Category Archives: category-defying

RIP Joanna

I was sorry to learn this week of the death of Joanna Wiesner at the age of 96. You couldn’t be very involved in choral music in Bath without coming across her, in my case mostly through the South West … Continue reading

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my favourite Zooms

There is a parody of the first verse of ‘My Favourite Things’ by Ian McMillan doing the rounds ‘Lawyers in meetings who look just like kittens…These are a few of my favourite Zooms’. I’ve added a couple of verses specific … Continue reading

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Lichfield, the geeks’ cathedral

I hope they won’t mind my describing them that way. Not long ago I wrote about their project to crowdsource transcriptions of their 19th-century music lists. I’m still at work on this, a few days of music at a time … Continue reading

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Scottish echoes

Our Director of Music puts a lot of effort into stitching our videos of ourselves into a coherent synchronised whole, and in general the result sounds as it might in the warm but not resonant acoustic of our church. However … Continue reading

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Round-up of 2019

This wasn’t a particularly notable year with obvious high points, rather one in which I revisited places (Truro Cathedral) and works I had not encountered for a long time. The latter included three Requiems (Mozart, Brahms and Howells’), the last’s … Continue reading

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railway bitonality

My recent visit to Japan (the previous one was just before I started this blog) didn’t have a great deal of musical content, but I was able to observe again one feature of travel there: the use of distinctive melodies … Continue reading

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in praise of … the hire score

I have a rule of thumb that if it costs no more than twice as much to buy a score as to hire it, I’ll buy. (This seems to happen increasingly often.) There are advantages to singing from a score … Continue reading

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one-church denominations

I apologise in advance that this isn’t really about music, although there is a slight musical angle to it. On my way to a Lord’s Test match last year I walked along the Regent’s Canal and noticed a handsome church … Continue reading

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Lichfield dedications

For the last few years Lichfield Cathedral Choir have set a themed quiz at Advent and Lent, with a question each day. I have in the past had fun identifying Cathedral choir stalls and music setting the word ‘star’, though … Continue reading

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Review of the year: 2018

I don’t think that this was a particularly vintage year, though there was one obvious highlight: singing in Mahler 8 at the Proms. For public exposure that is hard to beat! If there was a theme to the year, it … Continue reading

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