203 and 204 Choirs Day 22 June 2024
Short concert to 100 or so parents, grandparents, friends and groupies, comprising "How shall I sing", Gaelic Blessing (Rutter), "I was glad" (Parry), Morte Criste (Jones), Rhythm of Life (Coleman), "Glory to thee" (Tallis canon), Sevenfold Amen (Stainer).
The concert started with the first performance of a newly-commissioned piece for the current Chapel Choir with organ.
But the day started with a morning rehearsal (see 204). The chatter stops as the organ introduces "How shall I sing" - the first time many have sung it for 30 years. Just listen to this! After "My Bonnie", 204 continues with verse 1, which told me immediately "this will be a day to remember!" The power, authority and sheer oomph of the sound. And, all the breathing is right!
Sung by 91 girls from Chapel Choirs back to 1949, with the current Chapel Choir, led by Kate Morgan and David Andrews, with accompanists Christine Alp (retiring after 40 years at HLC) and Adrian Selway.
A great day and echoed in Hong Kong with a similar celebration. See Facebook https://www.facebook.com/groups/alumnihlc/discussion/preview
for many, many enthusiastic comments from happy choir girls.
In August 2024 I wrote an article for the Knaresborough churches magazine Accord. Much of this I'd already put on Facebook, but it was all still so strongly in my mind that I had to tell the whole world! Well, a little part of it . . . .
Two Accords ago I was anticipating 22 June and the re-union of old choir girls from Harrogate Ladies’ College where I taught for over 30 years. They came, 91 of them, aged between 36 and 90 years old, from near and far, the south of France and Istanbul. Girls in Hong Kong who couldn’t get back had their own re-union and sent us a recording of their own singing. I’m still not sure I understand what happened that day, but, I’ll try to explain.
The “girls” represented choirs dating from 1949 to 2010. At school they had attended Chapel every morning except Saturday, plus two, sometimes three, services each Sunday. I chose to join the College as Director of Music in 1977 because I wanted an all-immersive environment, with a chapel, and because I couldn’t cope with boys’ voices breaking at puberty, I chose a girls’ school. I can’t pretend that they all took to “religion” happily, but with the odd eruption, most managed to enjoy their Chapel time and singing. In retrospect, perhaps I should have paid greater attention to their “immortal souls” but there was always another piece of music to learn. As teenagers they didn’t say much about what they did or didn’t believe in, but since 22 June, that’s all changed. They are teenagers no longer, and in the main, articulate, confident and assured women - wives, mothers and grandmothers, professionals in medicine and law, in business and government.
All teachers, including ministers of the church, wonder what will be the fruits of their labours. If I taught Physics, GCSE or A level grades might indicate something, or numbers going on to study at university. But the influences like Christian (or any religious) faith have no “assessable outcomes” (to use current educational jargon) yet they will mould lives, influencing everything tackled.
What followed that day left me in no doubt at all. The overwhelming power and sheer joy of singing together in the place they had known 30 years before, the music they all knew so well, generations of singers united though music, was palpable. “What an absolutely immense never-to-be-forgotten day!”; “HLC chapel, such special and unforgotten memories of my school day. Especially Choral (DA. staff ‘abandoned’ me to lead a hymn practice with 200 girls every Wednesday). Happy days and wonderful memories!”; “Although I was never a member of the choir, the choir was always a part of me. And of anyone who attended HLC. Neither am I a Christian, but the music has had a profound impact on me. As have you, Mr. Andrews. Thank you for the music”; "I’ve tried to explain to people what an experience it was and what it felt like being back, but either the right words fail me or they don’t exist as nobody else can truly appreciate what you created for us. “
And then “the elephant in the room”, except it wasn’t an elephant, but it was something so many mentioned – a presence in the Chapel, a 4th dimension, “almost divine” said one, “the stones were adding to our voices” said another. The College Hymn is “How shall I sing that majesty” with the phrase at the top of this article “Sing, sing ye heavenly choir!”. I prefer to believe that it was voices from that heavenly choir which joined ours that day, a glimpse of heaven before we get there to remind us we are on the right path and that one day we will all sing again, together in the heavenly choir.
“Mushy nonsense!” I hear some say. But when all is said and done, 100 people enjoyed that same, ecstatic state. And the comments on Facebook even now are evidence of the lasting effect.
It had all started about a year ago when a girl emailed me to ask for a recording of her singing solo “because my granddaughter wants to hear how I sounded then.” Granddaughter! She was 18 when I last saw her, what’s happened? To find her solo I had to search through dozens of old cassette and reel tapes and wondered if others would like to hear them. I put them on a website. then more, and more, some YouTube videos too, and the total is now 205 items at www.violinman.co.uk/music. 203 and 204 are from 22 June.
But that’s not quite the end of the story: just last week one of these choir girls brought me an old Sony camcorder on which her father had videoed the choir’s trip to Paris in 2003. I retrieved the recordings he made of rehearsals and concerts in Paris cathedrals, including the highlight – Mass in Notre Dame, in which the Choir sang the Fauré Messe Basse and other French pieces, earning applause from the congregation and an invitation to lead the procession out at the end. St John’s Choir which sang at St George’s Chapel Windsor and Westminster Abbey recently will understand the pride and honour felt. That appears on the website as 205. I’d never seen it before nor had most of the girls. Thank you to all doting fathers with cameras!
And thank you too to all the girls who sang and trusted me to guide them then, and for their love and gratitude now.
In the words of Mother Julian of Norwich,
"All shall be well, and all shall be well,
and all manner of things shall be well".
David Andrews
Organist at Nidd
