CE Blackburn Cathedral Oct 16th 2013

[ardcarp]

This might cheer everyone up ...

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/health/children_shealth/10394004/Confessions-of-a-choir-mother.html

RJ

Lovely post Roger, and good for them.
But without wishing to get drawn into the disputatious nature of things, I'd just say:
Oxford. Middle Class. Easy Peasy.

[Miles Coverdale]

But that's only because choir directors are sneakily training their girls to sound like boys - trying to steal the essential boyness detected by Draco and others.

No, it's because the majority of people can't recognise what they're hearing. As I've said to some of my colleagues when discussing this topic, there are two things which annoy people on this board, especially the more 'traditionalist' ones. The first is that they're often not told whether it's boys or girls singing, as if they have some divine right to this information. The second, which annoys them even more than the first, is that they can't tell the difference.

As for choir directors 'sneakily' training girls to sound like boys, if they are, they haven't managed to fool me yet (although there's a first time for everything).

[Gabriel Jackson]

I think she was being facetious...!

[jean]

She was.

She had this in mind:

It is undoubtedly true that there is a qualitative difference between the sound a good girls' , a good boys' and a good mixed choir make...The various timbres boys and girls make at both the top and bottom of their registers are distinctive. Yes, some DoMs are adept at making one gender sound like the other: one might argue that New College Oxford of late has trained boy trebles to sing with production and diction plus vibrato that makes them sound very like young but adult women almost to the point of caricature some might suggest.

Which seems to posit an absolute difference between boys' voices and girls', while allowing for the possibility of even the most perceptive listener being fooled...

[ardcarp]

If anyone hasn't already, do have a listen to last Sunday's The Choir.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b03d7pl5

Lots of lovely music (including Mendelssohn's Lift Thine Eyes and Vivaldi's Magnificat in G minor) all written for and performed by women's voices.

[Gabriel Jackson]

Which seems to posit an absolute difference between boys' voices and girls', while allowing for the possibility of even the most perceptive listener being fooled...

What you have to remember, Jean, is that vibrato is a VERY BAD THING that only pesky women indulge in. It is very naughty of Edward Higginbottom to deny the New College choristers' essential boyness by allowing it and to confuse listeners into the bargain.

[ardcarp]

Oh dear......

[Magnificat]

1. Introducing girls *was* a way of thinking outside the box; at one cathedral near here recruitment (options severely limited by so many factors,despite built into the system that there's no space to list them here) tripled within 9 months, and has stayed strong, because the boys are now under less pressure and had some time with their families at weekends. They were singing eight services a week, including Saturday, in addition to a full day-school timeable. What parent is going to buy that for their child? Both sets of choristers are thriving. 2. Middle-class parents are not always the most helpful demographic when it comes to chorister recruitment; they are more likely to be the ones with the skiing plans at Christmas, or the ones who take half-term breaks abroad which clash with rehearsals. 3. Do you seriously think cathedrals have money to throw at professional recruitment consultancies? What sort of recruitment consultancy knows anything about this issue, or would be in the least bit interested in the brief? Do you know how much these people charge even to switch on their laptops? 4. It seems pretty obvious to me that the Preston church is doing better than the cathedral because they're asking less time of people. One or two years of strong recruitment does not indicate a long-term ability to recruit; let's see how they are doing in three years from now. And of course numbers do not indicate quality of applicant. Even Barry Rose had to operate some sort of quality control, despite your frequent protestations to the contrary.

Caussade,

I agree the advent of girls' choirs in the cathedrals was a sort of thinking outside the box but it wasn't done with helping recruitment of boys in mind, the idea was that girls ought to have the same sort of musical education ( including the chance to sing in cathedral choirs ) as boys in this day and age and there is no doubt that it was becoming impossible to deny them this.

There have been helpful side effects for the recruitment of boys in that their workload has been lightened (I did, in fact, say that D&Cs should be more aware of this and put the needs of choristers and, of course, their parents and siblings first more than they seem to do ) some cathedral timetables were and still are becoming unsustainable. Girls also have brothers and I know of several who joined the boys' choir as a result of their sisters singing in the girls'choir.

There were warnings, however, of the danger of girls taking over as they had already done in many parish church choirs and I am afraid that we are starting to see this happening not least in that CE broadcasts from several cathedrals are always by the girls choir or use mixed boys and girls.

What the cathedrals have to sell is not an impossible timetable ( although as with any sporting activity singing requires a lot of effort and practice, for example, to become skilful at it ) it is more that a boy will be experiencing doing something at the very highest standard possible with all the advantages and good habits that will supply him with during his life, the widely acknowledged benefits for school such as improvement in concentration ( one teacher at the Abbey Primary School in St Albans, despite being a very irregular attender at services, donated £25,000 on her retirement to endow a choristership because she had seen so often how much singing in the choir improved boys' attitudes to learning generally during her career ) and how to work within a team.

When Barry Rose was at St Albans I was told by a cathedral warden who knew exactly how Barry operated and whose son was a chorister that he would take any boy and teach him to sing as long as he and his parents were committed to the choir. I believe that the only times he turned someone away was if the boy had an impediment in his voice that could not be corrected and would make it impossible to train; and as regards the parish church near Preston it is just as obvious to me that the choirmaster has considerable energy and dynamism and is prepared to go out and recruit boys for his choir unlike some complacent, lazy cathedral organists!

Turning now to thinking outside the box currently, perhaps professional recruiters are not the answer, although some may relish a challenge and see a business opportunity and may have some useful ideas but it would be very expensive I agree.

What I would like to know, however, is how many cathedrals have a youth ministry or policy involving not just choristers but other children and young people in other activities?

I know of one well known member of a chapter ( who has written to the old BBC choir board and tangled with one or two of us on a particular matter ) who, when asked whether his cathedral did any youth work other than running the choirs, said they had no young people's policy at all and did not see that they should do anything as it was not what the cathedral was for! A very shortsighted attitude in my view as any church should be looking for ways to bring in the children - its future after all - and more boys and girls being involved is always an opportunity for chorister recruitment.

More radically I really think that every cathedral should have a parish not just act as the mother church of the diocese as it would be then able to become much more involved in its locality and again be able to reach out to more young people ( possibly more prospective choristers ) than currently darken its doors with, I would hope, a vigorous well resourced youth policy. I certainly know of cathedral clergy who would rise to this sort of challenge but whether the majority of D&Cs would want to disrupt their cosy lifestyles with some hard missionary work - probably not and again how short sighted this would be for the church.

VCC

[terratogen]

This might cheer everyone up ...

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/health/children_shealth/10394004/Confessions-of-a-choir-mother.html

RJ

Oh, dear. A delightful article... and then the comments.

[jean]

Especially this one:



We must make sure young men and boys never again congregate among themselves... that's not allowed... solidarity is not permitted... they must always have a female infiltrating the ranks... males together are dangerous... boys and man cannot be allowed to create beauty among themselves... Typically when the solidarity is destroyed, the boys lose interest and walk away from the arts...

This make all the "high minded people" very happy... Mission accomplished...

[DracoM]

'Ve haff vays of lighting ze blue touch paper!'

[french frank]

As a matter of interest (taking up one or two of the comments under the article, not here), if a boy treble sounds both different and unique, what does an 11-year-old girl sound like that makes her not unique?

[ardcarp]

Careful ff. Don't start them all off again......

[french frank]

I withdraw my query in that case. I don't think I really need to know ...

[jean]

Pity. It's a good question.