Llandaff Cathedral Choir

[Guest]

Very sad news here. The cathedral choir will cease to exist after tomorrow night.




A sad day for music in Wales

Thank you for all your support over the last few weeks of campaigning to save Llandaff Cathedral Choir.

Sadly, the Cathedral Chapter made the terrible decision today to sack its Choir just five days before Christmas.

The Cathedral Choir, which has appeared twice on the BBC’s Songs of Praise this year, is one of the last cathedral choirs in Wales to employ professional singers.

This is a damaging and short-sighted decision by the Cathedral Chapter with huge repercussions for the individuals involved and for Llandaff Cathedral. We believe that, if the Cathedral had supported the Choir’s own fundraising plans and taken up the offers of support from the Save Llandaff Choir Campaign, it could have raised the necessary funds to keep these musicians employed.

You can read our response to today’s decision on the campaign website.

We now need your continuing support as the choristers’ consider submitting an appeal against redundancy.

The choir’s final performance will be a concert tomorrow at 7pm at the Cathedral.

As an example of what just one concert can do, the fundraising concert held earlier this week raised £1,280 to support the Cathedral’s Music Department. We remain convinced that our detailed fundraising proposals offered a viable alternative to redundancies.

You can continue to help us: please ask people to register their support for the choir.

In the mean time, we would like to wish you a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year.

Best wishes

Henry Vann and David Abrahams
Save Llandaff Choir and the Incorporated Society of Musicians

[DracoM]

Appalling news. Would be nice to know what else the Chapter had considered to be cut instead of the choir - e.g. clergy numbers?

[Gabriel Jackson]

Appalling news. Would be nice to know what else the Chapter had considered to be cut instead of the choir - e.g. clergy numbers?

They don't seem to have many of them either! Extraordinary and disgraceful that such a momentous decision was made without a Dean in post.

[Chris Watson]

Do they really think that with the choir gone people are going to turn up just to hear their sermons?
I've always been comforted by the thought that despite all this waffle about eternal life, once these wretched priests have turned to dust and their names have been forgotten, the music and the names of the composers and musicians who worked for them live on.

[DracoM]

Indeed, Chris. And how much does the music expressing the act of worship make an impact, keep a hold, even convert, even proselytise? One might suggest rather more than the clergy. A scarily shortsighted move. A skeletal church with no heart?

[Gabriel Jackson]

Indeed, Chris. And how much does the music expressing the act of worship make an impact, keep a hold, even convert, even proselytise? One might suggest rather more than the clergy.

That's what some of them hate about music, of course.

A scarily shortsighted move. A skeletal church with no heart?

But with a fantastic new organ...

[Vox Humana]

Indeed, Chris. And how much does the music expressing the act of worship make an impact, keep a hold, even convert, even proselytise?

I find it ironic that the clergy (at least in my particularly puritanical corner of the world, but I think everywhere else too) are currently wringing their hands over how to get more youngsters into church when they themselves are the prime reason for the problem. In my opinion, the best way of getting children into church is to encourage and nurture choirs. All the priests I know would second this wholeheartedly. I have never yet met a priest who didn't want his choir stalls to be full and his processions to look impressive. Frankly, however, this isn't going to happen unless you take music seriously. Really seriously, I mean. Make it strategic. Delegate the music comprehensively to a professional musician, employed at a realistic rate with a remit to develop the church's musical foundation. Make music a proper ministry. Make it part of the DoM's job description to pull in the youngsters and give them a full musical and religious education. Then, if you are lucky, they may remain faithful through to adulthood. The Americans know full well how to do this. Over there even ordinary town churches may offer full time DoM jobs. Just look at what is going on in this Methodist church and the structure of the musical programme: http://www.asburyweb.org/Music/index.htm. I was here in 1998 and everything was healthy and vibrant then; it looks even better now.

Alas, it is already too late for the British church, which has so attenuated, discouraged and alienated musical talent that there is now little or no basis for any recovery. It is not entirely the clergy's fault. Most people economically active today were born after the explosion of pop music in the 50s and 60s. It is the product of these generations that for some time has been shaping today's general musical taste. Pop music is now the cultural norm. Classical music is perceived to be at best specialised and at worst elitist. Class music in schools is also much less classically orientated than it was too - just ask the universities. The clergy are of this generation and are simply relating to what they are able to comprehend - which, musically, isn't much.

Classical church music is still alive in pockets here and there. However, it is moribund and ultimately doomed. A change of priest can destroy a long-established tradition overnight - this has been proved many times. In due course such destruction will ensure the end of traditional classical church music, choirs, probably organists and, eventually, the church itself.

I highlight this profoundly depressing scenario merely to put Llandaff into perspective. Do I detect the sort of serious focus on music that I have recommended above? No. I merely have visions of hands thrown up in horror, accompanied by cries of, "No, you don't understand, it's impossible." Probably, at this stage of the game, it is. More shame on Llandaff if so. It is not the first cathedral to run into financial problems. Rochester has already been there but has solved it in a way that has at least been able to keep the four-part choir going. Sadly, I very much fear that these two examples are just the thin edge of the wedge. More will follow.

[W.Kearns]

In view of the significant place choral music has held in the history of Anglican worship, I've never understood exactly why the C of E theological colleges give it such little attention. Experience - as VH's lucid post bears out- suggests that clergy surely ought to have more grasp of why the tradition of music in church counts for so much.

[ardcarp]

Over there [USA] even ordinary town churches may offer full time DoM jobs.

And in Norway too.

In my opinion, the best way of getting children into church is to encourage and nurture choirs.

Absolutely. Sitting in a crowded airport departure lounge yesterday, Mrs A. and I chatted with an adjacent family. A delightful 11-year-old girl was telling us animatedly about the church choir she belonged to, and it was obviously an important part of her life. The family was not especially 'religious' which just goes to show how music can draw people in. It is clear there was a charismatic DoM in the background, and presumably supportive clergy too.....which is the key to it all.

But with a fantastic new organ...

The point of which is.....?

[Tallis]

I highlight this profoundly depressing scenario merely to put Llandaff into perspective. Do I detect the sort of serious focus on music that I have recommended above? No. I merely have visions of hands thrown up in horror, accompanied by cries of, "No, you don't understand, it's impossible." Probably, at this stage of the game, it is. More shame on Llandaff if so. It is not the first cathedral to run into financial problems. Rochester has already been there but has solved it in a way that has at least been able to keep the four-part choir going. Sadly, I very much fear that these two examples are just the thin edge of the wedge. More will follow.

Not all doom and gloom!
Did you see the article in the Christmas edition of Organist's Review Magazine about the new state catholic Cathedral Choir School In Leeds? This seems to be just one part of a massive programme of church music across Yorkshire driven from Leeds Cathedral. It appears that serious music can in fact be used (as in previous generations) to involve children and rejuvenate the church. In this case it seems on the scale of an industry. Is it just a Catholic thing? http://www.dioceseofleedsmusic.org.uk/

[ardcarp]

Is it just a Catholic thing?

No. It's because people in authority have seen sense.

[Vox Humana]

Not all doom and gloom!
Did you see the article in the Christmas edition of Organist's Review Magazine about the new state catholic Cathedral Choir School In Leeds? This seems to be just one part of a massive programme of church music across Yorkshire driven from Leeds Cathedral. It appears that serious music can in fact be used (as in previous generations) to involve children and rejuvenate the church. In this case it seems on the scale of an industry. Is it just a Catholic thing? http://www.dioceseofleedsmusic.org.uk/

Yes. Although I don't take Organists' Review any more, I had heard about the programme at Leeds. We could do with more of that sort of thing. What knock-on benefits is it having out in the diocese? Down here, if you talk traditional church music to an Anglican parish priest the response you will usually get is a dismissive, "Oh, we don't want to ape cathedrals." It's so short-sighted. I do know one or two churches (with adult choirs) where you can hear decent music, but in these cases the priest himself is musical. In the city where I live there is no church music to speak of. There is now not a single choirboy and, so I was told recently, only one young girl chorister.

[Gabriel Jackson]

The point of which is.....?

Precisely!

[bach736]

Do they really think that with the choir gone people are going to turn up just to hear their sermons?

Last year, I attended a carol service in our local parish church - excellent RSCM choir and organist. The vicar launched into a 20 minute sermon right in the middle - totally destroyed it. Unbelievable.

Not so long ago, we went to Midnight Mass at a church that was bursting at the seams - standing room only. Instead of welcoming his congregation,
the vicar berated them from the pulpit for not turning up every Sunday.

Anglican clergy? You couldn't make it up.

[Vox Humana]

Not so long ago, we went to Midnight Mass at a church that was bursting at the seams - standing room only. Instead of welcoming his congregation,
the vicar berated them from the pulpit for not turning up every Sunday.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RpNIwx32F30