Howells and a screaming child

Choral Evensong from Selwyn College has just come across my Facebook feed so I have been listening to it. Who the hell takes a screaming kid to choral evensong?

The canticles in the above video are by Herbert Howells whose music was really popular when I was a chorister and, I assume, still is. This music speaks powerfully to me although I did not initially like the St. Paul's Service when I was young, although all ex-choristers love the "Coll. Reg". I think the first set I got to know was the B minor which I have not heard for years.

Listening to Howells' music takes me back and I feel both nostalgic and emotional. I was incredibly lucky to be a chorister under one of the finest choir trainers of his time in a period when church music was highly-valued. We worked hard as choristers and we were urged to aim for perfection: this was an attitude instilled in us. Mistakes, yawns, bad intonation and poor dynamics were frowned upon. Bum notes from the organ were as rare as poo from a wooden horse.

I was also lucky enough to sing in the first performance of Howells' "Thee Will I Love" which was written for Peterborough Cathedral and the commemoration (with a Solemn Requiem) of the 1100th anniversary of the Massacre of the monks of Medehamstede and first performed in Peterborough Cathedral on 9 November 1970: I was 12. This is a long anthem with an absolutely brilliant climactic moment just over a minute in at the word "Reigneth". I once conducted it when I was an organ scholar some 8-9 years later.

I would have liked to have been present at an evensong like this one featured on YouTube but the child would have ruined it for me. I can only assume there is something I do not know as to why this child was there. I had to stop listening to the video as I was totally distracted by the extraneous noise: full marks to the professionalism of the musicians. I simply could get get 'into the zone' as it were. Even the dignified recitation of the Creed was spoilt for me.

It has been a day of spoilt worship. Communion this morning was ruined by [a] Show and Tell church [b] a long sermon which merely retold the old testament reading's story of Elijah and the Baal worshippers. No mention of Father's Day.

I think I simply do not enjoy church any more and I need to stop playing for services which annoy me.