There was a very musical hum of excitement in Burnaby Road on Thursday afternoon, as the Chapel Choir gathered alongside various baskets filled with music folders, cassocks and sandwich teas as they waited for the coach to take them to Ely Cathedral to sing Choral Evensong with the Cathedral Choir. This was the first tour for the Chapel Choir in several years, and indeed the very first tour for many of the trebles from the Prep School, and the 44-strong choir (formed of boys from Year 5 to the Upper Sixth) were clearly relishing the opportunity.
After about an hour on the coach, and surprisingly few “Are-we-there-yets” from the trebles seated near the front, the coach drove past the former home of Oliver Cromwell and took a tight right turn into the narrow street where the imposing cathedral stands. After a quick snack and a change into their cassocks in the Lady Chapel, the choir assembled in the Cathedral for rehearsal. They were directed by the Cathedral’s Director of Music, Edmund Aldhouse, who worked with the choir to show them how to really take advantage of the acoustics of the huge space, and they were soon making amazing contrast in dynamics and directing the sound right to the end of the long nave. Rehearsal almost completed, the boys were joined by the ranks of the Cathedral Choir to run through a few last things, and then it was time to prepare to process in for the Evensong service.
The service itself was a wonderfully Bedford School-studded occasion. Upper Sixth Former James Watson played a beautiful piece of Vierne on the organ before re-joining the choir below, and the First Lesson was expertly read by Upper Sixth Former Feyisayo Okusanya. Our Chaplain Mr McCleery sang the lines of the Precentor in the Responses, and Mr Roberts conducted the joint choir in the Stanford Magnificat and Nunc Dimittis, as well as the Wesley Anthem. The Chapel Choir were impressive throughout, and their hard work during rehearsal clearly paid off. The words of the Psalms were crisp and clear, and the crescendo to fortissimo at the close of the Wesley Anthem was both beautiful and incredibly moving.
Director of Music Mr Sanders, who accompanied the choir on the trip, remarked that this was “the first trip for the majority of the Prep boys singing treble, many of whom have only been singing with the Chapel Choir for about six months. They have had a steep learning curve, and they have handled it wonderfully”.
On the return to school, after the packed teas had been demolished on the way back, Mr Sanders addressed the whole Chapel Choir and congratulated them all for the way they had represented the school, and for the truly beautiful sound they had made collectively. This was indeed a whistlestop tour, but it was nonetheless a fantastic opportunity for the boys and one that they wholeheartedly made the most of.
