Sonic shambles

The television broadcasts of the late Pope’s funeral and the marriage of Prince Charles, coming as they did on consecutive days, gave the opportunity to compare two different styles of choral singing at their most typical. Of course I am going to go on to say that the British version, as represented on that occasion by the choir of St George’s Chapel, Windsor, represented everything that is best, indeed just about everything that is humanly possible, in liturgical singing, while the choirs gathered in Rome managed to fulfil every gloomy expectation of those who care about these things. It has been many decades since the Sistine Chapel Choir was first recorded, bringing tears of something to many people’s eyes, and it sure hasn’t got any better. Complacent people on this side of the Channel anxiously ask each other how it is possible that the premier location in Catholicism can allow such a sonic shambles.

It is an interesting question. What is there about Anglican priests that has produced the choral tradition that we have in England, and have exported to other countries in our near orbit; and what happened to Catholicism, at some critical juncture in the past, that destroyed what they had? The answer is not obvious because priests of every century and every religious persuasion have not been reliably interested in having their services constantly interrupted by art music. At a guess I would say the two religions had produced about equivalent numbers of advocates, don’t-carers and priests actively hostile to liturgical music in the past 450 years, and in both cases the advocates would make up a small percentage of the whole. Nonetheless, 450 years later, the results are as we heard them the other week.