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On this First Sunday after Christmas, things have kind of a quiet vibe, at least where I am. Not only are choirs and congregations a bit smaller than they were on Christmas Eve, but even the Introit for the day speaks directly of profound quietness.

I’ve written about this special Christmas quietness before: Whenas all the world was in profoundest quietness: Silence at Christmas 27 December 2019

And in this quiet Christmas mood, our carol for today is the Nativity Carol by John Rutter (who we mentioned yesterday, but didn't quite listen to!). One of Rutter’s earliest compositions, the composer also wrote his own text for this one.

Especially as far as Rutter’s Christmas output is concerned, this carol has a special place in my heart. It was a regular part of the Christmas lineup at Christ Church Cathedral, Indianapolis, when I served as assistant organist there.

This carol was sung at the Festival of Nine Lessons and Carols at King’s College this year. It had previously been sung at the made-for-TV service called “Carols from Kings”.

Labels: 12 Carols for Christmas, Christmas, John Rutter

I have enjoyed the tender John Rutter treatment of the Christmas lullaby text “Dormi, Jesu” for many years. It has also been on my planning list of possibilities to sing on Christmas Eve for a few years now. I thought 2024 was the year.

But a review in the Journal of the Association of Anglican Musicians caught my attention, and I realized that another composer’s setting of these words would fit the bill just as well, if not better.

Jaebon Hwang was commissioned to write “Dormi, Jesu” for the Lessons and Carols Service held in the Memorial Church at Harvard University.

The Latin words for this carol were popularized after their discovery by Samuel Taylor Coleridge. What I particularly enjoy about Hwang’s carol is she fully participates in the macaronic carol tradition by incorporating Coleridge’s English versification alongside the original Latin.

Labels: 12 Carols for Christmas, Christmas, Jaebon Hwang, John Rutter

Please read this article closely. There are many puns and there are TWO (2) possible ways to earn a homemade fruitcake sent to you ANYWHERE IN THE WORLD!!!

As it is our care and delight to await the coming of the PDF of the King's College service leaflet for this year's Festival of Nine Lessons & Carols, we must in heart and mind go to this webpage and refresh it endlessly until the document we seek is found.

OFFER OF FREE BAKED GOOD: If you find the 2014 service leaflet before I do I will send you a homemade fruitcake. You may email me at dsinden@gmail.com, tweet me @sinden, or even call me if you can figure out how. This offer is valid to the person who contacts me first, regardless of medium.

In the mean-time, I have some half-baked predictions (not like the fruitcake mentioned above, which will be fully-baked and delicious).

• The first carol will be "Once in Royal David's city" - this will not surprise anyone.
• Rutter's "What sweeter music" seems quite overdue - In fact, last year's service was noticeably Rudderless Rutterless. Look for it as the Invitatory Carol after the Bidding Prayer. Or look for something else by Rutter somewhere else.
• We haven't heard the Warlock "Adam lay ybounden" in a long while - not since 2006. So I would put good money on this -- but! There was no "Adam lay" setting at all last year, which was quite unusual. The carol text had been a staple of the service since at least 1997 (probably well before that, but further research is required*) A robust rendition of the Ord may be in ORDer to restore the balance. Oh dear, here we go with the puns.
• The second carol after the Third Lesson will be "God rest ye merry, gentlemen". - You can count on it. Let nothing you dismay.
• Cleobury will put down his own "Joys Seven" after the Fifth Lesson - I mean, if I keep predicting this it has to happen, right?
• "While shepherds watched their flocks by night" will be the second carol sung after the Seventh Lesson. Money in the bank. The Old Bank of Winchester. (Hymn tune joke - har har har)

I have no clues about the commissioned carol this year, so I'm not going to hazard a guess.

A final note or two or three (so, a chord, really) about another fruitcake offer: If you can provide me with an order of service prior to 1997 so I can fill in more boxes on my nifty spreadsheet, I will also bake and send you a delicious fruitcake ANYWHERE IN THE WORLD. One homemade fruitcake per person, please. Don't be greedy. They don't keep well you know.

That is all. Happy Advent. Happy refreshing. Happy baking.

*I am eagerly awaiting a fully funded sabbatical to visit King's College and really research these and other questions. My sabbatical year should be 2016/17ish. Ahem, vestry in the parish where I currently serve...

Labels: Christmas, Cleobury, food and drink, hymns, John Rutter, King's College (Cambridge), Ord, Warlock

When's the last time you read about a piece of organ music in the newspaper?

Wait, never? Now's your chance.

Remember that guy who got fired from Westminster Abbey recently for saying disparaging things about John Rutter? He's in the news too.

. . . the music at weddings lives or dies at the hands of the organist (in my youth I wrecked quite a few with my approximation of Mendelssohn’s Wedding March) and here Will took no chances. Edward Tambling, assistant director of music at Spanish Place, has the most impeccable technique and judgment. As an organ scholar at Westminster Abbey, he got into hot water for using ‘colourful language’ on a Facebook page to describe the nauseating clotted harmonies of John Rutter. Good man!

As we took our places, out roared my favourite E-flat major chord — the opening of Bach’s ‘St Anne’ Prelude and Fugue BWV 552. Nothing in Bach’s organ music surpasses the grandeur of this work.

Thompson, Damian. "Wedding music lives or dies at the hands of the organist". The Spectator, London. 20 September 2014.

Labels: Bach, BWV 552, John Rutter, organ music, weddings

There is surely no blog on the internet that geeks out as much about the annual Festival of Nine Lessons and Carols at King's College, Cambridge as this one.

Last year, we even reported that the King's website's claim that the service booklet would be available in the beginning of December was a little bit hasty. It wasn't available until slightly later.

This year, King's only goes so far as to say that the service booklet will be available "in December".

Thankfully, this once again gives Sinden.org the opportunity to make semi-educated guesses about what long-time music director Stephen Cleobury has put down for this year's service.

Open Source Liturgy Information: By the way, you may view a spreadsheet of music at previous years' services that we at Sinden.org have maintained. And see below about how you can earn your VERY OWN HOMEMADE FRUITCAKE.

• The first carol will be "Once in Royal David's city" - this will not surprise anyone.
• Rutter's "What sweeter music" seems a bit overdue - We bet we'll hear it as the Invitatory Carol after the Bidding Prayer.
• We haven't heard the Warlock "Adam lay" in a while - but maybe that's just us.
• The second carol after the Third Lesson will be "God rest ye merry, gentlemen"
• A work by John Tavener will be heard either after the fourth or fifth lessons. We believe it will be either "A Hymn to the Mother", last heard in 1997 or "The Lamb". Actually, it will probably be "The Lamb", which was commissioned for the service in 1982. In that case it would be after the Fourth Lesson.
• Cleobury will put down his own "Joys Seven" after the Fifth Lesson - unless he surprises us with a new carol of his, that is.
• "While shepherds watched their flocks by night" will be the second carol sung after the Seventh Lesson.
• And might we hear some Britten? We haven't. And this certainly seems like a good year for it.

There's so much music to think about.

We haven't even mentioned the commissioned carol by Thea Musgrave. We're not sure where that will go. Probably later in the service.

In some ways the service is more unpredictable than it has been in years past. This is, in our judgement, a good thing.

Also, let it be stated that if you can email service information from earlier than 1997 we will gladly bake and send you a fruitcake ANYWHERE IN THE WORLD.

Labels: Britten, Christmas, Cleobury, John Rutter, King's College (Cambridge), Musgrave, Tavener, Warlock

Mmmm, delicious. The only way to sing this one.

Labels: 12 Days of YouTube, Christmas, John Rutter, King's College (Cambridge)

Today, Tuesday 11 December 2012 the service leaflet for this year's service was posted online. Last year's leaflet was also released online about this time, Tuesday 13 December 2011.

The service will once again open with "Once in royal David's city".

We should have been more confident with our prediction that the Invitatory Carol would be "Up! good Christian folk and listen" by Woodward because it totally is that carol.

We missed the mark in regard to the first carol after the First Lesson. That carol is "This is the truth sent from above" by Ralph Vaughan Williams, which was last sung in 2010 as the Invitatory Carol. Before that, it was sung in this position in 2007.

Stephen Cleobury has thrown a curve ball with a setting of "Adam lay ybounden" by Christopher Brown, a new work first performed 9 December 2006 in Linton, Cambridgeshire. This is the first time in my records that the sung setting of this carol has been composed by someone other than Peter Warlock or a Director of Music at King's.

Philip Ledger, who died on 18 November is commemorated with two carols in this year's service: his arrangement of "Good Christian men, rejoice", and "A spotless rose". "Good Christian men, rejoice", sung after the Second Lesson, has not been previously sung at the service in this arrangement -- and we have not been aware of it before now. You can listen to a performance on the Christ's College, Cambridge recordings page. We had predicted that Pearsall's "In dulci jubilo" would be sung here, (the same tune. Likewise, we predicted Howells's a "A spotless rose" to be sung after the Fourth Lesson, the same position it held in last year's service. It returns, but in the exact same setting by Ledger. This carol was composed for the King's service in 2002, but it did not bear the distinction of being the commissioned carol that year (it was "The angel Gabriel" by Robin Holloway).

We were right in our prediction that the Sussex Carol is not being sung after the Third Lesson. It is instead, a repeat of last year's "Nowell sing we now all and some". This is one of four repeats of the internal carols from last year's service (not counting the three constant carols that bookend the service: "Once in royal", "O come, all ye faithful", and "Hark! the herald"). The four carols being repeated are:

• Nowell sing we now all and some
• A spotless Rose - Ledger
• The Hymn "While shepherds watched their flocks by night"
• The Three Kings - Cornelius

All this repetition from last year may be meant to offset some of the extra "newness". In addition to the commissioned carol there is a carol written for the choir's last CD, and that new (shocking!) setting of "Adam lay ybounden".

The hymn after the Third Lesson. It is "Unto us is born a Son". For the 16 years for which we have records it will have been sung six times in this slot. It just edges out "It came upon a midnight clear" which has beens sung five times.

The commissioned carol by Australian composer Carl Vine, "Ring out, wild bells is heard as the second carol after the Fourth Lesson. We're standing by our prediction that it will be awesome.

The hymn after the Seventh Lesson is not "God rest ye" as we thought it might be. It's "While shepherds", one of the four repeats mentioned above.

Since 2000, Stephen Cleobury has included one of his own carol arrangements in the service. The trend continues this year with "The Cherry Tree Carol", the melancholy story of pregnant Mary and indignant Joseph that could be equally at home in an Advent carol service. It was last sung in 2004.

John Rutter's "All bells in paradise" a carol written for the recently released Lessons & Carols CD on the college's new CD label is included in the service after the Sixth Lesson.

William Mathias's "Sir Christèmas" from his carol sequence Ave Rex is the final choir carol of the service. We don't believe that it has been sung at the King's service before.

The famous spreadsheet of all the carols sung at the service since 1997 has been updated.

Labels: Carl Vine, Christmas, Christopher Brown, John Rutter, King's College (Cambridge), Mathias, Philip Ledger

It's time once again for the annual broadcast of A Service for Advent with Carols, sung by the very fine Choir of St. John's, Cambridge.

You can listen the service for the next six days at the BBC, and we at Sinden.org highly recommend that you avail yourself of this opportunity.

You can download a PDF of the service at the College website.

This service is famed for many reasons. The singing is of the highest standard, and the liturgy is very thoughtfully conceived. The service is divided into four sections (The Message of Advent, The Word of God, The Prophetic Call, and The Christ-Bearer) mirroring the four weeks of Advent. In fact, the collects at the head of each of the first three sections is the Prayer Book collect for the respective Sunday of Advent. The fourth collect, however, either must come from a different source or was specifically composed for the service.

The seven Advent "O Antiphons" are evenly distributed throughout the four sections.

Highlights this year include:

• "There is a flower" by John Rutter. This a capella carol was composed specifically for John's as a sort of counterpart to his beter-known "What sweeter music", written for King's College.
  
  
• The energetic "Vigilate" by James Long (b. 1987), a new carol commissioned for the service.
  
  
• "A Spotless Rose" by Philip Ledger, who died just a few weeks ago.
  
  
• The return of Matthew Martin's Magnificat, which I thoroughly enjoyed when I first heard it on an Evensong webcast from May.
  
  
• "The Seven Joys of Mary" by William Whitehead which is just plain good fun.
  
  

Labels: Advent, James Long, John Rutter, Matthew Martin, Philip Ledger, St John's (Cambridge), William Whitehead

Already online via "The Royal Channel".

I've embedded two copies of the video below. Each is queued cued up to start at the beginnings of the two newest works.

Rutter This is the day the Lord has made begins at 26:30 (see below)

Mealor Ubi caritas begins at 39:00 (see below)

WARNING After the motet, after the words "let us pray" the sound goes beserk and the picture goes out. If you are wearing headphones, you'll want to take them off before this.

Labels: church music, John Rutter, Paul Mealor, weddings

When . . . you have a choral society in Tokyo dedicated solely to the performance of your music, you don’t have to worry.

Rutter’s music has always been of the easy-listening variety: tuneful, popular, conservative and sweet-toothed. Classic FM as opposed to Radio 3. It’s also music that declares its sources without shame. You hear it and think: ah yes, the Bernstein bit, the Britten, Walton, Faure. But that said, it’s immaculately crafted; it’s loveable (I’d man the barricades for at least one of his Christmas carols, What Sweeter Music which, I’m afraid to say DOES reduce me to tears); he has a gift for melody that most “serious” composers would kill for (if they were honest); and his music touches people’s lives in a way that most contemporary writing doesn’t. It’s no wonder that the musical establishment regards him with suspicion; but then, he hardly needs its accolades. When your international profile is so huge that you have a choral society in Tokyo dedicated solely to the performance of your music, you don’t have to worry. So I don’t suppose it will bother him that the real hit of the wedding music turned out to be another new-ish piece – not a commission – by a little known composer called Paul Mealor.

Few outside the British choral tradition will have heard of him, but he’s fairly young (born 1975 in Wales), teaches at a Scottish university, and writes music less ingratiating than John Rutter’s but still easy to assimilate.

For contemporary church musicians it’s a stroke of luck: a chance to ride a moment when their culture acquires a sudden spotlight.

The Ubi Caritas setting they did this morning had an austere resonance of plainsong that then flowered into the kind of cloudy harmonic suspensions of a Morten Lauridsen or Eric Whitacre: the two figures that seem to define where-it’s-at choral writing at the moment. So, not terribly original, but well put together and effective. And I confidently predict that Mealor will now leap to sudden fame on the back of it. His Ubi Caritas was certainly the closest this wedding got to the nerve-touching John Tavener moment at the last big royal ceremonial that broadcast to the world: Diana’s funeral.

Music at a royal Abbey occasion can’t help having a significance. For future generations it will stand as evidence of past taste: who was in or out of favour. For contemporary church musicians it’s a stroke of luck: a chance to ride a moment when their culture – these days relatively marginal in public consciousness – acquires a sudden spotlight.

White, Michael. "Paul Mealor's Ubi Caritas was the real hit of the wedding music". The Telegraph 29 April 2011

John Rutter’s This is the day wasn’t undignified or poppy, but its easy tunefulness did border on the slick and saccharine - give it some new words, and one could imagine Elaine Paige belting it out at the tear-jerking climax of a West End musical.

A young Welsh composer Paul Mealor (not, I confess, someone whose name or work I was previously acquainted with`) contributed a well-crafted motet Ubi caritas et amor. Lachrymose and meditative in mood, it is an exercise in the minimalist school of spirituality, heavily influenced by Tavener, Part and Gorecki, and Classic FM’s favourite Karl Jenkins. Pleasant enough, I thought, but not memorable.

Christiansen, Rupert (Opera Critic). "Royal wedding music: a magnificent Pageant". The Telegraph 29 April 2011.

The two new commissions were "This Is the Day" by John Rutter and a setting of the "Ubi caritas" text by Welsh composer Paul Mealor. The Rutter was, well, Rutter. Pretty enough, easy for amateur choirs to sing, but immediately forgettable. There's nothing wrong with Rutter's compositions per se, it's just that once you've heard one, you've heard them all, so there's very little point to a new commission.

Considering the popularity of the lovely "Ubi caritas" setting by Maurice Duruflé, Paul Mealor had big shoes to fill. His music is gently dissonant and reminiscent of Eric Whitacre's work.

Adair, Marcia. "Royal wedding: what the music says about William and Kate" LA Times Culture Monster blog 29 April 2011.

Mealor on his "Ubi caritas"

The composition is for choir and is gentle, delicate and meditative. The ancient, 6th century plainchant of Ubi Caritas is blended with 21st century harmony to create a work that, I hope, is both new and reflective of the past.

Mealor, Paul. "Royal wedding music: a 'delicate and meditative' composition" The Guardian 29 April 2011

Website of Paul Mealor

Labels: church music, John Rutter, Paul Mealor, weddings

The text of the anthem commissioned for the royal wedding tomorrow is available in the service leaflet

This is the day which the Lord hath made: we will rejoice and be glad in it.
O praise the Lord of heav’n: praise him in the height.
Praise him, all ye angels of his: praise him, all his host.
Praise him, sun and moon: praise him, all ye stars and light.
Let them praise the Name of the Lord.
For he shall give his angels charge over thee: to keep thee in all thy ways.
The Lord himself is thy keeper: the Lord is thy defence upon thy right hand;
so that the sun shall not burn thee by day: neither the moon by night.
The Lord shall preserve thee from all evil: yea, it is even he that shall keep thy soul.
The Lord shall preserve thy going out and thy coming in: from this time forth for evermore.
He shall defend thee under his wings.
Be strong, and he shall comfort thine heart, and put thou thy trust in the Lord.
John Rutter (b 1945) 
specially commissioned 
by the Dean and Chapter of Westminster for this service

Psalms 118: 24; 148: 1–3, 5a;
91: 4a, 11; 121: 5–8; 27: 16b

Extract from The Book of Common Prayer, the rights in which are vested in the Crown,
is reproduced by permission of the Crown’s patentee, Cambridge University Press.

Labels: John Rutter, weddings, Westminster Abbey

There's no author mentioned in conjunction with "Sounds of the Season from Churches and Halls" in today's New York Times.

There's no Rutter mentioned in the article either.

Both times he is listed as "Rütter".

I'm sorry, but misspelling an English composer's name does not give your Christmas program more international panache.

Labels: errata, John Rutter