Some thoughts on our day out in Oxford — as they happened…
Eucharist
9.30 Nice to greet people for the Sunday leg of one of these trips sans hangovers and sleep deprivation. (tough when I remarked on this one voice piped up ’speak for yourself’. Bodes well!) 15 mins to kick off.
9.46 So far, so predictable: the Palestrina is impossibly high for tenors to croon quietly, and the car load of singers transporting the music (and the organist) is late. Though only by two minutes.
9.46 Ian arrives! Tim makes a barbed comment about vibrato and Palestrina not mixing well, tehehe.
10.20 Unusually the mass (in the earth-bound key of F major) doesn’t seem to have gone flat once in rehearsal.
11.00 Mmmm, tea and biccies provided by the cathedral, how very civilised.
11.15 As ever, Eucharist proves to a be a nerve-jangling seat-of-the-pants affair — even if you’ve been to spy the previous week!
11.35 Anthem before the gospel. Unusual, but rather nice. I think we sang the Grieg Ave Maris Stella extremely well, although with hindsight the 4 part ladies split is probably a bit of a tough ask with only 2 top sops on a top G and no acoustic to hide behind.
12 midday — the trio nail the Benedictus, sometimes known as the Marie Celeste on account of its tendency to wonder mysteriously
12.10 Agnus II is, unsurprisingly, beautiful. In short, CLit rock!
12.20 Toppie’s favourite hymn for overblown punctating
12.30 Post-eucharist and a pre-lunch aperitif in the form of a dry run of the Stanford (For Lo I Raise Up). Surprisingly slick.
The bit in the middle
13.00 Lunch at the Head of the River. My first 2 pints of the day, a steak pie with mash and a ’side’ of nachos courtesy of the ever health-conscious Dr West.
14.45 Ed gives Tim a quick conducting lesson before rehearsal. Beat 2, to the left — got it.
Evensong
(To be continued…)
Recordings
I remember being extremely pleased with the contrast of styles and dynamics in the opening four of Leighton’s responses; whether or not this fully comes out in the recording I’m not sure.
One notch the right side of a Twickenham mob, the gents did us proud in the Magnificat (Walmisley). However, it’s the quartet in the He Remembering, the ppp tutti repeat and the altos in the Gloria that make this for me.
And finally, one Stanford crowning achievement (IMO): For Lo I Raise Up. Acoustic not especially kind to us — nor the organ — and I took it a bit slow at the start. Even so, quite an achievement in one afternoon and only 18 voices, I feel.
T
