2005

WILLIAM’S TREBLE FINALE 

St Mary’s said thank you at the end of January 2005 to retiring Deputy Head Chorister William. 

William joined the treble line of the choir as a probationer under David Atkinson’s directorship back in November 1998 and received his surplice in February 1999.

From then William progressed through the ranks, being successful in passing his Dean’s Chorister examination in March 2003 followed by his Bishop’s Chorister Award a year later.  As Deputy Head Chorister, he has been responsible for leading the boys on numerous occasions.

Away from St Mary’s, as well as travelling on the choir’s most recent overseas tour, to Bingen in 2000, William has been one of the choir’s keenest participants in RSCM Cathedral Singers events, as a leading treble light, devoting much of his spare time to travelling long distances to sing in different cathedrals across the country, and has also received invitations to RSCM national events, including a special service in Gloucester Cathedral on Easter Monday 2004. 

He attracted the cameras, as St Mary’s boys often tend to do, when he was pictured prominently in the RSCM’S national magazine in full voice after being selected to sing with over 250 other choristers at the RSCM’S 75^th anniversary Celebration Service in Westminster Cathedral in 2002.   

William has enjoyed attending residential courses for choristers – no less than six over the last three years - ranging from Easter courses at Pocklington, Stowe School and Worksop College, to his particular favourite: the summer singing and activity course held at Kingswood School, Bath, where he has sung services in Bath Abbey during late August in each of the last three years. His enthusiasm means that there is a strong chance he will return there again in a lower part voice.  

On a lighter sporting note, with the choir football team, William will be remembered as the first treble in living memory to suffer the spiritual and physical effects of a foul committed on the field by the exuberantly tackling Vicar of St Mary’s, appearing in opposition in a special challenge match, which resulted in a first ever yellow card shown to the offender! The spectators could not tell who was the more shocked! Our Vicar’s conscience moved him not only to change sides in the second half, but also to recount the tale and to confess all in priestly style before our Patrons of the Living, represented by an amused visiting preacher at St Mary’s on William’s last day, the Dean of Chapel of Trinity College, Cambridge.  

We send our best wishes to William for a smooth downward vocal transition and hoped for future appearance in the choir’s back row.   

Ed Kisby

ST MARY’S CHORAL CELEBRATION OF TRINITY LIVINGS LINK

 Every few years, rarely enough for trebles to have become tenors and basses in the intervening period, a very special event appears in the diary of St Mary’s Choir.

For the first time since 1997, on Saturday 2^nd July 2005 St Mary’s Choir joined several hundred choristers travelling by road, rail and air from all over England converging on Cambridge to renew their churches’ historic link with their patron of the Living.

Trinity College, the largest of the Cambridge colleges, was founded in 1546 through an amalgamation of King’s Hall, whose gateways still form the main entrances to Trinity today, and Michaelhouse, whose name lives on in the Trinity Street centre of that name. Its endowments of land were quadrupled by Henry VIII, partly through confiscation of monastic wealth, and subsequent benefactions, and this is how St Mary’s came to fall under its patronage, after some of the more local Cambridge area Livings.

The Livings today also include diverse towns and villages, many in historic northern locations, whose church choirs were represented at this choral festival, including Blyth, Guiseley, Kendal, Masham and Barnard Castle, plus more southerly towns of Fakenham, Ware and Enfield.   

On entering the college, either via the Great Gate or from the Backs, the day began with a fortifying festive lunch of salmon and strawberries, served by the excellent college catering staff in the shade of the Cloisters on a warm sunny day. The afternoon rehearsal commenced in the chapel after traversing the Great Court, with its imposing fountain and renowned for its midnight student dash.

There followed tea and cakes, after which St Mary’s, along with St Andrew’s Chesterton, retired to their appointed robing room, the wood-panelled Allhusen Room, overlooking  Neville’s Court, and the famous Wren library, which had been opened especially to allow private viewing by choristers of an exhibition of Livings archives.

As punts passed peacefully on the Cam below, we processed to the service to find our seats at the eastern end of the packed chapel, opposite a similarly sized choir from Ware. With congregational space limited to the anti-chapel, the visiting choirs were privileged to hear the resident Trinity choir perform the familiar introit, Beati Quorum Via, by one of Trinity’s famous men, Sir Charles Stanford, whose canticles in C were later to receive a rousing rendition by the massed choirs.

Dr Richard Marlow, for so long a pre-eminent figure as Director of Music at Trinity, conducted proceedings to great effect as he now enters his final year before retirement, having contributed much to maintain and enhance the reputation of the Trinity College Choir as well as to English choral music as a whole.

The long list of eminent Trinity scholars includes other musicians such as Thomas Walmisley, and the composer of the setting of the final hymn, the Old Hundredth, Ralph Vaughan Williams, which followed a hearty singing of Hubert Parry’s anthem “I was Glad”.

The generous Trinity hospitality continued after the service and a group photograph in the Great Court, when we were entertained to farewell drinks on the lawn of Nevile’s Court, providing a further opportunity to exchange greetings with other choristers and to meet Richard Marlow and Trinity’s Dean of Chapel, Dr Arnold Browne, who had preached at St Mary’s earlier this year.

There could have been no more appropriate end to a memorable day than news that our former decani bass Jordan Skittrall, who also acted as a Chapel Warden during much of his undergraduate time at Trinity, had graduated earlier in the same week with a first in mathematics, and was able to join the St Mary’s contingent for the day, sporting his well deserved new gown for the service.

Ed Kisby 

_____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

Towering transfer

At the end of the summer term Aidan relinquished his position leading the treble line. Aidan served as a treble in the choir for over 7 years, having originally been recruited by David Atkinson early in 1998.

During his singing experience to date, Aidan has passed two diocesan exams, achieving his Dean’s choristership in 2003, followed by his Bishop’s Award in 2004. He has also been a keen participant in the RSCM Southern Cathedral Singers over the last few years, and has attended Easter residential singing courses at Pocklington School in 2002 and at Worksop College in both 2004 and 2005. 

Last year Aidan became our Head Chorister and has literally grown into the role, and been one of our most regular attendees. He has also been active in our choir football team. Aidan has been a guiding light to new choristers to the choir and his generous warm –hearted nature has proved popular with the other trebles. Lately his ever towering height has meant him losing his treble notes, but after a fleeting visit to the alto level, he has since started to find the bass ranges much more to his liking, and he has already begun to sing with the back row. Thank you Aidan for all your contribution and good luck with the continued development of those lower notes.

Ed Kisby

______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

Rhythms of the World 2005 at St Mary's

The choir were pleased to be part of the Rhythms of the World festival on 10th July. We performed a selection of anthems from Tallis in the 16th century to Childs in the 21st century on the St Mary's stage at the end of the festival on Sunday.

_______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

David Atkinson RIP

1935-2005

The choir were sad to report the death on 28th August 2005 of their much-loved former Master of the Music, David Atkinson.

Click here to read one of three tributes that were given at his funeral service

Below is a quote from a eulogy to David published in the British Institute of Organ Studies Journal in October:

The hymn singing in the congregation was enthusiastic, and the final descant, written by David for the last verse of Praise my soul the King of Heaven, made a fitting climax to a memorable service. The Fantasia in G major by Bach, performed by Alan Childs as the outgoing voluntary, was exciting and showed off the organ as well as the performer to great effect; at the end it drew a round of applause. It is clear that music at St Mary's is thriving; I am sure that that would please David greatly.

_________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

SCS summer visits

After summer visits by the St Mary’s Choir members of the RSCM /Southern Cathedral Singers to long distance venues in the south including Bath, Portsmouth and, over the weekend of 3-4 September, Chichester, the most recent event on Saturday 10^th September saw a more local autumn visit to St Edmundsbury Cathedral. Here most of our SCS members sang evensong including music of Tye, Smith, Walmisley and Caesar.

_________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

HARVEST FESTIVAL 2005

A glorious sight awaited the congregation on the morning of 2nd October when we gathered to give thanks to God for our harvest. Our grateful thanks go to Margaret Khinmaung and Wendy Zimmerman for orchestrating such a marvellous display of flowers, fruit and vegetables.

The All-Age communion service started with the rousing hymn Come ye thankful people, come which aptly illustrated the thanks of the Pilgrim Fathers on their first successful harvest in the New World. This was ably acted out by our vicar Michael and the children (with excellent sound effects from them and the congregation), sailing their make-shift ship around the church. The first lesson had been read by Lizzie and the intercessions were led by Hazel and Jasmine. At the offertory the congregation brought forward their gifts of flowers for the sick and elderly, packets and tins for the North Herts Sanctuary and money for the Send a cow to Africa appeal (we raised £460). The John Rutter anthem For the beauty of the earth floated across the church during the distribution of communion and the service finished with us all singing the hymn Now thank we all our God.

At Festal Evensong later in the day the choir sang the much-loved Stanford in Bb canticles and, having read the Old Testament lesson, Michael Attwood was the tenor soloist in Thou visitest the earth by Maurice Greene.

‘Send a Cow’ to Africa The really good news is that we’ve reached, and even surpassed, our target of £750 to ‘Send a Cow’ to Africa. We’ve raised £810 some of it gift-aided, and that’s enough to send not only a cow and a flock of poultry, but possibly enough to send a couple of sheep too!  Very grateful thanks to everyone who responded so generously to the appeal.

____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

CANTORIS OLD BOY THWARTS DECANI FIGHTBACK

St Mary’s Choir Annual Football Challenge

Decani  2 Cantoris 3

Sunday 16th October – Purwell Recreation Ground

See the report and photos

_________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

Edwin Pettitt RIP

1929-2005

The choir were sad to announce the death of their Senior Choirman, Edwin Pettitt on Thursday 9th November 2005.

__________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

MILLENIUM SUCCESS

Alastair became the second St Mary's chorister to successfully pass his audition into the RSCM Millenium Youth Choir in the autumn.

This choir, under the directorship of David Ogden is an exciting chamber choir, founded in 2000 at the suggestion of the Archbishop of Canterbury. It offers special opportunities to 36 young singers to sing the widest and most exciting range of sacred music to the highest standards. Residential courses of approximately 4-6 days are held during school and university holidays, and include individual musical and vocal tuition, services and public concerts.

Well done Alastair!

__________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

HELEN HITS FIRST DIOCESAN GOLD! 

St Mary’s alto and Choir Librarian Helen Gimson, who became the first alto in the RSCM ‘s St Albans, Hertford and Bedford area to pass her Bishop’s Award last year, has  repeated the achievement, this time at the Gold Award standard, the highest national Award achievable by a chorister.

RSCM HQ has confirmed that despite there being much success from other voice parts, there have been no previous altos receiving the Award since its re-designation from the previous St Cecilia Award in 2003, making this another first for St Mary’s.

Helen’s success was achieved after a journey to the church of St John the Baptist, Kingsthorpe, near Northampton, in November. She chose “Qui sedes ad dexteram” from Vivaldi’s Gloria as her main solo item, and in addition prepared Bainton’s “And I saw a new Heaven” and Ireland’s Te Deum in F, including writing of programme notes and answering stylistic questions.

The vocal examination involved preparation of five other anthems/settings from which three (by Gibbons, Joubert and Rutter) were selected by the examiners on the day, including testing of another voice part and theory related questions. As well as sight-reading, Helen was required to prepare a brief evening service, to discuss and read aloud bible excerpts and prayers, and to provide choral references.   

Her overall attainment was an excellent  88 % mark, and Helen is particularly grateful to St Mary’s Director of Music Alan Childs for his time, expertise and support in her preparations. Many congratulations Helen!

EJK

_____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

EXAM SUCCESS

Congratulations to Wesley on passing his Bishop's Award with merit. As well as a hymn and psalm, Wesley chose to sing the Batten anthem O sing joyfully.

Congratulations also goes to James on passing his Dean's Award with distinction. James' anthem was All people that on earth do dwell by Tallis.

_______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

St Mary’s Hitchin Music Report 2005-2006

The past year has been one of both sadness and optimism for the choir. 

We were all very saddened by the death of former Director of Music, David Atkinson, in late August 2005 and only a matter of weeks later by the loss of Senior Choirman, Edwin Pettit.  Both men made enormous contributions to the musical life of St Mary’s and continue to be much missed by us all.

Autumn 2005, however, also provided us with much excitement and optimism with the launch of the first ever St Mary’s Girls Choir.  To our delight 18 girls responded to the invitation to join and we are thrilled that they have, to date, remained enthusiastic to the challenge and have subsequently be joined by two additional recruits.  The Girls Choir made their debut at the Crib Service on Christmas Eve 2005 and since then have participated in the Christingle Service and the 9.35am Eucharist for Mothering Sunday.  As the girls increase in confidence we will be seeing and hearing more from them, although it will be a while yet before they are ready to sing a full compliment of Sunday services with the adults.  Robing of the Girls Choir continues to cause concern.  I do ask everyone to remain patient while we find the finances and best way forward to unify the dress code for boys, girls and adults.

Our committed team of boys, although still smaller in number than ideal, continue to provide a reliable top line for the choir and allow us to maintain a varied diet of music to suit all occasions in the church calendar.  As always, we remain extremely grateful for the continued loyalty of the choir back rows, whose vocal talents can be heard regularly in the familiar and less well known musical tastes of the Director of Music!  We must not forget our much valued Soprano Choir who join us for special occasions. Without these ladies we would not be able to undertake such things as the Charpentier Messe de Minuit heard at the Christmas Midnight Mass.

The last few months have also witnessed the forming of the St Mary’s Orchestra in addition to the long established Laudate.  The orchestra, a variable sized ensemble have provided accompaniments for the Crib Service, Christingle Service and Mothering Sunday Eucharist.  It is hoped that this group will be present at approximately two services each term. Thanks to Rosemary Read, who not only performs with the orchestra, but spends many hours preparing orchestral parts for the often unconventional combinations of instruments available.

The musical life of the church was also enriched in the past year by a very successful series of Saturday morning concerts during the Summer of 2005.  40 to 100+ people came into the church to listen to different musicians, many local artists, and a great variety of music for a short time each Saturday morning.  We hope to repeat this venture in future.

Music is alive and well at St Mary’s and those of us responsible for planning, rehearsing and performing the musical programme hope that our efforts assist you all to come a little closer to God in your worship.  Thank you all for your words of support and encouragement.

We are always looking for new singers to join the various choir teams and players for the instrumental ensembles.  If you know of anyone who might be interested in participating in the musical life of St Mary’s please do not hesitate to contact me.

Alan J Childs

____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

St Mary’s Choir RSCM Report – Year to 31st December 2005 

The Royal School of Church Music has continued to organise numerous choral activities and events during 2005, taking St Mary’s Choristers to both local and far-flung Cathedral, Church and College destinations around England, and providing opportunities for outreach by participants of different ages who have shared experiences and made new acquaintances with choristers from many other churches through singing together, often at the office of Evensong or at other services and occasions. Many further events have already been arranged for 2006. Here is a summary of 2005: 

 Regional event (St Albans, Bedford and Hertford area)

• In March the full Choir participated in a local regional evensong at St Michael’s Letchworth, directed by Area Chairman Chris Muhley. Many of us will remember with fondness our Senior Choirman, Edwin Pettitt, performing the bass solo in Ireland’s anthem “Greater Love”, one he had performed many times before at St Mary’s. 

Southern Cathedral Singers 

The traditional programme of visits took place and, with participants from almost all voice parts, included the following:

·        At the end of January we attended a training day at the Church of St Peter, Great Berkhamsted, where music for the forthcoming year’s events was rehearsed, and we fostered contacts with our colleagues there, with whom we hope to arrange a joint Evensong in the future.

·        March saw members of the boys’ and men’s section travel by train to Peterborough Cathedral for evensong, and families enjoyed a lunch together in the city.

·        April saw post-Easter visits by the boys’ and men’s section to Chelmsford Cathedral and by the girls’ and adults section (which now includes our under 18 young back row members) to Coventry Cathedral.

·        Mid-May saw an innovative appearance in the Brighton Festival  Fringe,  at the high Anglican church of St Michael’s, tucked up the hill behind the sea front, on a chilly day of sea mist.

·        The late May bank holiday weekend involved another long distance trip, including a convenient overnight stay for some, to Chichester Cathedral, for Monday evensong, and some of our number returned there in early September to support the SCS Director’s local choir who were visiting to sing the weekend Cathedral services.

·        It was soon time for one of the favourite visits, to Norwich Cathedral, for a June evensong conducted by Judy Martin, with organist Peter Parshall, formerly of RSCM, and now Director of Music and Organist at Christchurch, Dublin.

·        In early July there was a visit to Beckenham Parish Church for a Saturday evensong, and at the end of the month some of us began our holidays with another visit to the south coast, this time to Portsmouth Cathedral for a late Saturday evensong, in an area of the city steeped in naval history.

·        The autumn began with the traditional early September visit to St Edmundsbury Cathedral where we were impressed to see the recently topped – out elegant new central tower, devoid of scaffolding for the first time for several years.

·        Southwark Cathedral was the venue for a Saturday evensong at October half term.  

·        Advent for SCS means Rothwell, and a traditional carol service at  possibly  England’s longest parish church, when our visit always seems to bring bracing conditions, and whose notoriously cold rehearsal hall is more than compensated for by the wonderful free home-made tea provided for the visiting choristers. 

·        Let SCS soothe your international travel traumas! This was again the aim as well as collecting donations for SCS charities when robed choristers out of school performed their mobile singing routines in shuttles and on escalators under indefatigable Director John Wardle’s beat, all around Gatwick Airport on the Monday before Christmas.

 Students  

·        Jeremy Smith participated in numerous nationwide events as a chorister of the Millennium Youth Choir, some involving TV and radio broadcasts, and Alastair successfully auditioned to become our second MYC member in 2005.

·        Some of the young back row attended a day culminating in evensong in St Edmundsbury Cathedral on Easter Tuesday.

 Residential Courses

·        The 2005 Easter course was again held at Worksop College, including a Friday evensong visit to Lincoln Cathedral. This was attended by our largest contingent for several years, a total of nine trebles and young back row.   

·        Five of our singers also attended the annual summer course at Kingswood School, Bath, when families converged westwards to attend the sung services in Bath Abbey, on the final weekend. Sad news had spread from Hitchin of the death of David Atkinson, and we were moved to hear prayers said in his memory at the Abbey’s Sunday morning service.

Examinations 

Alan Childs coached choristers to more successes in 2005. In the Dean’s Award Examination, there were ribbons for Chris, Wesley and James, and in the Bishop’s Award category, Hamish, Thomas, and Wesley.

Our Librarian, alto Helen Gimson, became the first diocesan alto to pass the newly constituted Gold Award Examination, the highest national Award available to choristers.

 Ed Kisby