I celebrated my birthday by going and singing Mendelssohn’s anthem with a visiting choir (the combined forces of St. Peter’s Caversham and St. John’s Mortimer) in Bristol Cathedral. It seems to be one of those anthems that is famous, but little performed (largely on account of its length, I suspect). At any rate I think this is only the third performance of it I’ve ever sung.
The rest of our service was rather more routine: Rose responses, Noble in B minor and Farrant’s Hide not thou thy face. Bristol made us welcome; I hadn’t sung in the Cathedral within the lifetime of this blog, although I walk past it every time I go to the office.