm afraid.

[ardcarp]

Simon. I'm inclined to agree with you that if we can't have a live service from John's, then we ought to have it from somewhere else. But I would hardly call the bill of fare 'new and trendy' ! I've no idea what the new commission will be like but I can't see anything else on the list that is trendy exactly. I don't think William Whitehead's piece is likely to be spectacularly avant garde. Let's not forget that in Gibbons' time it was the norm for the 'organist' (for want of a better title) to be a composer and to write much of the stuff to be sung...i.e. it was contemporary.

[Miles Coverdale]

Oh sorry, I didn't know you had a normal way...! I just noticed the listing on the R3 schedule and copied and pasted. The line spacing isn't ideal, I agree. If you have a more readily-legible source, feel free. (Or copy it into a PM and I can amend my post!)... Didn't mean to tread on toes!

Blue text in bold isn't the easiest on the eye, perhaps.

[Vile Consort]

And, of course, much of Buxtehude's music was lost because a (not very much) later pastor threw it all out, declaring, "there's nothing so old as old music"!

Full Term at Cambridge ends on Friday, so the undergraduates will be heading off home. They will probably be getting kicked out of their rooms to make way for conferences. I am sure in my day we could stay for the whole term, not just Full Term plus a few days either end, which seems to be the case nowadays.

[Nick Armstrong]

Blue text in bold isn't the easiest on the eye, perhaps.

Noted & sorted

[Alison]

Having slept on it, maybe after all a recording from St Johns would be preferable to a live offering from most other institutions. I'm hoping for tip-top engineering as compensation.

[Simon]

Let's not forget that in Gibbons' time it was the norm for the 'organist' (for want of a better title) to be a composer and to write much of the stuff to be sung...i.e. it was contemporary.

Yes, you're right I suppose.

[Simon]

Having slept on it, maybe after all a recording from St Johns would be preferable to a live offering from most other institutions.

Having drifted up, partly working and partly wandering about, from the West Country a couple of weeks ago and having deliberately made time to drop in to two "other institutions", I can assure you that your use of the word "most" was very wise! For both of these were superb. Great repertoire, too.

[subcontrabass]

the excerpt from Rachmaninoff's Vespers is very moving.

But totally non-seasonal. The text is part of a service used on Saturday evenings and on the eves of lesser feasts throughout the year. Why do they not look for something that is appropriate to the occasion?

[orbis factor]

But totally non-seasonal. The text is part of a service used on Saturday evenings and on the eves of lesser feasts throughout the year. Why do they not look for something that is appropriate to the occasion?

But still an Ave Maria

[Il Grande Inquisitor]

Full Term at Cambridge ends on Friday, so the undergraduates will be heading off home. They will probably be getting kicked out of their rooms to make way for conferences. I am sure in my day we could stay for the whole term, not just Full Term plus a few days either end, which seems to be the case nowadays.

Yes, this note from St John's Chapel website makes this point clear:

This year the College will hold two Advent Carol Services on the 24 November 2012 at 6.00pm and 25 November 2012 at 4.00pm (a week before Advent owing to the way the University Term is this year). The Sunday Service will be recorded for broadcast by BBC Radio 3 at 4pm on Advent Sunday, 2 December.

http://www.joh.cam.ac.uk/chapel-services

[weston752]

[QUOTE=mangerton;228449] I could well do without the Rutter.

I would have thought this is one piece of Rutter that we could very much do with - a sensitive and reflective setting of John Audelay's words, being performed by the choir for which it was written.

[mangerton]

But still an Ave Maria

Thank you, orbis factor. That is what I had in mind.

weston 752 #28 - This could well be the exceptional piece of Rutter's which proves (tests?) the rule. I suppose I must give him the benefit of the doubt. We'll find out next week.

[Gabriel Jackson]

Trinity College, Cambridge's Advent Service is live online (video, not just audio) right now http://www.trinitycollegechoir.com/webcasts/live-video/