ST PAUL’S CATHEDRAL CHOIR ALED JONES ANDREW CARWOOD WITH THE CATHEDRAL CHORISTERS OF BRITAIN 1 George Frederic Handel Zadok the Priest @ William Walton Jubilate Deo 3:44 (Coronation Anthem) 5:38 Solo trebles: Hugh O’Donnell, Kasper Lootens, Oscar Pavey Solo altos: Christopher Field, Matthew Venner Felix Mendelssohn Hear my Prayer Solo tenor: Jon English Solo bass: Tim Jones 2 I. Hear My Prayer 5:39 3 II. O for the wings of a dove 5:34 £ Howard Goodall The Lord is my shepherd (Psalm 23) 3:06 Solo treble: Nathaniel Morley Solo treble: Nathaniel Morley 4 Charles Villiers Stanford Justorum Animæ 3:39 $ John Rutter The Lord bless you and keep you 3:07 5 Thomas Weelkes Hosanna to the Son of David 1:58 % Paul Mealor Ubi caritas 4:39 Solo treble: Ndiana Essien 6 Thomas Tallis Salvator mundi [I] 3:13 ^ John Rutter A Gaelic Blessing 2:06 7 Henry Purcell O God, thou art My God 3:35 & C. Hubert H. Parry I Was Glad 7:20 Solo trebles: Toby Hunt, Oscar Pavey Solo alto: David Bates Solo tenors: Roy Rashbrook, Andrew Yeats Solo bass: Martin Oxenham * John Rutter A Gaelic Blessing with Aled Jones Especially arranged by John Rutter 2:06 8 Maurice Greene Lord, let me know mine end 5:58 Solo trebles: Nathaniel Morley, Leo Greenlees 9 John Ireland Greater Love Hath No Man 6:35 Solo treble: Benjamin Irvine-Capel Solo bass: Edward Grint St Paul’s Cathedral Choir The Cathedral Choristers of Britain 1, ^, &, * 0 Ralph Vaughan Williams O Taste and See 1:49 Solo treble: Benjamin Irvine-Capel Aled Jones Baritone * Simon Johnson Organ 1-3, 7-$, ^-* ! Henry Balfour Gardiner Evening Hymn 6:36 Andrew Carwood Director 2 he album presented here created just by you and your friends. diction, to shape beautiful vowel sounds don’t need to be religious, you don’t brings together St Paul’s The most obvious benefit of being a for optimum tone, to create the careful even need to be Christian. Although, T Cathedral Choir with choristers chorister is the total submersion in precision which can only be achieved by even as I write that, I’m aware there is a from fifty cathedral choirs across music. As a young singer, you have listening intently to those around you certain spirituality that all choristers Britain, all in support of a vital new the opportunity to gain a complete and blending your tone and rhythm with come to know well. It’s something that charitable enterprise – the Diamond musical education by a process of theirs – all of these skills become second lurks in the silences of a darkening nave Fund for Choristers. And when I write osmosis. When you come to hang nature, and all of them have strange while rush-hour traffic chugs about ‘vital’, I mean it from the bottom of up your cassock for the final time at and unexpected use and resonance just yards outside the West door. It’s a my heart. This fund finances bursaries the age of 13 you will – without even later in life. And then there’s the sheer, spirituality that is wrapped up in the and projects to help children from having realised it was happening, unadulterated pleasure of it all. Choral ritual, the mystery, and the beauty of less well-off families to benefit from because you were just having a music, to this day, has the power to this ancient tradition of religious music. the greatest single leg-up they can be lovely time singing – have personal move me so profoundly that I can lose And I’m going to call this spirituality given in life: to become a chorister. experience of every age and fashion of myself in it for hours and just ride out ‘The Privilege of Choristership’. Along Now, I know that sounds overblown. music from the ancient fauxbourdons the happy contemplations it evokes. It is with the outstanding tradition of Britain’s And, yes, it is a bold claim. But the more of plainchant, to the exciting knotty a constant and lifelong tiding of comfort cathedral music, that is what this album I think about it, the truer I realise it is. textures of anthems so contemporary and euphoric joy. celebrates. We must do all in our power to preserve it for the future generations. I was lucky enough to be a boy chorister that the composers themselves might At St Mary’s, which had a good mix of at St Mary’s Cathedral in Edinburgh, very well have conducted you. boy and girl choristers as is now fairly and I owe my entire career to the You will have breathed life into everyone typical in cathedrals up and down the knowledge I gained there. It was where from Buxtehude to Britten to Bach to country, and then later at Trinity College, I learnt to perform, and where I learnt Bridge to Bax to Brahms to Byrd to Cambridge, where I was a choral scholar, to use the full range of my voice. It Bairstow to Bruckner to Bliss – and those I sang with people from all walks of was where I learnt to listen, and where are just a few of the Bs in the roster of life. I sang alongside people of different I learnt to write comedy, and where I great composers – and you will know faiths and plenty of none at all. And I am learnt to carry a pencil at all times. But them, and value them, and love them in always heartened by the ethnic diversity most importantly, it was where I learnt the way only a performer truly can. The in our cathedral and college choir rooms. the wonderful truth that something musicianship you absorb as a chorister It goes to show that you don’t need to exceptional, something as beautiful as is astounding too: the way to phrase be a boy to be a chorister, you don’t anything you can find anywhere, can be elegantly and musically, to project good need to be a toff to be a chorister, you Alexander Armstrong 3 St Paul’s Cathedral Choir here has been a choir of boy 2015) and in 2016 HM The Queen’s choristers and Vicars Choral 90th Birthday. T at St Paul’s for over nine The choir regularly commissions new centuries. The choir was enlarged and works; in recent years, these have re-organised in the late nineteenth been from Sir John Tavener, Sir Peter century under Sir John Stainer, Maxwell Davies, John Rutter, Francis and St Paul’s was one of the first to Grier, Judith Bingham, Nico Muhly, care properly for its choristers with Will Todd and Judith Weir appropriate housing and education. The choir has given concerts The present choir consists of around extensively in the UK, Europe, Japan thirty singing boys and twelve adults. and North America including in The Choir is at the heart of the daily recent months Freiburg, Aldeburgh round of worship in the Cathedral and Frankfurt. In April 2015, the choir singing daily Evensong during term toured the United States, performing in time and three services on a Sunday. Boston, Atlanta, Houston, Washington In addition it takes part in a number DC, Minneapolis and Chicago. of services of national importance, The gentlemen of the choir, the Vicars many of which are broadcast around Choral, are full-time professional the world. Most recently these have musicians. The Choir is led by the included the celebration of HM The Director of Music, Andrew Carwood Queen’s Diamond Jubilee (2012), the who came to St Paul’s in 2007 after a funeral of Baroness Thatcher (2013), career as a professional singer and services to mark the end of military conductor. He is supported by a team activities in Afghanistan, the 200th of organists led by Simon Johnson. anniversary of the Battle of Waterloo and the 10th anniversary of 7/7 (all in 4 5 riends of Cathedral Music’s Cathedral choristers go on to provide Diamond Fund for Choristers the backbone of many an adult choir, Faims to raise £10m to help UK and the best go on to outstanding cathedral chorister families in need careers in music. But choristers tend with the costs of voice training; to help to do well whatever career path choristers develop and flourish; and to they choose. sustain Britain’s oldest living cultural Cathedral music is one of the UK’s heritage, dating back 1400 years. greatest contributions to world Rising costs and shrinking resources culture. Our cathedral choirs are the make cathedral choirs increasingly best in the world, admired around difficult to sustain. We cannot afford to the globe; cathedral choristers lose them because the wide range of acknowledge the transformative effect skills choristers pick up from singing in of their training on their lives. The a cathedral choir gives them the best benefits flow back to the workplace, possible start to life. the community and the nation. Singing in a cathedral choir enables the The Fund, started in 2016, supports disadvantaged to succeed in life. It also projects at cathedrals around the breaks down barriers between children country, and plans many more. For from different backgrounds. more information go to fcm.org.uk, or contact [email protected]. Cathedral choirs offer the public uplifting music and an oasis of calm in You can donate via JustGiving at a busy and tense world. justgiving.com/focathedral-music. 6 St Paul’s Cathedral Choir The Cathedral Choristers of Britain St Paul’s Cathedral Alto Bass Aberdeen: Lewa Olaosebikan New College, Oxford: Oscar Ross Choristers David Bates James Birchall Arundel: Madaleine Hallam Newcastle: Amelia Lewis Michael Bell Patrick Craig Michael Bundy Bangor: Owain Fisher Newport: Jack Templar-Johns Oscar Curtis Christopher Field Michael Craddock Birmingham: Lucie Prince Norwich: Barnaby Shaw Hugh Davies Karl Gietzmann John Evanson Blackburn: Elizabeth Fielding Peel, Isle of Man: Mackenzie Brown Toby Davies David Gould Edward Grint Bradford: Zachary Smith Peterborough: Annabelle Pick Toby Edgar Davies Rory McCleery Edward Jones Brecon: Margaret