On Thursday, the sound of choristers filled the corridors as we hosted the inaugural Bedford School Choral Cup. Five schools sent their finest choirs to take part, together with our Y6-8 Senior Prep Choir, for a fun-filled day celebrating singing – as well as a bit of healthy competition, as Director of Music Mr Sanders put it, “…to focus the minds”.
The day began in a packed Erskine May Hall, where our boys joined with pupils from Bedford Greenacre Independent, Eaton House The Manor, Heath Mount, St Anthony’s Prep and Wetherby Prep.
During the morning, the choirs enjoyed a series of workshops with our esteemed guest judge, Bob Chilcott, one of the world’s most widely performed composers and arrangers of choral music. They began, as all singers should, with a warming-up of the vocal chords. The children were tasked with repeating vocal lines sung by Bob, increasing in difficulty every time. They then had a go at clapping out some rhythms, which got ever trickier each time they were mastered.
Once everyone was thoroughly warmed up, they went on to rehearse two of Bob’s own compositions – Spring and Winter, both set to poems by Delphine Chambers (b.1998), written when she was a teenager studying at Oxford University. The amassed young musicians created a beautiful sound, directed by Bob, who encouraged them to give shape to the phrases, to emphasise particular words, to enunciate clearly, to take heed of the dynamics and to successfully retell the story of the songs.
“I have been a singer all my life. A lot of what you do as a singer is tell stories, ideas or thoughts. When you sing a song, you are creating a story that lasts about two and a half minutes, and it could be a really important story. Storytelling can be really important. And being in a choir is about telling a story collectively. We have to create this collective voice. Your job is to make the story come alive.”
After a busy morning rehearsing and a suitably hearty lunch in the Dining Hall, it was time for the choirs to assemble in the Great Hall, where they were joined by an expectant audience of parents. Each school choir performed two songs each, and the standard was incredibly high. After some entertainment from the Upper School’s String Quartet and Brass Ensemble, while Bob finished his deliberations, the winner was announced as Heath Mount School – with their fiendishly difficult Japanese song Hotaru Koi, followed by the Irving Berlin song Puttin’ on the Ritz, complete with top hats and even some tap-dancing!
The day finished with a joint performance of the two songs they had rehearsed earlier. All of the choirs sang together and demonstrated what they had learned in the workshops. They were greeted with a very well-deserved rapturous applause from all of those listening.
We hope to see the choirs again next time!
