Celebrating Easter ……..

Choristers in Rochester Cathedral before the doors were closed.....
Choristers in Rochester Cathedral before the doors were closed.

Easter 2020 was celebrated with the finest music, prayer and thoughtful sermons. No Change then! But this time we could choose where we worshipped without leaving our homes. We could ‘step’ into cathedrals and schools across the land to share and enjoy a veritable feast of music and liturgy.

Of course, much of this was made possible by social media and the constant updating of cathedral websites. However, these wonderful offerings came thick and fast, so here are a few reminders of what you might have missed or would like to tune into again.

Some people don’t own a computer, let alone have a twitter account so once lockdown is behind us why not share some of these links with family and friends?

Hopefully they were able to enjoy the very reassuring Easter Service from King’s College, Cambridge on Saturday, 11 April on BBC2 https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m000h9x6 and the Easter Sunday Choral Evensong from Norwich Cathedral, recorded in 2017 https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b08md9vg

Palm Sunday and Virtual Choirs get going!

The team at St Paul’s Cathedral provided backing tracks and scores and invited us to join in on the first day of Holy Week with their worship and reflection. At the end of term 70 schools had taken part in a Hymn Flashmob. This time more than 70 people recorded contributions for Palm Sunday from Africa, USA and across the UK.

The Choir of the Nation

This too had an international flavour with contributions from all over the world, including Japan. 200 singers got involved, including 20 parish church members alongside singers from St Paul’s, Winchester Cathedral and College, Salisbury Cathedral and York Minster.

Tom Daggett, St Paul’s Cathedral OBE fellow who set up the Hymn Flashmob, says: “Singing brings great hope, and helps us to keep focussed on God at times of difficulty. That’s why our Hymn Flashmob has helped to bring comfort to thousands. We hope to hear many more voices across the church joining together to sustain our national rhythm of prayer and praise in the weeks to come, and our Choir of the Nation will help us to do that.”

School Assemblies

CSA has enjoyed assemblies from a number of schools, working hard to keep the school community together. So here are a few examples including David Morton, headmaster of The King’s School, Gloucester reminding us about the Rules set by St Benedict, “father of Western monasticism.”

Clive Marriott, Headmaster of Salisbury Cathedral School teamed up with Deputy Head, Nick Hawker to deliver some great assemblies for pupils and parents. Here’s the first one from 27 March, followed by the video for Easter Sunday.

Finally, enjoy this uplifting rendition of ‘Thine be the Glory’ from Exeter choristers singing from their homes!

Exeter Cathedral

What next?

Lots of terrific initiatives are underway to help us become a nation of singers! More on this in the next story…..