Music Hall Production at St George's School, Hannover Sq.
The Boys Choir of Widford Lodge School, Chelmsford, Essex
My first regular choir was the boys choir of Widford Lodge School, Chelmsford. We sang at a number of places in and around the community including at Chelmsford Cathedral Festival Fringe 1987 and 1988, Waltham Abbey, Gt Baddow Church and for the Carol and Founders Day Services in Chelmsford Cathedral itself. We took part in a the Sainsbury's Choir of the Year Competition First Round in the Lobby of St Kaths College, Cambridge and dispite not getting through we impressed enough in the Hallowed Halls to be invited up to the Pearse School in Cambridge to sing Lloyd-Webber's Jospeh with all the college top lines We also sang at RSCM choral day at Rochester Cathedral. Hence I got my first two cathedrals on the board.
Audition for The Choir of the Chapel Royal St James's Palace
In 1989 when I was taking the entrance examinations for public schools in England I took part in an audition to be a Choral Scholar for Queen Elisabeth II and sing for her on remembrance day on TV. I got to visit St James's Palace the original home of the Royal Family and see the chapel in which Henry Purcell had his choir and was Master of the King's Music. Despite having a compliment from the choirmaster my interval training hadn't been good enough. It was however a wonderful experience early on to have done that as part of my entrance examination to Westminster School.
Ipswich School Choral Society (Now 1st and 2nd Year Chorus)
We performed four pieces with the Ipswich School Choral Society when I went up to secondary school at Ipswich School. In those days it was for parents and the whole of the 1st and 2nd year. The first term was a complete baptism of fire in choral arts for most of the intake. The Headmaster John Blatchly was chorus crazy and music crazy in general but a Chemist by PhD and he encouraged my in particular in my lifelong quest to be a polymath with skills right across the arts and sciences. Some thought he'd really bitten off more than he could chew when he personally rehearsed a performance of Verdi's requiem with us. Yes! that's right it was compulsory for the whole first and second year on the gaffers orders to sing one of life's truly great choral works at 11. Some would say wrong decision! I would say great bloke! Bang on!
Of all the great works I performed at Ipswich School in terms of oratorio and opera. I started listing them all in the L6 and a colleague of mine from my L6 English class said, when I mentioned Verdi's Requiem. Oi, mate hang on! I sang that with you, and you know I loved it as an experience. So as a chorister I would say he definately did the right thing. So we did that and then we were told to calm down so we did some more modern cantatas by Heard (Rooster Rag) and Galloping Godiva by Andrew Carter which we performed mostly in the first and second ever Ipswich School at Snape Maltings Concerts. When we did the 1st one in 1990 it was meant to be a one of but it's now the flagship event of the Ipswich School Music Calendar to sing at the world famous Benjamin Britten Festival Hall at Snape Maltings up the road in the more wild part of Suffolk. We also sang the muscial Smike by Holman/May
My First Conductor with Ipswich School Chapel Choir 1989-1990
Stephen Orton was on balance probably the best regular choirmaster I had. He was Ben Parry's last conductor at Ipswich School in the late 1970s. He left Ipswich school about 1 year after I arrived to take up a position in the company fo St Martin in the Fields in Trafalgar Square as Sir Neville Mariner's cellist. Being Cambridge educated he was also my chess master as well as my choirmaster. Sadly, I think he died a few years back. This is a picture of him and his son Joe in a church near Chevereuse just outside Paris in France where he and I were on tour when I'd just turned 11.
The ambition of what we put on on that tour impressed me greatly. More on that later. Let's go straight in and say what I remember him the most for and that is conducted the Handel Coronation Anthem Let thy Hand Be Strengthened in it's enitrity with us on tour in Paris the week the Berlin Wall fell in October 1989. One of the times we performed it we got a 3x standing ovation with 9 in the audience at a remote church. One of the greatest early memories of music making. Just click on the link to a performance of this glorious 3 movement work that I sung as a Cantoris or Second Treble the week I turned 11. The link is behind the picture.
One Cracking Chorus! The Chevreuse Tour Choir of 1989
That year we had many people in the choir who went on to be quite famous on the BBC, and the future organ scholar of Pembroke College, Cambridge. As you can see from the household names of the 90s and 00s in this tour list.
Chapel Choir Tour to Chevreuse 1989 : Itinery
Choir Tour to Chevreuse 1989 : The Magnificent Repertoire
What challenging repertoire for a 10 year old in his first half of his first term! Just look at this list of choral greats! Most people would deem that impossible outside a cathedral these days but we did it together! It was the only one of the three tours we did when we rehearsed a whole week in school beforehand.
Ipswich School Chapel Choir - The Yearly Bread and Butter
Me in the Ipswich School Chapel with Choirmaster Dore & Head Chorister Tim Kiddell 1993
If anyone has heard of Harry Potter you may have heard of public school houses at Ipswich School we had 6:
Rigaud
Sherrington
School
Brooke
Holden
Felaw
I was in Rigaud house. In the first and second year or lower school as it was commonly know there were no houses. There were house services with compulsory attendance for house members 3 per term 2 houses per service and parents were cordially invited. In ISCC it was compulsory to attended two of them per term as choir members and a third if you were a treble in years 1 or 2.
The house services took the format of a standard evensong or conservative evangelical evening service with a Psalm a setting of the Magnifcat and Nunc Dimittis otherwise known as the canticles and sung responses to prayers, plus a sermon form the school chaplain. There is also an anthem which is different for each service a common one is provided below as an example of each.
An Example Mag is the Stanford in Bb arguably the greatest and most famous example of all time!
And the ultimate 'Huncky Nuncy' to the Charles Villiers Stanford in Bb
This is an Latin anthem known as a 'motet'; an anthem is strictly speaking written in English or a modern language such as German.
Ipswich School Chapel Choir - The Nine Lessons and Carols
Within the yearly frame of my 7 years in Ipswich School Chapel Choir came 2 winter carol services in the Michaelmas Term near Christmas in the towns main churches one of which is now extremely famous.
The church of St Mary Le Tower which is the one with the Spire incidentally produced many great singers form its in house choir including Ed Sheeran. I sang in Ed Sheeran's church on many occasions during my Ipswich School career and even recorded there as he did. That was before he was involved with them. I first sang there at Christmas in 1989. The other service was at St Margaret's just across the road. I've even robed up in the same vestry many times. Briefly, for about 2-3 weeks I was even in the Choir of St Mary Le Tower itself but they required me to be there for 3 services on a Sunday and it was impossible to travel there that many times in a day. I sang there as a male alto but my association with them was main through ISCC.
On the day of the two services you got the morning off lessons to rehearse in church the whole morning. The format was the same with nine lessons and carols as the broadcast from Kings College Cambridge with the then late Choirmaster Sir Stephen Cleobury in command, more on that later. As a member of ISCC we were mostly being groomed towards choral scholarships at Oxford and Cambridge University colleges covering much of the same repertoire. Many of the more famous choristers we had until Ed Sheeran did that. We all know his music.
Ben Parry was probably the most famous of the other choristers. The great grandson of Hubert Parry the first principle of the Royal College of Music, he's also one of the most famous musicians in Ipswich. The other one of the trio being Paul D'Annio of Iron Maiden. He was actually proudly expelled from Ipswich School as a rebel. I love his music as well. Ben Parry was the one who was most popular with the Ipswichian establishment. I know and have worked with him myself. He was extremely amenable. His daughters went to the school as well though in my day it was mostly single sex.
Ben Parry is most famous for being a choral scholar at St Katherines in Cambridge and then becoming a Harvidian and working with the Ward Swingle in his famous a cappella band The Swingle Singers. One of their most famous singles is their own version of there was a lover and his lass. He is a choral composer and involved in the creation of Voces8 and The National Youth Choir and also worked for as a syncer in Hollywood film music.
Here are some examples of Ed Sheeran, Paul A'annio and Ben Parry's sort of thing.
Three very contrasting styles
Moving back to the nine lessons and carols here are some examples of the of the carols we sung. Some of them are hymn like ones and som e of them more complex. I sang in the solo quartet of Britten's first piece A Hymn to the Virgin opus 1 when I won the school singing competition more on that later.
The Ipswich Judges Service
Another obligation we had at the start of my career as a school chorister was singing for th Ipswich justice in their civil church service at St Mary Le Tower. The anthem was always Let Justice and Judgement the middle movement form Handel's Coronation Anthem Let Thy Hand Be Strengthened that we sang in France in 1989.
The Cathedral Visits and Guest Evensongs
As part of our duties we carried out guest evensongs at cathedral churches all over East Anglia and on tour. Most reguarly we sung in the diocese cathedral of Bury St Edmunds or St Edmundsbury cathedral a few times but also in Norwich early on and the Ely as well with it's famous octagonal tower between Cambridge and Kings Lynn. Including the 2 I sang at at Widford Lodge I have sung at a total of 9 British Cathedrals and one German one. This was in Norwich in 1990.
The Remaining 2 ISCC Tours to York in 1990 and Edinburgh 1996
Evensong in Durham Cathedral on my Birthday Fri Oct 19 1990
The Ipswich School Chapel Choir to York Itinery 1990
