After a gap of a few years, I rejoined Peterborough Chamber Choir for a weekend in Salisbury Cathedral (which I also hadn’t visited for a few years).
The highlight of this weekend was another chance to sing Howells’ evening canticles in B minor, which I’ve only done once before. They seem to come round much more in broadcasts than they appear in the repertoire of visiting choirs, which these days generally confine themselves to Gloucester, Coll Reg and St Paul’s; even the setting in G seems to be a rarity now. We paired them with Bruckner’s Ave Maria in honour of the Cathedral’s dedication.
On Saturday we sang Vann’s ‘Salisbury’ canticles (still in the choir library at Salisbury – do they ever perform them?), Greene’s Lord, let me know mine end and Richard Shephard’s Responses (I pointed out that these last were ‘coming home’). Sunday morning was Bairstow’s Let all mortal flesh and Vierne’s Messe Solennelle. The latter piece, very familiar to me, caused problems with different editions. I rehearsed from the little cut-down French edition I’ve always used – the most expensive score members of the Erleigh Cantors have ever had to buy – but realised that there were discrepancies over matters such as note lengths with the American one which everyone else had. So I took that one into the service with me as well. It was good to see the organ part in full, but to my horror I found that the C# major ‘Dona nobis pacem’ had been thoughtfully written out in Db. I felt sure I’d make mistakes, so whipped out the French copy part way through the Agnus and reverted to singing from it. (I was once told that very sharp keys in French church music symbolise heaven (e.g. Duruflé’s In Paradisum, Messiaen’s O Sacrum Convivium), although I can’t find anything online to back me up on this. If so, this symbolism is wrecked by writing the passage out in Db).
I was rather sorry that the Rite of Coffee is no longer celebrated in the Chapter House. And maybe this will be my last time in their current song room as (following the lead of Wells, Exeter and others) they are intending to create a new one.