Remembrance Services

[mjgrieveson]

As there has been no mention on here of such things I thought I would enquire.

Is anyone taking part/ playing at one of these events tomorrow and if so, what has guided your preparation?

It seems strange that such a memorable event has had so little said about it among musicians; I can't be the only one twiddling my thumbs waiting for kick-off tomorrow evening and hoping for the best (I wasn't given much notice) in view of all the Civic Digs who will (please, God NOT) attend.

I asked a similar question elsewhere and the response was patchy; am wondering how widespread these services are, across the country?

[jackaubrey]

Can't help you on the planning front, but as part of "Cornwall remembers" we had a special and well attended evensong today in Truro Cathedral, three anthems: greater love, like as the hart and the Rutter Gaelic Blessing. Organ voluntary was Crown Imperial.

Good luck tomorrow !

[Philip]

I may already have told you this in the other place you asked, if I'm thinking right, but still...!

 

We are having an 'informal' service of readings and music tomorrow night at 8pm (with a muffled quarter peal preceding it) - our vicar wanted to keep it low key and not have any of the pomp or processions of dignitaries. There are three hymns and two choir 'items' - one of which is a Soprano singing Faure's 'Pie Jesu' and by virtue of lack of parts (it being August) the other will be White's 'Prayer of St Richard of Chichester'. I'll be playing Nimrod at the end because it's always well received and very apt for the occasion.

 

No idea what the turnout will be - I think it will be pretty decent. The big services with Processions and Dignitaries I'd imagine will be largely the domain of Cathedrals and larger Parish Churches who can still manage the resources for these services in August!

[DHM]

We have a Vigil service at 10:00pm tomorrow with the Lord Lieutenant, High Sherriff and lots of military top brass.
Music will include the Kyrie from Jehan Alain's Messe de Requiem, My soul, there is a country from Parry's Songs of Farewell, Rheinberger's Abendlied and Stainer's God so loved the world.

Over this weekend we have been joined by singers from Aachen, and from the Marienkirche in Rostock, to commemorate the anniversary and celebrate the many Anglo-German friendships we now enjoy. Music was a mixture of German and English, including Mendelssohn's Verleih uns Frieden (Give peace in our time, O Lord...) and some standard Anglican fare such as Stanford in C and Naylor in A for Evensongs, Harwood in A flat for Mattins and Sumsion's Communion in F, David Terry's beautiful new setting of Laurence Binyon's They shall grow not old... and - to make the point that the war didn't only take place on land - Sumsion's They that go down to the sea in ships.

 

Great music-making with old and new friends, and some very emotional moments.

[mjgrieveson]

Well hello there. Small world, which rather illustrates my point as far as this is concerned. Events are going on all year, of course, but tomorrow is especially significant which is why I can't understand the apparently haphazard nature of it's observance nationally.

Why we have to go the whole hog when the huge city centre church with infinitely better resources is not ( at least, not according to it's website) is a mystery to me. All the notion of the local councillors, it seems, so we have to host the thing. The rest you know.

 

Arrangements were still being changed as late as last Wednesday. After the national anthem I shall close proceedings with the Adagio for Strings organ transcription and hope it's appropriate. If it's not, I'll blame those in charge for not giving me more notice.

 

I wish we had a choir!

[mgp]

We've gone for two events. One at the War Memorial in the Town Square tonight. The "chain gang" etc will be there and it will be outside whatever the weather. Very low key, based on the CofE Vigil. Two hymns - O God our help and Who would true valour see - Regimental Hymn - accompanied by Brass Band.

 

There's a second service in church on 14th Sept (1st deployment of local regiment - colours laid up in the church) aimed at those unable to be present tonight. Still juggling the liturgy/music for this. Introit likely to be Lloyd Prayer for peace, Anthem Kyrie or Agnus Durufle Requiem or A New Commandment Tallis depending on the final choice of readings etc.

[Phoneuma]

If it is of any use to anyone I have a copy of an organ arrangement of the Royal British Legion March (legitimately purchased as pdf and I can download it as many times as I wish by the way!).. We have an annual Remembrance service at school and I use it at the end (alternating with RAF March Past and any other Marches I can lay my hands on). It's the one they use at Remembrance Services nationally and is a cracking March (albeit a little Monty Python in places). Not difficult and lends itself to judicious editing / cuts as needs be. Get on side with your local Legion lads and lasses, they would be very pleased if you offered this I'm sure. We get the Legion in at Remembrance as the lads at school love to see uniforms, flags and medals (so do I) and it all lends a certain dignity and a little bit of military pomp (in the best sense of that word). Do PM if you'd like a copy (pdf).

[Philip]

Hope your respective services went well. At ours, a healthy turnout (about 80) with both familiar and unfamiliar faces - a huge encouragement to me that people still feel able turn to the church on occasions such as this. Not a civic dignitary in sight. The church had been most tastefully decorated with displays of poppies at the font, the nave altar and high altar. At the end of the service, not one person moved from their seat until the end of the final chord of 'Nimrod', which was a pleasing and somewhat unusual occurence. The whole occasion was most dignified and a fitting commemoration.

 

Now settled down to watch events from the Abbey.

[Martin Cooke]

Having listened to the Abbey the other night, I shall be downloading Stanford Sonata 2 - Daniel Cook played the last movement 'Verdun' before the service - sounded very interesting. Lots of French NA. A reference to this on the ABRSM forum mentions the Hugh Blair Short Sinata in eulogistic terms. This, like the a Stanford is available from IMSLP.

[SteveBarker77]

Can't help you on the planning front, but as part of "Cornwall remembers" we had a special and well attended evensong today in Truro Cathedral, three anthems: greater love, like as the hart and the Rutter Gaelic Blessing. Organ voluntary was Crown Imperial.

Good luck tomorrow !

 

I am currently on holiday in Cornwall and was at the service in Truro Cathedral on Sunday afternoon (and morning too as it happens); very good combination of music and readings, and the Crown Imperial was very good. Only slight disappointment was the lack of reeds used in Greater Love, but as I don't know the organ they may have obliterated the choir, had they been used! However, as I and most of the choir were away, back home they had a quiet said service on Sunday evening with no music at all.

 

Steve

[mgp]

Having listened to the Abbey the other night, I shall be downloading Stanford Sonata 2 - Daniel Cook played the last movement 'Verdun' before the service - sounded very interesting. Lots of French NA. A reference to this on the ABRSM forum mentions the Hugh Blair Short Sinata in eulogistic terms. This, like the a Stanford is available from IMSLP.

Opening is based on O Filii e Filiae and dedicated to Widor. Any sugetsions as to what what triggered Stanford into writing these sonatas - 3rd uses St Patrick's Breast[;ate & 4th Hanover.

[wolsey]

Opening is based on O Filii e Filiae and dedicated to Widor. Any sugetsions as to what what triggered Stanford into writing these sonatas - 3rd uses St Patrick's Breast[;ate & 4th Hanover.

The full dedication is to 'Monsieur Charles-Marie Widor and the great Country to which he belongs'. The first three Sonatas were written during the Great War, so the dedication and themes of No. 2 (the last movement uses the Marseillaise, as Martin Cooke notes above) immediately make sense.

[kropf]

We have a Vigil service at 10:00pm tomorrow with the Lord Lieutenant, High Sherriff and lots of military top brass.

Music will include the Kyrie from Jehan Alain's Messe de Requiem, My soul, there is a country from Parry's Songs of Farewell, Rheinberger's Abendlied and Stainer's God so loved the world.

 

Over this weekend we have been joined by singers from Aachen, and from the Marienkirche in Rostock, to commemorate the anniversary and celebrate the many Anglo-German friendships we now enjoy. Music was a mixture of German and English, including Mendelssohn's Verleih uns Frieden (Give peace in our time, O Lord...) and some standard Anglican fare such as Stanford in C and Naylor in A for Evensongs, Harwood in A flat for Mattins and Sumsion's Communion in F, David Terry's beautiful new setting of Laurence Binyon's They shall grow not old... and - to make the point that the war didn't only take place on land - Sumsion's They that go down to the sea in ships.

 

Great music-making with old and new friends, and some very emotional moments.

Beeing one of the mentioned Rostock singers, I want to thank DHM for giving us opportunity to share this experience. It was among my toughest and most beautiful experiences as a musician.

Beeing known here on the forum as admirer of Anglican church music, it was the first time I was part of a native performers group as a singer, which I enjoyed the more that I normally only conduct or play the organ at home.

Having attended many evensongs at great places and translated it to our Rostock version, it was still an incredible challenge to cope the Ladies und Gentlemen of with Rochester Cathedral Voluntary Choir - according to German levels a very experienced and well-sounding choir - to have the right pieces at hand at the right moment, to keep close contact with the conductor and to link into the high musical tension, which was kept throughout all services...

The estimation of the daily musical work which is done in the cathedrals and major churches in the Anglican world has doubled, and it was high before....

Thank you everybody out there for keeping and making flourishing this tradition.

As this is an organ-related forum, I want to say that Rochester Cathedral's organ was among the very impressive experiences of cathedral organs I have had until now. Projection ad sound in the quire is very compact, and it seems well capable of bearing the congregational singing on sundays.

Though I hope to achieve similar effects at home, I never experienced the feeling of a congregation beeing united or melted together by the organ accompaniment to the hymns that much before.

This all would not have happened without a superb player, always on the spot throughout the rehearsals, making use of a wide variety of sounds for choir accompaniment and giving us Dupre's B-major prelude as Sunday postlude. It was Matthew Jorysz, currently organ scholar at Clare College, Cambridge.

 

And, back to topic:

I'm a native Austrian, living in Germany since 1992. My generation has been told its lessons and has quite thoroughly learned them. Therefore it is always interesting and important to see, what commemoration of the Great War or WW II does like on the side of those, who helped to make them end. Naturally, the view will differ slightly from those who started all.

Every day I tell the visitors to our organ loft (part of our noon prayer routine) the story of the removal of 3.000 pipes in 1917 for ammunition industry just in our own organ (the 90 facade pipes where to be sacrificed, but it was decided to kick out everything which would not have survived an intended major rebuild, too...), and I tell them about the inauguration of the next organ in Nov 1938, the air raids of 1942-44 and how they brought back what has been sent out...

May it never happen again.

 

Greetings from Rostock

KBK