I joined the choir of St Mary’s Bathwick to sing at the Assumptiontide Festival of the C of E Catholic Societies in Bristol. Actually that is a bit inaccurate because so many of that choir were away that fewer than half the singers were from St Mary’s, the rest having been drafted in from outside.<\/p>\n
First there was a Solemn Concelebrated Mass at the Cathedral, with movements from Byrd’s four-part setting. We sang all 10 (!) verses of Ye who own the faith of Jesus<\/em>, a favourite hymn in its abridged version of the Catholic headmistress at my primary school. We must have sung it there at least once a fortnight. As yesterday, there was a mismatch between our verses and the congregation’s. Some less familiar hymns too, including one which I found myself singing for the first time while processing!<\/p>\n There was a less solemn moment: a huge crash during our offertory motet, Britten’s Hymn to the Virgin<\/i>, as someone overlooked a DO NOT STAND ON THIS notice on a piece of staging, and it up-ended. The communion motet was Farrant’s O Sacrum Convivium<\/i> which is actually a fitting of those words to Lord for thy tender mercy’s sake<\/i>.<\/p>\n With barely a break we crossed the road to the Lord Mayor’s Chapel for vespers. I have been on the dep list here as long as John Marsh has been organist, and this was the first time I’d sung a service in the Chapel. We had the impression that the Chapel isn’t much used by visiting choirs. More Byrd (his Ave Verum<\/i>) and a rather lovely setting, with moments of drama, of O salutaris hostia<\/i> by Elgar in E flat. This is not the most familiar setting of these words by Elgar, but rather this one<\/a>. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" I joined the choir of St Mary’s Bathwick to sing at the Assumptiontide Festival of the C of E Catholic Societies in Bristol. Actually that is a bit inaccurate because so many of that choir were away that fewer than … Continue reading