Andrew Reid appointed director of the Royal School of Church Music

Paul B. Batson, Jr. of Girard, Ohio, died on October 29, 2002, at the age of 72, after a 15 year battle with cancer. He was an active organist in the Youngstown, Ohio, area, having twice served as Dean of the Youngstown AGO chapter. He served other roles in the chapter and was an ardent supporter and manager of the chapter?s concert series for many years. He was also a dual member of the Pittsburgh chapter. In addition to his work in the office of the Youngstown Sheet and Tube Company, Mr. Batson served as organist for the First Baptist Church of Girard, Canfield Presbyterian Church, Christ Lutheran Church in Boardman, John Knox Presbyterian Church in Youngstown, Holy Name Roman Catholic Church in Youngstown, and Central Christian Church in Warren. He had studied organ in Salzburg, Austria, while in the U.S. Army, and then at Youngstown State University and Westminster College. He is survived by his mother and two nieces, and was preceded in death by his father and a brother. A memorial service was held on November 16 at Central Christian Church in Warren, where he had served for over 25 years, and on November 17 a two-hour program of organ music was played by members of the Youngstown AGO chapter at Canfield Presbyterian Church.

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George Guest, organist and choirmaster of St. John's College, Cambridge, died on November 20, 2002, at the age of 78. Born on February 9, 1924, in Bangor, Gwynedd, he had enjoyed a 40-year tenure at St. John's (1951-91). In 1947 he was appointed first undergraduate organ student under Rob Orr, and then succeed Orr upon graduation. In 1955 he oversaw the rebuilding of the chapel organ, adding a fourth manual. The addition of a solo trumpet stop was celebrated by a setting of the Evening Canticles by Michael Tippett. Much in demand as a recital organist, Guest had no fewer than eight of his former students go on to be cathedral chief organists.

George Howell Guest was the son of a grocery-man and traveling village organist. He was born in Bangor, North Wales, and was a chorister at the cathedral there and then at Chester, where he later served as sub-organist. He moved to Cambridge after four years in the Royal Air Force. In 1948 he won the John Stewart of Rannoch Scholarship for Sacred Music, and was appointed organist of St. John's in 1951. He also served as university lecturer in music from 1956 to 1982, and held the post of university organist from 1974 to 1991. In 1977 he was made a white Druid for his services to Welsh music. A member of the Council of the Royal College of Organists from 1964 until his death, he was its president from 1978 to 1980. He was also a member of the Council of the Royal School of Church Music from 1983, and was an examiner to the Associated Board of Royal Schools of Music from 1959 to 1992. He was president of the Cathedral Organists' Association from 1980 to 1982, and of the Incorporated Association of Organists from 1987 to 1989. He was president of the Friends of Cathedral Music and an honorary fellow of several universities and colleges.

George Guest and the St. John's Choir made some 60 recordings on various labels. His autobiography, A Guest at Cambridge, was first published in 1994 and is now in its second edition. A third edition is planned. He was appointed CBE in 1987. He is survived by his wife Nancy (née Talbot), whom he married in 1959, and by their son and a daughter.

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David H. Williams died on November 22, 2002, the day after his 83rd birthday, at his home in Tucson, Arizona. He was born on November 21, 1919, in Caerphilly, Wales, and arrived in New York City in 1927. There he attended at The Juilliard School, worked at H. W. Gray, and studied organ with Walter Wild. He served churches in New York, Connecticut, and Vermont, before moving to Arizona in 1963, where he was appointed organist and choirmaster at St. Andrew's Presbyterian Church. From 1966 until 1984, he served as minister of music, organist, choirmaster, and composer in residence at Catalina United Methodist Church, Tucson. A prolific composer of church music, Mr. Williams had more than 200 works published and had been recognized by the American Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers since 1953. He was named an honorary lifetime member of the AGO. A memorial service took place on November 30, 2002, at Catalina United Methodist Church, Tucson. The service was planned in detail by Williams, and included music by Vaughan Williams, Elgar, Bach, Bobby McFerrin, Manz, Parry, as well as by Williams himself and by his son Peter Williams. The combined choir included members of the choirs from Catalina United Methodist Church and Trinity Presbyterian Church, conducted by his son Peter. A tribute written by former Catalina pastor Stan Brown was read, detailing their many years of collaboration. He is survived by his wife of 57 years, Ruth Williams, five children, and eight grandchildren.

Gordon and Barbara Betenbaugh

Gordon and Barbara Betenbaugh are organists/choirmasters at First Presbyterian Church in Lynchburg, Virginia. They also direct Cantate, the Children's Choir of Central Virginia, and Mrs. Betenbaugh is chapel organist and assistant choral director at Virginia Episcopal School in Lynchburg. Last summer they completed a 13-week sabbatical in the UK, visiting Cambridge, Oxford, London, and Salisbury. See previous articles from their sabbatical: "London Chats #1: Michael McCarthy," October 2003, p. 18; "John Tavener's The Veil of the Temple," November 2003, p. 17; "Cambridge Chats #1: Timothy Byram-Wigfield," December 2003, pp. 16-19; and "London Chats #2: Patrick Russill," February 2004, pp. 20-22.

We met with Sarah MacDonald on June 5, 2003, during exam week, in the lovely garden near the chapel of Selwyn College. On the previous day we had attended a rehearsal of the Selwyn choir and Evensong at the college. Sarah is the first woman in the history of any of the Oxbridge college chapels to hold the position of director of music. She greeted us by giving us publications issued by Cambridge University that included a prospectus and other materials given to all potential students. We learned a great deal from Sarah about the system of the Cambridge colleges. Sarah is a friendly young woman with an ever-present smile and bubbly personality.

Sarah was appointed Director of Music in Chapel at Selwyn in January of 1999. She is Canadian, and studied piano, organ and choral conducting at the Royal Conservatory of Music in Toronto before coming to Cambridge as Organ Scholar of Robinson College. She has taught organ and conducting at the Eton Choral Courses, teaches for the University Music Faculty, and is a winner of the Royal College of Organists' Limpus Prize for organ performance.

GB: Thank you for these materials.

SM: You're welcome! This should give you some information on the 17 colleges out of 23 undergraduate colleges that do offer choral scholarships. It certainly should give you an idea about the range of activities of the various choirs. Of course, they are all made out to sound like every choir is fantastic. You can judge that for yourself! (laughter)

BB: How long have you been here?

SM: I've been at Selwyn for four and a half years. I was here in Cambridge at Robinson College as an undergraduate from 1992 until 1995.

GB: As an organ scholar?

SM: Yes.

GB: Did they have a director of music?

SM: No, I was it—just my kind of organ scholarship!

GB: Let me quiz you about the organ scholarships. How are the lessons worked out for the organ scholars?

SM: Most colleges pay for them completely or subsidize the lessons up to a certain point. The amount you can claim depends on which college you're at. They study with a variety of teachers, including David Sanger, Anne Page and Nicholas Kynaston. Most of the organ teachers come up to Cambridge three times a term. Or one could go down to London for lessons if one preferred.

GB: So, basically they are just coaches, then.

SM: Yes, in a sense they are. Most organ scholars only have three lessons a term. That's really all they have time for. The terms are really short (only eight weeks long). That is actually almost a lesson every two weeks. It does come as a bit of a shock to some of them, because they come from schools where they've had lessons every week throughout the year. David Sanger, who teaches most of them, is very much a kind of Conservatoire coach. He's interested in hearing something once, maybe twice if you're going to play it in a big competition or something. I was really fortunate because I'd done this in piano performance in Toronto. I'd had that kind of teaching for three years already, and I understood it completely.

GB: Where is home base for him?

SM: He lives in the Lake District in a converted chapel which is absolutely stunning.

 

BB: We love the Lake District! It's so beautiful.

SM: Occasionally he will invite students up to spend a couple of days and have a couple of lessons. The nave of the old chapel is his living room, and the organ is in there. It's fabulous! It's not easy to get to—you have to take about three trains and three buses. Then he has to pick you up. It's just amazing once you get there!

BB: Tell us about your new organ here at Selwyn.

SM: Oh, it's going to be excellent! It will be a 3-manual with 30 stops, made by Orgues Létourneau. I knew their organs from Canada although they haven't built very many here. There's one in Pembroke College Oxford and one in the Tower of London. We went down and played the London one, and spoke with the organist who told us two things that really sold us on it—first of all it was the finest organ he'd ever accompanied on. The other thing was that it had been in for a year at that point, and they hadn't had a single technical fault with it. For a new organ that's very impressive.

GB: I knew Létourneau when he was working for Casavant, and I put in a new organ in Nebraska. Of course I know of his instruments around the country like the big installation at First Presbyterian in Greensboro, North Carolina.

SM: I've seen that one advertised.

GB: So he will have large-scaled principals here?

SM: Yes.

BB: When's it due?

SM: It comes in July of 2004 and will be installed over the summer. We'll then sort of "play it in" through Michaelmas term of 2004. We're having it dedicated in January of 2005 by Naji Hakim.

GB: Are you going to have French reeds?

SM: Yes, absolutely, French Canadian reeds! They will have Cavaillé-Coll shallots.

BB: How did you end up studying in Canada?

SM: I am Canadian, grew up there and studied there first of all.

GB: Is that when you studied with John Tuttle?

SM: Yes, that's right.

GB: You studied piano first?

SM: The organ was only ever for fun. I primarily wanted to be a conductor anyway, so I knew I would have to learn to play the organ and decided to do that. I do take my playing very seriously, however. I got the top prize for organ playing in my associateship exam for the Royal College of Organists, but I have not yet had the courage to attempt the fellowship. It costs £300 to take it so I can't afford to fail it! Only a very small proportion of candidates pass it the first time. The keyboard tests in particular are notorious. I think I'll wait until the new organ is installed, when I will really want to practice for it.

BB: Tell us about the instrument you have in your chapel at the moment.

SM: It was built in 1994 by a local Cambridgeshire company. It's actually the same builder as the organ in St. Catharine's College for which Peter LeHuray was the consultant. The St. Catharine's instrument is really quite good, especially following its recent cleaning and revoicing by Flentrop. Ours at Selwyn is not a successful organ though, and has a sad history. There's a place in the world for mediocre parish church organs, but a Cambridge College Chapel with a musical tradition is not one of them. We have an organ repair budget of £10,000 a year. Last year was the point at which we knew we would have to do something. You can imagine how excited the College was about the idea of replacing an organ that was only eight years old. They were fantastic about it, but they were not happy.

GB: That's happened in the States with several builders. At least you're going to have pistons!

SM: Yes, we need them really.

BB: It's good that the College is supportive.

SM: Selwyn has one of the most prestigious traditions of the 20th century, and the college knows it needs to be preserved. There's a long list of important 20th-century church musicians who were organ and choral scholars here including Richard Marlow (Trinity College), Sir David Lumsden, John Harper, Grayston (Bill) Ives, Andrew Lawrence King, Percy Young, Frederick Rimmer. Of the past five organ scholars who've come through here, not a single one of them is playing anymore because they found the experience of three years as organ scholar here so disheartening having to play this instrument. Something had to be done.

BB: Do you play the last hymn and the postlude all the time?

SM: No, only about once a term. I do very little playing, but I do play at an Anglo-Catholic church where I am assistant in my spare time. Because it's exam term the external pressure on the choir is at a maximum. Evensong has to be a fun experience, because the exam pressure is horrendous here. Everything is 100% finals. Your entire degree is based upon these three weeks now. They write five or six essays every week all throughout their 3-year degree, and they don't count for anything. That's one of the reasons that this is a good time for the senior organ scholar to conduct. He's a wonderful player, but not an experienced conductor. The music is easy, and finals are mostly finished now. It's just the 6 or 7 first years who have exams right now that are going to be away. The whole atmosphere is more relaxed, but normally the organ scholars don't conduct unless I'm away. I think it's a bit odd that in England the way the tradition works is that they teach you to play the organ. You play the organ and play the organ and then suddenly get thrown in front of a choir, never having had a conducting lesson in your life. They expect you to know what to do. I think that's a bit unfair, actually. Once or twice a term, I let the organ scholars conduct while I'm there, so that we can actually have a chat right afterwards.

GB: None of the schools here teach basic conducting?

SM: There are a couple of new conducting programs at some of the London Conservatoires. There's a new program at the Royal Academy which started up two years ago which is a Master's in Church Music and Choral Conducting. Again, there are only four or five students per year, and they are teaching you professional choral conducting. The difficulty is that they will become accustomed to working with former Oxbridge choral scholars that sing like a recording whether you can beat time or not. Then you get thrown in front of a choral society or parish choir, and you can't even bring them in.

GB: Right. It's different in the States. In the better colleges much emphasis is put on conducting. You are the first woman in 700 years at an Oxbridge College. Tell us about that.

SM: It is a very male-dominated tradition. I'm now chairing the annual meetings after the choral scholarship trials. It is me and this table full of gentlemen. It's fine actually. In fact, an interesting statistic which I just heard the other day concerns The University Church (Great St. Mary's) which is just now advertising for a director of music.

GB: Yes, we saw that.

SM: They have 17 applicants—not a single woman.

BB: I wanted to ask you if other women had applied for positions and not been accepted or if they just didn't apply.

SM: No, they just don't apply.

GB: Do they think they can't break through?

SM: Yes, there's this mythology that women can't train boys' voices, which isn't true. The feeling is that we haven't gone through what boys do at the age of 12, so we can't possibly know what to do with them before they go through it.

GB: Are there any female organ scholars in Cambridge?

SM: A few, actually! There are girls at Sidney Sussex, Emmanuel, Magdalene, Corpus Christi, and Christ's Colleges this year.

GB: There's a woman who's a sub-organist at one of the cathedrals.

SM: There are three or four women sub-organists, and there are also several women in number one spots in major parish churches, where they are training men and boys choirs perfectly well.

BB: Have you had any problems?

SM: I've had no problems at all. I'd like to think it's because I know what I'm doing and not because I'm female. I've had an easy time of it. I expect that's from a kind of "short list" point of view.

GB: Do you think it will be another 50 years before there are females in the top cathedral positions?

SM: As a matter of fact, there are two women in number one cathedral positions already: one is Judy Martin, a former Selwyn organ scholar, who has recently gone to St. Patrick's Cathedral in Dublin, and the other is Arundel Roman Catholic Cathedral in Sussex, where both the "master" of the music, and also the assistant organist are women. I am not sure how long it will take before one of the traditional cathedrals with a medieval choir school will appoint a woman to the top job.

BB: There are the girls choirs now.

SM: One of the main problems with the girls choirs is that they are creating jobs for women, but they shouldn't be. Why is it that a man can conduct a men and boys choir, but a woman has to be appointed to the position of "Assistant Organist and Director of the Girls Choir." I hope it will not become another unbreakable tradition that if you are a woman you must conduct only a girls choir. It's still discrimination.

Part of the problem is that the real training is still being given too much to the boys only, first as cathedral or collegiate choristers, and then at the traditional all-boys private schools which carry on teaching the choral tradition. The girls choirs are still too new for the effects to be felt at university. I've got three or four ex-collegiate/cathedral boy choristers in the choir. When they arrive at university, the men know the repertoire already. The girls are the weak sight readers, and do not know the mixed choral repertoire. The men know all the organ accompaniments by the time they're 18. They come up here, they do three years and they walk into those jobs because they're already qualified.

GB: Right. I've been very impressed with 18- and 19-year-olds handling huge instruments like at King's, the "accompanying machine." There are very few 18-year-olds in the United States that could handle a big instrument like that with complete mastery and artistry.

BB: I think Trinity College must be the silver slipper. It appears that way to us just from the two or three days we were there.

SM: Yes, anywhere with that kind of tradition and that kind of money to uphold it is nice.

GB: What plans do you have for touring with your choir?

SM: We're going to Finland and Estonia in September, and then we will do a brief tour to Scotland next summer, because we're hoping to go to New Zealand (if we can find the money) in 2005. Bishop Selwyn was the first bishop of New Zealand, and we've still never been there.

BB: If you ever come stateside call us, and we'll work something out.

GB: It would be nice to have you. Does the college underwrite the tours?

SM: They subsidize them. Selwyn choir is not well known. International Record Review two years ago reviewed one of our recent CDs and said that we would easily give any of our better-known neighbors a run for their money. Reviewers can say that, but still when it comes down to it, no one has heard of Selwyn, so we can't charge a big fee.

BB: Maybe that will change.

SM: I would hope so, but I don't expect it to change in the next year or two. Domestic invitations are starting to come in now which is great. Two weeks from now we're going to Birmingham, (not terribly exotic, but the invitation is lovely) to St. Augustine's Church in Edgbaston which is the only parish church for which Howells wrote canticles, and they're on our CD. In March we went to Canterbury and sang the premier of a new work by Jonathan Dove. That was really fantastic. Those things are starting to come in, and I can now actually get expenses paid when we're in the country. However, no one's invited us anywhere more exciting than Canterbury or Birmingham at this point. Choir members have to contribute their own money, which is unfortunate. It's well subsidized, though. They're getting ten days in Finland and Estonia for £150 which is a lot cheaper than they could do if they were actually going on holiday.

GB: That's a good deal!

BB: So, do any of these students have jobs outside of the college?

SM: They're not allowed to. It's against University regulations. You cannot have a job while you're a student. You obviously can when you're home in the summer, but not during term.

GB: We were just punting yesterday, and our punter was a student. I guess his exams are over.

SM: Yes. It's very, very intense academically. That's why I have to be really careful about balancing. My choir does really well academically, and that's important from the college's point of view. I don't want it to appear that choir is "getting in the way" of their studies. Also, there's a great deal of pressure from the media firstly, and the government secondly, to open up Cambridge and Oxford. We're trying desperately hard. In this country only about 40% of the population actually goes to university. They are desperately trying to increase that, but there's no tradition of it. In the UK education system, I think it's 7% of school-age children in the population are in private schools (i.e., schools for which they pay fees); 93% are in state-funded public schools. Cambridge and Oxford, which are government funded universities, are still struggling to get 50% of students from state-funded schools, which obviously is not representative given the percentage of children who attend state-funded schools. One of the areas that have had to deal with that over the past ten years is the choral tradition because we can't let people in now just because they can sing (i.e., they probably went to a private choir school and then a private high school where the choral tradition is still taught). If they can sing, good, great, but they need to be absolutely top class academically as well. They've got to fight evenly against everyone else. If you've got two people, both of whom are equal academically, and one of them can sing, great—in comes the singer. If you've got one who's reasonably good who can sing and one who's brilliant academically who's tone deaf, the tone deaf one comes. We have to do that, and we've all had to learn to deal with it.

GB: Your system is so different than in America. How do beginning harmony, theory, counterpoint, dictation and sight singing work with your system here?

SM: All of that gets taught in the first year. They have weekly one-on-one tuition in harmony and counterpoint. At the end of the year for their exam they have to do a 4-part fugal exposition on a given subject, and they have to complete a piece of 3-part Palestrina where one part is given throughout. There's no keyboard aid—it's all pencil on paper.

GB: So, they're taught harmony and counterpoint at the same time?

SM: Yes, and both are examined at the end of the year in three-hour exams. The harmony exam consists of three questions, and they have to answer two of them. One of them is the harmonization of a sort of "Schubertesque" song, and they have to write the piano part. The other is completion of a string quartet. They will be given four bars of the string quartet which they have to complete to a specified rubric (e.g., "write a further 24 bars with a modulation to the dominant at the half-way point"). The other question is to write up to six variations on a ground bass, either for a keyboard instrument or for strings. Aural training is extremely difficult here, because 20 or 25 of approximately 60 undergraduate musicians in each year have perfect pitch. Coming up with an exam that all of them can take is hard work. For the dictation questions, there are two things rather loosely termed "melodies." They are given the first note and 6 to 8 bars, and they get to hear it twice. These are really horrible—they are designed to test the people with perfect pitch. Then there are four rhythms that they have to memorize which are usually shorter, about four bars. Again, they hear them twice, but they can't write until after the second playing.

GB: It's different in the States.

SM: It's quite a clever trick, actually. You really learn to record and play back in your head. It's a skill that all of us have, but they have to learn to use it. They also have to complete a piece of 3-part keyboard counterpoint dictation, like a Baroque 3-part invention. They are given one part all the way through, and have to take the other part down. They hear that a total of four times. Then they have something called orchestral timbres. They are given a piano reduction of an orchestral score, and they then hear the orchestral version played three times. They then have to fill in boxes and say "that was a Cor Anglais or that was a viola with a mute on playing really high." They have to score up eight bars of it towards the end.

GB: That's all first year?

SM: Yes, it's all one three-hour exam.

GB: So orchestration is first year as are harmony and counterpoint?

SM: Yes. Then they have aural analysis. They hear a four- or five-minute piece of music. On this year's exam it was a piece of Couperin's keyboard music. They hear it three times, and the question is to write an account of the movement. The people who don't necessarily write things very well can just say "this happens or that happens." The kids who are really good actually write proper Schenkerian analysis for something they've heard three times and haven't got a score for. That's quite a big one. There's a mistake-spotting test. They are given a score that has mistakes in pitch and duration. They get played the correct version, and then they have to circle and correct the mistakes. Some of those are easy, and some are not. They have a keyboard exam as well in which they have to transpose a chorale, realize a figured bass, score a string quartet, score a Palestrina piece in C clefs and harmonize a melody.

The other written exams include analysis, in which there are two unseen works plus a set work which is a quick study. They'll find out what that is a couple of weeks before the exams. They would be asked to write three analysis essays in the exam, at least one of which must be on the set work. There are also two history papers (we call courses "papers"), the exams for which are also usually three essays to be written in three hours. The first one is the 19th century, and the other is 20th century. During the second year they choose from a selection of topics. This year's options include a Bach course, a course on Handel in London, one on Paris opera in the 19th century, and that sort of thing. They also have to submit a portfolio of tonal compositions. They have a set number of styles they can write in (sonata form or theme and variations or a collection of three songs or a ritornello) and they also must submit a three- or four-voice fugue. They study fugue all the way through the second year. The tripos1 is in the process of changing, and the major change is that the only compulsory paper (I think we are the only remaining university in the world for this paper) is a four-hour fugue exam. Every undergraduate, by the end of their third year, can sit down and write a fugue without a piano in four hours. It's not nearly as difficult as one thinks. I will ever be grateful that I did it. Now it's my favorite course to supervise. I teach about 15 fugue students, and I love it. I especially enjoy the ones who at the beginning of their third year say, "You must be kidding." By the end if they actually work well through the year, it's not a terrifying exam. They've actually learned how to deal with large-scale form, small-scale harmonic movements, etc., and writing good four-part counterpoint. I don't know what will happen next year, because it's not mandatory. They will have a choice. They will either have to write a 10,000-word dissertation on some scholarly topic of their choice which would be submitted obviously, or they can do the fugue paper. There's still a little bit of academic rigor left, but my guess is that 70% or 80% of them will go for the dissertation, which is a shame, because there are a lot of people who actually end up enjoying fugue who would never choose to do it at the beginning of the year.

GB: For the fugue course, for instance, would you use a textbook?

SM: Nothing is textbook-based in this university.

GB: That's what I thought.

SM: By midway through their second year for their history papers, they are reading journals. It's much more research-based. What I do in fugue, with the students who are reasonably comfortable keyboard players, or who at least have played some pieces, they simply have to write for me a complete fugue every week. We'll have a half-hour or 45-minute session on it every week, just the two of us. With those who struggle a bit, I'll do small amounts, say have them write four expositions, and I'll dictate. I'll have them write one using semiquavers modulating from E-flat to B-flat or whatever or write one in three parts using triplet quavers. I'll dictate a little bit, but I'll do that for the first term, and then I'll insist that they write a complete fugue all the way through. Writing a sequence, using the circle of fifths, bearing in mind that they've learned all of the basics of suspensions, etc. during the first year, they can learn that in about two afternoons, even the weak ones. You need them to consider how they are going to use this little bit of material in the whole thing. Occasionally, you'll get them to practice writing endings of fugues. Can you work your way up to a Neapolitan sixth chord? Anyone can write a Neapolitan sixth chord, but it's getting there and escaping from it that's tricky.

In the third year they all study a major set work, usually a choice of one of six big operas, Boris Godunov was one of them and Così fan tutte. There would be a choice of four other papers on various history topics. There's an in-depth editing and notation paper which this year was on Frescobaldi, so one would be dealing with a lot of nasty tempo relationships and that sort of thing. There would be various other random history papers depending on what research any of the lecturers are doing. One of this year's choices is "Music, Politics and Theology in the English Reformation." That would've been a fun paper to take. They can also write a dissertation if they want, 10,000 words on the topic of their choice. There's also the option to take a performance, which many of them do, but it's only one option, only in the third year. Two-thirds of them will do a 23-minute recital in which there's a set work that you have to perform. They also have to write a 3,000-word essay on the performance reception and history of any of the pieces in your program, which is a little bit nebulous, but there has to be something academic since it's not a performing degree. I did it actually, and my essay was on a piece of Bach on the organ. I did a study of all of the published editions of the piece I played. I went down to the National Sound Archive and listened to loads of recording of it and looked up every reference to it in every book ever written about Bach. You can actually come up with an essay, but it's not easy.

GB: Most of our degrees in the States are performance degrees.

SM: Yes, exactly. You can do that at a Conservatory. There's a gap between the Conservatory and the University. Lots of students graduate from here with a degree and then go on and do a Master's at the Royal Academy. There's some fabulous playing and some fabulous singing that gets done here, but there's even better playing and singing at the Conservatories in the undergraduate programs, because the ones who are really top quality performers will often just go there first.

GB: All of this exam talk is exhausting. I know why the students are looking like they are now. (laughter)

SM: Exactly, and that's just in music. The worst one I think is the English course. They don't do exams at the end of the first year, because there's too much to learn. They only take exams at the end of the second year. The first morning of the exam week they get up and write an exam called 900-1100. Then they get up the next morning, and it's 1100-1300, then 1300-1500, etc. Eight days in a row they will write an exam covering two hundred years of English literature. Then they have to take a second language paper as well and something called literary criticism, analysis of unseen texts.

GB: This is all much more difficult than in the States.

SM: I think it's more difficult here than in most places. Certainly the music course is twice as rigorous as anything I've ever seen in North America. In fact, there was a mathematician visiting a week ago who came in for dinner with someone he knows. He had been looking at the first years' math papers. Bearing in mind that Newton was a mathematician at Cambridge, and Stephen Hawking is here, I think it's allowed to be a difficult course. He was looking at the first year math exam, and he said to me that he had had a Ph.D. in mathematics for 20 years, and he thought he could probably get through about 25% of that exam. I'm sure that he is a top scholar in the specific area, but here it is a huge amount of material our students have to get through in a short amount of time. It's not just that they do everything in no detail. They do things in great detail, but they do an awful lot of stuff in a lot of detail. It's really intense, and that's why they get so stressed at this time of the year, because they have to show what they know now.

BB: That's hard, because they don't get graded at any time until the end. What about people that don't test well?

SM: Women always do worse than men. It's very definitely a man who would've thought of it, because it wouldn't occur to a man that it might not be a good day for a woman to write an exam. Many women do extremely well, but in general the overall performances show that the men do better. The other thing is that more men get in. There are three colleges that admit only women, and there's still a 65/35% gender imbalance across the university, even including those three colleges.

GB: Magdalene was the last college to accept women?

SM: Yes, in 1991.

GB: What was the first year?

SM: In 1972 or 1973 there was a wave of 3 or 4 colleges that accepted women. There was a big bunch in 1976 which included Selwyn. The rest of them jumped on board over the next few years, and Magdalene went in 1991.

GB: Well, we've covered a lot of academic ground.

BB: Thank you for explaining all this. We didn't understand all that we knew about the system in Cambridge. Most Americans don't understand the system here at all.

SM: Unless you've come up through it, you don't realize. You can't do anything resembling a liberal arts degree. If you come up here to read for the Music tripos, then you read for the Music tripos full stop. You can go and attend lectures in any of the other subjects if you want to, but you won't be examined on them, and no one will know. Nobody has time to do that anyway. Some people will finish Part I in a particular course, and then change. The sad ones are those who do Part I in a course they love and then panic and do Part II in Law when they realize that History or English or whatever isn't going to give them a job. That does happen, but it's usually only 3 or 4 students per course in each year that would actually change.

GB: The Oxbridge Colleges are still the only places that give an MA three years after the Bachelor's?

SM: Yes, absolutely.

GB: Free of any advanced study?

SM: Yes.

BB: This would then be different from an MA from the Royal Academy?

SM: That's right. You can do a Master's degree here as well—it's called an M.Phil. It's a one-year postgraduate research degree, and then you do your doctorate. Anyone who knows if your degree says MA Cantab (the abbreviation for the Latin form of Cambridge) they know perfectly you haven't worked for it. The other thing is that the undergraduate degree is really heavily research-based and a ridiculous amount of work. I didn't feel in the least guilty about accepting an MA, because I knew that I did so much intense research for my BA.

GB: I've heard that there were discussions about phasing that out.

SM: I don't know. It's fighting against 700 years of tradition. I would be surprised if they phase it out, especially because if you have a degree from Cambridge people know if it says M.Phil that you worked for it. If it says MA, then it just means that you did your undergraduate degree at Cambridge. If I go back to North America and say that I have an MA, they all assume that I've done a three-year research degree, which in a sense I have. It just comes with the undergraduate one.

GB: What is the total for room, board and tuition for a year?

SM: Tuition for a home student (a UK or EU student are the same) with parents that make money is £1,125 per year for any university in the UK. It's subsidized, you see. Tuition fees only came in three years ago. Before that it was free. You can imagine how painful that was. When I was here as an undergraduate tuition was free, and they still received maintenance checks from the government to go to university. That was their desperate attempt to increase the number of people at university. The maintenance checks were means-tested, so if you had wealthy parents you didn't get one. Fees and loans for home students are now means-tested instead, and grants are no longer available.  There is a huge debate in Parliament right now though about raising university tuition fees significantly (to £3000 a year minimum), and some universities, including Cambridge, are fighting for the right to set their own level of fees, rather than having it set by the government as it is now. In terms of living costs, 95% of undergraduates live in college residence, which keeps costs down. Rent in Selwyn, for example, is actually quite low. The rooms are small, because it was originally formed as a college for priests and for children of poor clergy. It doesn't have any of the big sumptuous rooms that some of the wealthy medieval colleges have. Depending on the size of the room they would be paying between £450 and £600 per term (there are three terms a year), which is quite low actually compared to some of the colleges. They also have to pay something called a kitchen fixed charge, which is about £100 a term. This keeps the prices for meals in hall really low, so they can get a full 3- or 4-course meal served in the formal hall three times a week for only £4, and daily lunch can be bought for as little as about £2.

Fees for overseas students, however, are exorbitant. For a science course, which music is classed as because a lot of the teaching is one-on-one, the tuition when I came ten years ago was £9,750 a year. Then I had to find accommodations on top of that. They expect you to have about £15,000 or £20,000 a year, which is fine except if you're paying it in Canadian dollars worth next to nothing.

GB: What kind of stipend do the organ and choral scholars get?

SM: The choral scholarship, as you will see in the materials, is £100 a year plus singing lessons. The organ scholarship is £300 a year plus organ lessons. There is an agreement across the whole university such that every choral scholar, no matter which college they're at, gets paid £100, and every organ scholar gets paid £300. An instrumental award is £75. It does depend on what college you are as to how much is paid for lessons. Selwyn is quite generous, because we had a nice alumnus about 25 years ago who endowed a music fund. The choral scholars claim up to £300 a year or up to £450 for lessons if they're studying music. This actually isn't bad—you can have a lot of lessons for that kind of money. We do get lots of inquiries from North Americans who think that choral scholarship is an equivalent football scholarship (i.e., is actually substantial financially), but it isn't.

GB: Are they big on early fingering here in Cambridge?

SM: Some of them are, yes. Then the musicians among us will think about the early fingering and how it affects articulation, and then do the articulation with normal fingering! (laughter)

GB: That's what I do—it's easier than refingering everything.

SM: Yes.

GB: What one hears is the main thing.

SM: If you're on your way to King's there's a mass there on Thursdays. It's not Evensong.

GB: Yes, they are doing the Howells Collegium Regale. We have heard the Kodály Missa Brevis twice. I don't know what their rotation schedule is. I haven't figured it out.

SM: My guess is that it's probably not particularly methodical. You can't count anything as being in your repertoire until the third term, because a third of the choir is new at the beginning every academic year.

GB: It's been a joy to hear all the Howells settings, particularly. They are our favorites.

SM: You should get our CD in that case!

GB: Yes, we'll pick one up from the porter.

BB: Thank you for giving us your hour and sharing your knowledge.

SM: Certainly. This has been fun.

Author's note: We left Sarah with promises to meet in cyberspace soon.

Godwin Sadoh

The history of church choirs in Nigeria is interwoven with the arrival of Christianity in Nigeria, which dates back to the mid-nineteenth century. The early missionaries from the United States and Europe settled mainly in the southwest (Yoruba) and southeast (Igbo) regions of Nigeria. The conversions of the local indigenes encouraged the missionaries to build several churches for worship and to continue the propagation of the Gospel in Nigeria. It was in these churches that the converts were first exposed to English hymns in four-part harmony.

Worship at the Cathedral Church
The Cathedral Church of Christ, Lagos, was founded in 1867 by a group of Christian worshipers from St. Peter’s Anglican Church, Faji, Lagos, where services were conducted only in Yoruba language. These worshipers were Sierra Leonians who spoke mainly English and wanted to have services in English. Hence, it was agreed that services at the Cathedral Church would be conducted exclusively in English. Consequently, the congregation at the Cathedral Church strictly committed to having all worship in English, including the sermons, hymns, announcements, and all special musical renditions by the Cathedral Choir. Another reason for embracing worship in English was that the church was designed to cater to the musical and spiritual needs of the cosmopolitan Lagos society as well as visitors from outside the country, foreign diplomats, and the various ethnic groups in Nigeria who communicated fluently in English. In other words, the congregation at the Cathedral Church comprised the elite, the well-educated, intellectuals, upper-middle-class, the affluent and apparently the cream of the Lagos society. I remember my days at the Cathedral Church as a chorister between 1980 and 1994: almost everyone communicated in English during choir rehearsals and services. Occasionally, one might hear people communicate in Yoruba, but it was always some few sentences and they would quickly switch to English.
While the Cathedral Church of Christ has received criticism for adopting a complete English service within a Yoruba state and in one of the most populous African countries, one could argue that this decision was worthy, considering the pluralistic nature of the indigenous languages in Nigeria. Linguistically, Nigeria is widely diversified, with three major ethnic groups—Yoruba, Igbo and Hausa. In addition, there are multiple subdivisions of the major languages, known as local dialects that include hundreds of tongues. With such extensive linguistic diversification, the government had to adopt English as the official language of the country after independence from Great Britain in 1960 in order to unify the diverse ethnic groups. To elevate one of the local languages over another would have caused internal dissatisfaction and deep division.
Interestingly, the Cathedral Church of Christ was one of the few pan-ethnic and pan-African congregations in Nigeria. Membership in most other churches was made up of one major ethnic group; hence, services were conducted there in the indigenous language of the group. But at the Cathedral Church of Christ, there are Yoruba, Igbo, Edo, as well as descendants of Sierra Leone, Ghana, Togo, and other West African countries who migrated to Nigeria in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. As the mother church of the Anglican diocese in Lagos, the Cathedral Church of Christ is always busy with services and other benevolent activities throughout the week:
Sunday Worship
7:15 am—Holy Eucharist (Communion service without choir)
9:15 am—Choral Mattins (Cathedral Choir sings)
9:15 am—Contemporary Praise and Worship (Every fourth Sunday)
9:15 am—Cornerstone Fellowship (Youth/college students)
9:15 am—Children’s Church (Sunday school)
11:15 am—Holy Eucharist (Communion with or without the Cathedral Choir)

Sunday Evening Worship
5 pm—Evensong with the Cathedral Choir (first and second Sunday)
5 pm—Community Hymn Singing (third Sunday)
5 pm—Time of Refreshing (fourth Sunday)
5 pm—Psalmody (Whenever there is a fifth Sunday)

Weekday Worship
6 am—Mattins
6:45 am—Holy Eucharist

Saturday Worship
7:15 am—Mattins
11:15 am—Holy Eucharist

Cathedral Choir and Masters of the Music
The Cathedral Church of Christ Choir is the oldest choir in Nigeria, with an average membership of about fifty male voices, half of whom are boys who sing the treble part. However, that number has recently exploded to over eighty strong and dedicated voices—treble (37), alto (18), tenor (13) and bass (15). The first choir was organized by Robert Coker in 1895, comprising young men and women. Coker was acknowledged to be the first indigenous organist and choirmaster in Nigeria, and apparently the first to occupy this lofty position at the Cathedral Church of Christ, Lagos. Prior to his appointment as organist at the church, he was sponsored by the Cathedral Church to travel to England to study music in order to form a good choir suitable for Christ Church, which was later elevated to a cathedral status in 1923. Coker was regarded as a musical genius of his time. He was the first indigenous musician to attempt the performances of Western classical music in Nigeria, notably Handel’s Messiah. Coker died on February 9, 1920.
The choir was later reorganized during the tenure of N. T. Hamlyn, a British musician and pastor of the church. Hamlyn replaced the women of the choir with boys and young men, following the tradition of most British cathedrals. The choir made tremendous progress that established it as a model for other church choirs. Hamlyn provided the choir with surplices and erected choir stalls at the east end of the church. A strict disciplinarian, Hamlyn was always keen on regular and punctual attendance, and was thus able to set a high standard that has been maintained to this day. After the era of Hamlyn, there was a brief period of short appointments of organists such as that of D. J. Williams, J. G. Kuye in 1904, and later Frank Lacton, a Sierra Leonian who served until the appointment of Thomas Ekundayo Phillips in 1914.
Thomas King Ekundayo Phillips (1884–1969) was appointed Organist and Master of the Music after completing his musical training at Trinity College of Music, London (1911–14). Prior to his appointment at the Cathedral Church, he was organist at St. John’s Anglican Church, Aroloya, and St. Paul’s Anglican Church, Breadfruit, Lagos. Phillips’s tenure was a remarkable turning point in the history of church music in Lagos and Nigeria as a whole. He built a solid foundation on which the present choir stands firmly today as one of the best cathedral choirs in Africa. He retired in 1962 after serving in the music ministry at the Cathedral Church for forty-eight years (Trinity Sunday 1914 to Trinity Sunday 1962).
Thomas Ekundayo Phillips was succeeded by his son, Charles Oluwole Obayomi Phillips (1919–2007), as the Organist and Master of the Music; he faithfully served the church for exactly three decades (Trinity Sunday 1962 to Trinity Sunday 1992). Charles Obayomi Phillips was born on September 28, 1919, in Lagos. After attending C. M. S. Grammar School, Lagos, he proceeded to Durham University, England, receiving a bachelor’s degree in commerce with distinction in June 1946. Phillips started taking private lessons on piano when he was only four years old with Nigeria’s most celebrated international musician, Fela Sowande, and as a choir boy at the Cathedral Church received organ lessons under the tutelage of his father. At age fourteen, Phillips had already started assuming leadership roles in music; first, he rose to the enviable position of school pianist at C. M. S. Grammar School and was later appointed by his father as the assistant organist of the Cathedral Church in 1933.
Charles Obayomi Phillips studied organ with J. A. Westrup at Durham University, and with Christopher Idonill in 1976 at the Royal School of Church Music, London. During his tenure as Organist and Master of the Music at the Cathedral Church, Phillips maintained the tradition of the Cathedral Choir and developed new ideas that made the choir soar in standard. In spite of the tremendous economic upheavals in the political, social and religious life of Nigeria since independence in 1960, music at the Cathedral Church continues to be the center of inspiration and worship.
In addition to his strenuous tasks at the Cathedral Church, Charles Obayomi Phillips served as president of the Union of Organists and Choirmasters in Lagos, an organization that oversees the maintenance of high standards of music in all Anglican churches in the Lagos diocese. He was the Emeritus Organist at the Cathedral Church of Christ until his death in May 2007. After Phillips’s retirement in 1992, Yinka Sowande, Fela Sowande’s younger brother who had been Substantive Organist under Phillips for several years, was temporarily appointed as interim Master of the Music; he retired on December 31, 1992.
History was made on January 1, 1993, with the appointment of Tolu Obajimi as the first female Organist and Master of the Music of the Cathedral Church of Christ. She is the first woman to be appointed to the position of organist and music director in any Nigerian church. Obajimi is also the first Nigerian female organist to play recitals on the pipe organ. In addition to playing organ and piano recitals all over Lagos, she had accompanied several standard choral works such as Messiah, Elijah, St. Paul, Ode for St. Cecilia’s Day, and Thomas Ekundayo Phillips’s Samuel.
Tolu Obajimi certainly deserves special recognition and commendation for daring to step into the very shoes that even men found to be extremely challenging. Since 1993, she has expanded the music ministry of the Cathedral Church to the delight and with the support of the choir, clergy and the entire congregation. One of her most remarkable accomplishments was the creation of the Cathedral Church of Christ Choir Orchestra, which was launched at the 80th anniversary of the choir on November 22, 1998. The other two significant programs added to the Cathedral Church ministries under her leadership are Community Hymn Singing and Psalmody: Chanting the Psalms of David.
Tolu Obajimi’s successful activities at the Cathedral Church are not surprising to those who knew her before she began at the Cathedral Church. She brought into the church’s ministry several years of experience as a professionally trained musician. Obajimi studied music at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama, London, in the 1960s; on her return to Nigeria, she taught music at Queen’s College, Lagos, for several years, and she also founded and taught at her own Tolu Obajimi Conservatory of Music, Lagos. Obajimi is presently assisted by Richard Bucknor as Choirmaster, Sina Ojemuyiwa (the best and most famous Cathedral Choir tenor) as Assistant Choirmaster, Jimi Olumuyiwa (former Cathedral Choir Librarian) as Assisting Choirmaster, and Tunde Sosan as Substantive Organist.
It is important to mention that the Cathedral Church of Christ has a rich and rigid tradition of appointing someone from within the choir to the leadership position of Organist and Master of the Music. Charles Obayomi Phillips received organ lessons from his father, Thomas Ekundayo Phillips, and gave Tolu Obajimi her first lessons in organ and trained her to the proficient level necessary for appointment as the Cathedral Organist. Even though Obajimi was never a member of the Cathedral Choir, she had been a member of the church for several years and she began by playing piano for the 7:15 am Holy Eucharist during Charles Obayomi Phillips’s tenure. She was later called upon to accompany the choir at rehearsals during the week, and she participated in several concerts such as Mendelssohn’s Elijah and Handel’s Messiah in the late 1980s.
Tunde Sosan started off as a choir boy, and he was trained on the organ by Tolu Obajimi before he went to study at the Trinity College of Music, London. Other notable musicians who have served as honorary organists, substitute organists and/or recitalists at the Cathedral Church include Fela Sowande (musicologist and organist-composer), Ayo Bankole (musicologist and organist-composer), Modupe Phillips (a son of Thomas Ekundayo Phillips, he played the organ at the age of twelve), Samuel Akpabot (musicologist and composer), Kayode Oni (concert organist and choir director), Godwin Sadoh (organist-composer, choral conductor and ethnomusicologist), Kweku Acquah-Harrison (Ghanaian organist and music educator), Albert Schweitzer (German musicologist and organist), and Ian Hare of King’s College, Cambridge, England.

Choir Training
The outstanding musical standards of the Cathedral Choir today can be traced back to the hard work and foundation laid by Thomas Ekundayo Phillips. Phillips emphasized strict discipline, regular and punctual attendance at choir practices, correct interpretation of notes, voice balance, articulation, attack, comportment, reverence in worship, and utmost sense of good musicianship. His expectations were very high and certainly demanding, but the choir always rose to his standards. During choir practices, as the conductor, Phillips was very sensitive to intonation. He would detect and correct any faulty notes emanating from any section of the choir. He would also call to order any chorister who did not hold his music book correctly, such as covering the face with it or placing it on the lap while seated. The present arrangement where choristers placed their books on the raised desk did not exist then.
Thomas Ekundayo Phillips was known to be very meticulous and thorough in everything he did—whether he was dealing with twelve probationers or with his augmented choir of over one hundred voices. One of the criteria to join the Cathedral Choir or his augmented choir was the ability to sight-read music. Furthermore, the singer must have had a very good voice to be able to sing under Phillips’s direction. Consequently, his choir learned anthems, hymns, chants, and other standard choral works in a very short time. One of the ways he tested his choir to see if they had mastered a work was with the accompaniment. Often, at the last rehearsal of an anthem before Sunday worship, he would start the choir off with the organ, and then suddenly stop playing right in the middle of the piece; if the choir faltered and stopped, he would ask, “suppose the organ broke down during the performance on Sunday, are you going to stop singing?” His choir did not know an anthem, as far as he was concerned, until they could sing it convincingly and confidently without any accompaniment and without dropping in pitch. Honorable Justice Yinka Faji, who began as a choir boy under Charles Obayomi Phillips and now sings alto, recounts the benefits of the discipline instilled in him as a Cathedral chorister:

Membership in the choir disciplined me. To me discipline is synonymous with the choir. It is now a personal taboo for me to miss Sunday services—Mattins and Evensong. Choir practice at 6 pm on Tuesdays and Thursdays as a choir boy and now as a choir man, no side talks during rehearsals, team work, orderliness, and mutual respect; these and more have been and still are the norms of the choir. The choir made me bold. I remember one Holy Eucharist Sunday service that I was to sing a solo. It was the Agnus Dei. When it was time to sing, I stood up and opened my mouth. As soon as I started singing, everyone in the congregation looked up and my heart started beating fast. I then said to myself, “Yinka, they are looking at you, will you fail?” I almost stopped singing; one way or the other, I completed the solo and sat down. Since then, I have become very bold to address a large crowd; in fact, I can address the entire nation. Other good virtues I picked up include comportment during worship, improved speech control and good manners generally.
Before a choir boy or man can be admitted into the choir to sing in Sunday worship, he must first go through the rigorous probationary period that normally last several months. The probationary period of choir boys is eight months, while that of adults is around three months. I remember my probationary period in 1980 while I was still in high school. I attended the choir practices on Tuesdays and Thursdays, but on Sundays I would sit in the congregation for worship and was never allowed to sing with the choir until I completed my three months of probation. It felt so good in those days to put on my beautiful cassock and surplice and sing tenor in the most famous Anglican Church choir in Nigeria.
Whenever the boys completed their probation, they would be formally admitted into the Cathedral Choir at a special service in which their parents would assist them to put on the white surplice over the black cassock. This was always a moment of joy and pride for the parents. Each week, the choir comes into the church at least four times with a total time of about eight hours. The Organist and Master of the Music usually devotes thirty minutes to the junior boys or those on probation from 6 to 6:30 pm before the main choir practice begins. He/she trains them in sight reading of music notation, vocal exercises, and theory of music. All this training ultimately leads to the boys taking the external examinations of the Trinity College of Music, London. Successful candidates would receive certificates if they passed the exams.
The older members of the Cathedral Choir were never left out of continuous training. Some prominent senior members of the choir were occasionally sponsored by the Cathedral Choir to the Royal School of Church Music, London, refresher course training as the funds were available. This normally took place during summer when the choir was away on vacation in June or July. On return, the choir member would give a report of all he learned, paying particular attention to the new innovations in church music as practiced in England—in the form of new anthems, hymns or hymnals, latest techniques of chanting the Psalms or singing regular church hymns and sacred concerts.

Choir Ministry
The role of the choir in the ministry of the Cathedral Church of Christ is immense. The choir leads the congregation every Sunday in hymn singing, versicles and responses (antiphonal prayers set to music), special settings of liturgical music such as Venite, Benedictus, Te Deum, Nunc Dimittis, Magnificat and the Ordinary of the Mass. The Master of the Music uses the choir to teach the congregation new music.
The Master of the Music is always attentive to how the congregation sings church hymns. In order to boost the standard of congregational singing, Tolu Obajimi introduced a Community Hymn Singing service slated for the third Sunday of each month. This was designed to encourage members of the Cathedral Church to attend Sunday evening worship. Apart from the roster for church societies and individuals, families are also encouraged to sponsor the service. In this service, the Master of the Music writes out the background information or history of the hymns to be sung in the program. There is no sermon; however, one or two Bible lessons are inserted into the program as epilogue. The service opens and closes with prayer. The format of the service is simply an alternation of readings with hymn singing. The historical background of the hymns is read by individual members of the congregation, while the choir and congregation sing the hymns. Before the last hymn is sung, the sponsors and committee members of the service are usually acknowledged.
Whenever there is a fifth Sunday in a month, the Cathedral Choir presents special evening music entitled “Psalmody: Chanting the Psalms of David.” This was also one of the creative innovations of Tolu Obajimi. Similar to the Community Hymn Singing, Psalmody is simply the alternation of readings, in this case the Psalms of David, by members of the congregation, with the chanting of the actual Psalms done by the congregation and/or the Cathedral Choir. The reader presents an historical background of the Psalm—who wrote it, the occasion, why, when and where the Psalm was likely written. This approach helps the congregation to have a better understanding of the theological underpinning of the Psalm, which inevitably would enable them to sing with understanding and energy. Through this medium, the Master of the Music and the Cathedral Choir teach the congregation the latest techniques of chanting the Psalms of David, thereby helping them to correct some performance errors during rendition.
Interestingly, some Yoruba Psalms set to music as anthems by Thomas Ekundayo Phillips are always included in the service. Presently, this is one of the few avenues in which Yoruba songs are performed in worship at the Cathedral Church of Christ. According to the Master of the Music, the use of Yoruba versions of the Psalms in this program showcases works of talented Nigerian composers in sacred music and Psalmody/hymnody in particular. Special settings of the Psalms were normally performed by the Cathedral Choir only, while the congregation listened with dignified attention. Examples of works in this category include Thomas Ekundayo Phillips’s Emi O Gbe Oju Mi S’Oke Wonni (I Will Lift Up My Eyes Unto the Hills–Psalm 121) and Nigbati Oluwa Mu Ikolo Sioni Pada (When the Lord Turned Again the Captivity of Zion–Psalm 126). Interestingly, during the tenure of Thomas Ekundayo Phillips, the evening services on the last Sunday of each month were always in Yoruba. The Cathedral Choir would dress in their red cassocks and surplices, augmented by the voices of the Choral Society with the ladies dressed in white buba and alari costumes (traditional gowns). The two choirs would perform Phillips’s Yoruba compositions in these services.
The Cathedral Church of Christ truly proves itself to be a unique culturally blended congregation in terms of hymnals used for worship. The church exemplifies the nature of an interdenominational faith-based organization with the use of hymn books from diverse churches. The hymnals used for worship include Ancient and Modern, Ancient and Modern Revised, Songs of Praise, Methodist Hymn Book, Hymnal Companion, Baptist Hymnal, Saint Paul’s Cathedral Psalter, Church Hymnal, Alternative Service Book, New English Hymnal, Redemption Hymnal, Broadman Hymnal, Sacred Songs and Solos, More Hymns for Today, and indigenous hymns written by Thomas Ekundayo Phillips as well as other members of the choir.

Concert Performances
The Cathedral Church of Christ Choir is well known throughout the southern regions of Nigeria for its seasonal concert performances. The choir sets the tone and standard of music through its exceptional renditions of standard classical works. Thus, the extremely rigorous schedule of the Master of the Music is further laden with concert activities. Apart from the weekly routine of choir practices in preparation for Sunday worship, the Master of the Music must prepare the choir for concerts, which include sacred masterworks, instrumental pieces, and organ recitals. The concert performances are in the form of an Annual Choir Festival, Advent Carol Service, Festival of Lessons and Carols, Easter Cantata, and other types of variety concerts throughout the year.
Thomas Ekundayo Phillips inaugurated the Annual Choir Festival at the Cathedral Church of Christ in November 1918, to celebrate the musical accomplishments of his lovely choir and to showcase the expertise of the group. The festival is traditionally scheduled for the Sunday nearest to St. Cecilia’s Day (November 22), and takes place in the two main morning services (Choral Mattins and Choral Eucharist) and Evensong. The choir sings hymns, versicles and responses, Psalms, and beautiful anthems. The evening festival opens with a short organ recital or a variety concert of solo and chamber music that lasts twenty-five minutes, and it usually closes with an organ voluntary (postlude). The organ recital is played by one of the Cathedral organists or by a guest organist such as Kayode Oni and Kweku-Acquah Harrison.
It is noteworthy that on the occasion of the eighty-first Choir Festival in 1999, the Cathedral Choir marked the thirtieth anniversary of the death of Thomas Ekundayo Phillips with the publication of some of his compositions in book form, Sacred Choral Works: English and Yoruba. The book contains several anthems, hymns, descants for hymns, versicles and responses, settings for canticles and Psalms, and chants for canticles and Psalms.
The Cathedral Church of Christ is British in every aspect of its worship, ranging from the use of the English language to the order of service and the music selections. In fact, all the organists have been directly or indirectly trained in the schools of music in London. Hence, there is a tremendous influence of the British worship system at the Cathedral Church. Furthermore, most of the composers of the music used for worship are British—John Ireland, William Byrd, John Stainer, Bernard Rose, David Willcocks, John Rutter, Ralph Vaughan Williams, Samuel Wesley, Thomas Attwood, and Charles Stanley. However, in fairness to the Organists and Masters of the Music, compositions from other European nationalities are occasionally used. These include the works of Beethoven, Mozart, Bach, and Schubert.
To augment the works of foreign composers, the Cathedral Organist and Master of the Music uses the music of selected indigenous Nigerian composers, notably past and present choir members and organists. The Master of the Music has always been very careful not to promote and glorify the compositions of indigenous musicians who have no direct connection with the Cathedral Church Choir. Among the famous Nigerian musicians or choir members whose works were often performed include the father of the choir himself, Thomas Ekundayo Phillips, Charles Obayomi Phillips, Fela Sowande, Yinka Sowande, Lazarus Ekwueme, Tolu Obajimi, Sina Ojemuyiwa, and Tunde Sosan. I am looking forward to the day when my own compositions would be included in the music repertoire at the Cathedral Church.
The choral and organ compositions of Fela Sowande provided a musical and cultural link with the United States because some of Sowande’s pieces are based on African-American spirituals. The texts of the spirituals share a common theme with the Nigerian songs of liberation written in the 1940s through the 1960s during the era of the nationalist movement that fought for the independence of Nigeria from the British colonialists. The Cathedral Choir could see the spiritual connection between African-American slavery and the colonial experience in Nigeria, which lasted over a century (1840s–1960). The pain, suffering, anguish, and the hope for liberation from the imperialists are some of the commonalities in the themes of the songs. Even though Nigeria obtained her independence from the British government in 1960, the influence of British culture is still very strong today. It permeates every aspect of Nigerian existence, from cultural life to politics, social life, education, and Christian worship as observed at the Cathedral Church of Christ, Lagos.
Following the choir festival is the Advent Carol Service in December. The choir performs selected and tuneful carols and hymns with themes that talk about the coming of Christ. The carols and hymns are interspersed with the reading of six Bible lessons that tell the story of the promises of the coming Messiah. The lessons are mostly taken from the book of Isaiah in the Old Testament, with two short ones from the New Testament.
The Festival of Lessons and Carols has always been the climax of the Cathedral Choir musical performances for the year. Therefore, the choir is always at its best, singing with clarity, tenacity and excellence. The festival takes place on the last Sunday in December of every year even if it were after Christmas Day. This allows other parish churches to have their own Christmas services earlier, so that choirs from all over Lagos could converge on the last Sunday of December to hear the Cathedral Choir.
The Easter season is another high point in the musical activities of the Cathedral Choir. The Cathedral Church of Christ Choir is popularly known for its annual evening concert on Easter Sunday. This can take the form of the performance of an Easter cantata or the performance of a major choral work such as Handel’s Messiah as performed on Easter Sunday, April 19, 1981, and on March 31, 2002. The Cathedral Choir traditionally performed the entire three parts of Messiah once every three years during the tenure of Charles Obayomi Phillips; but the choir performed only parts two and three in 2002. Another Easter cantata took place on Sunday, April 7, 1996, with the performance of the entire three parts of Thomas Ekundayo Phillips’s Samuel. There were some few instances when the choir staged a concert on Good Friday, such as John Stainer’s The Crucifixion under the direction of Thomas Ekundayo Phillips in 1916. According to the Cathedral historians, this was the first Good Friday cantata concert in Nigeria.
There are other times in the year that the Cathedral Choir performs concerts in and outside of the church. Notable oratorios, cantatas, and orchestral works have been performed by the choir, such as Mendelssohn’s Elijah (performed in 1989), Hymn of Praise, and St. Paul; Bach’s Christmas Oratorio (performed in 1953); Samuel Coleridge-Taylor’s Hiawatha’s Wedding Feast; Handel’s Ode to Joy, Judas Maccabaeus, and Ode for St. Cecilia’s Day (performed in 1998); Haydn’s The Creation; Stainer’s The Daughter of Jairus and The Crucifixion (performed in 1916); Walford Davies’ The Temple; and Edward Elgar’s Pomp and Circumstance performed by the Cathedral Church of Christ Choir Orchestra at the 80th anniversary of the choir on November 22, 1998.
These concerts featured solos, choral and instrumental music. The concerts often attract dignitaries, professional musicians, and students from far and near to the Cathedral Church. The venues of the concerts were either the Cathedral Church, Glover Memorial Hall, or other concert halls in Lagos. The hall was always packed to capacity. Many visitors to the Cathedral Church have commended the outstanding singing of the choir and even remarked that it could favorably compare with the cathedral choirs in England in terms of quality. Gerald Knight, former Director of the Royal School of Church Music, London, once remarked that the Cathedral Church of Christ Choir, Lagos, is second to none in the whole of West Africa.
Some of these concerts were specifically organized to raise funds for either the Cathedral Church or to buy a new organ. For example, Thomas Ekundayo Phillips presented several concerts with the Cathedral Choir in various parts of Lagos to raise funds for the building of a new pipe organ. He later embarked on a concert tour with his choir to Abeokuta on August 24, 1930, and later to Ibadan, to raise funds to build a new pipe organ for the Cathedral Church. In these concerts, the Cathedral Choir performed mostly Thomas Ekundayo Phillips’s Yoruba songs to the delight of the natives of southwest Nigeria. The concerts were a huge success because the choir alone was able to raise more than half the cost of the organ. In fact, in 1927, Phillips went as far as England to appeal to British citizens for money to build the pipe organ. He was able to raise a substantial amount of money through the successful rendition of some of his Yoruba compositions by the St. George’s Church Choir on Sunday, October 23, 1927. The Yoruba songs were recorded by H. N. V. Gramophone Company in London, and the royalties from the sales of the recording were all credited to the Cathedral Church of Christ’s account in Lagos, towards the purchase of the 1932 organ.
The 1932 organ, which was later refurbished in 1966, is now in a very sorry state. In spite of regular servicing and replacement of deteriorated parts since 1966, the organ has reached a stage whereby no amount of repairs could restore it to its greatest glory. In 2005, in order to let everyone in the church realize the deplorable condition of the organ, the Master of the Music refused to send for the repairer when some faults developed. The situation got so bad that they had to stop playing the organ, using piano instead, much to the dissatisfaction of the congregation, including the provost (senior pastor of the Cathedral Church). The provost had to issue a directive that the faults be attended to immediately. The idea to build a new modern pipe organ for the church was originally conceived by the Women’s Guild Auxiliary of the Cathedral Church, and a committee was later set up to achieve that purpose. The Women’s Guild Auxiliary was able to raise some money. However, the funds could only cover the first installments for the purchase of the organ.
In view of the magnitude of the amount required and the importance of the new organ project to the history and development of the Cathedral Church, the Standing Committee decided to step in, and an organ fundraising sub-committee was inaugurated in 2006 to raise the proposed amount of 164 million Naira ($1,640,000 USD). Members of the Cathedral Church, societies, families, individuals, the choir, and corporate bodies were enjoined to participate in the organ project in order to maintain and preserve the tradition of musical excellence that the Cathedral Choir is noted for. Since 2006, the Cathedral Church of Christ Choir has embarked on several campaigns and concerts to raise money to build a new four-manual organ with 64 stops and 3,658 pipes. On Sunday, January 20, 2008, the provost of the Cathedral, Very Rev. Yinka Omololu, announced to the entire congregation with great joy, that they had realized the proposed amount. This feat was made possible through the generous donations of the Cathedral congregation and non-members from all over the country and around the world.
The Cathedral Choir has performed before renowned dignitaries. The choir performed before the British Royal Family, first in April 1921 at the foundation laying ceremony of the Cathedral Church of Christ by His Royal Highness, the Prince of Wales. In January 1956, the choir performed before Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II and Prince Phillip when they worshiped at the Cathedral Church, and finally, on October 2, 1960, at the Independence Day service of Nigeria, attended by Her Royal Highness, Princess Alexandra. On Advent Sunday, 1972, the Cathedral Choir performed with the King’s College Cambridge Choir, during their visit to Nigeria. The first broadcast by the Cathedral Choir on the British Broadcasting Corporation was aired on December 12, 1951.

Recordings
The Cathedral Choir’s musical activities have never been restricted to only live performances at services and concerts. The choir has been involved in recording some of their favorite repertoire. During the tenure of Thomas Ekundayo Phillips, the choir recorded two of his songs—Emi O Gbe Oju Mi S’Oke Wonni (I Will Lift Up My Eyes to the Hills–Psalm 121) and Ise Oluwa (The Work of the Lord) for the BBC series “Church Music from the Commonwealth.” In 2006, under the leadership of Tolu Obajimi, the present choir released its first recording in the twenty-first century, Choral Music: Volumes I & II. The two CDs contain a selection of the most famous hymns, anthems, Psalms, Te Deum, and Jubilate that the Cathedral Choir have been performing over the years. Composers of the selected works as usual are mostly British with the exception of the Cathedral Choir musicians, in particular, Thomas Ekundayo Phillips.

Choir Picnics
As the saying goes, “all work and no play, makes Jack a dull boy;” and in keeping with this, the Cathedral Church of Christ Choir does not only engage in rigorous rehearsals and performances throughout the year, but also have their moments of relaxation, partying and enjoyment. These are called the “choir picnics” or “choir treats.” These are annual events organized for the choir by the older members of the choir, choir patrons and/or patronesses or other affluent members of the congregation. It is a way for all those who enjoy and appreciate the outstanding work of the choir to express their gratitude. Choir treats have always been social gatherings held in a very relaxed and congenial atmosphere, mostly in the homes of the sponsors. There would be plenty of food, salad, desserts, and drinks. And for the younger choir boys, there are always indoor and outdoor games to play. A typical picnic day was and still is an occasion to display the football (soccer) prowess between the ‘Dec side’ (right side of choir stall) and the ‘Can side’ (left side of the choir stall) boys.
Some selected members from other parish churches are always invited to celebrate with the Cathedral Choir. This is not the only occasion in which choirs from other churches, even outside of the Anglican church, are invited to the Cathedral Choir program. There is a combined choir concert that takes place once a year. For this program, two to three members from various denominational churches would be invited to join the Cathedral Choir to form what is known as the Augmented Choir. The Augmented Choir, which normally comprised both male and female in the size of one hundred voices or more, would rehearse once a week and finally close this glorious event with a big concert at either the Cathedral Church or one of the churches in Lagos.
Another avenue of collaborative work with other churches occurs when the Cathedral Choir goes on their compulsory new year holidays in January or the summer vacation in June. Some of the church choirs in Lagos come in to sing for four weeks at the Cathedral Church. These collaborative endeavors date back to the era of Thomas Ekundayo Phillips, and subsequent Organists and Masters of the Music have kept up the tradition.

Ex-Choristers
In the ninety years of its existence (1918–2008), the Cathedral Church of Christ Choir has produced some of the most brilliant, outstanding and famous Nigerian musicologists, pianists, organists and composers. Historically, the choir has become a ‘school of music’ in which budding composers have had their formative years. Many of the talented musicians belonging to the Cathedral Choir family moved to successful musical careers, some at the international level. The products of the choir have brought immense pride and esteem to the pioneer choir in Nigeria. All these musicians, including myself, give the credit to Thomas Ekundayo Phillips’s work as the founding Organist and Master of the Music. The musical training, performances, discipline, and exposure to a variety of standard choral and instrumental works had a great impact in shaping the musical taste and career of the ex-choristers. Indeed, the Cathedral Choir is a breeding ground for future generations of talented Nigerian musicians. I cannot close this essay without highlighting the profiles of some of the musical giants produced by the Cathedral Choir.
Fela Sowande (1905–1987) came under the leadership of Thomas Ekundayo Phillips in the early 1900s as a choir boy. Under the mentorship of Phillips, Sowande was exposed to European sacred music and indigenous Nigerian church music. He received private lessons in organ from Phillips while singing in the choir. Sowande claimed that Phillips’s organ playing, the choir training, and the organ lessons he received had a major impact on his becoming an organist-composer. It was Thomas Ekundayo Phillips who exposed Sowande to the organ works of European composers such as Bach, Mendelssohn, Mozart, Guilmant, and Dubois. Sowande went on to study music in England, where he became the first African to receive the prestigious Fellowship of the Royal College of Organists (FRCO) in 1943 with distinction. He was a broadcaster, musicologist, organist-composer, and music educator. Sowande taught as a professor of music at several institutions in Nigeria and the United States, including the University of Ibadan, Howard University, University of Pittsburgh, and Kent State University. He composed several choral and solo songs, orchestra works, but he is most famous for his sixteen wonderful pieces for solo organ.
Christopher Oyesiku (1925–) had his earliest musical training as a choir boy at the Cathedral Church of Christ Choir under the tutelage of Thomas Ekundayo Phillips, who gave the young Oyesiku his first lessons in the theory of music, musicianship, and voice. Phillips also prepared Oyesiku for the external examinations of the Associated Board of the Royal Schools of Music, London. During his days as a chorister at the Cathedral Church, Oyesiku rose to become one of the leading trebles and later became the best bass in the choir. In the late 1940s, he was the leading bass soloist in some of Gilbert and Sullivan’s comic operas such as Trial by Jury, H. M. S. Pinafore, and The Mikado. Oyesiku later went on to study music at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama, London, from 1955 to 1960. Oyesiku returned to Nigeria in 1960, and in 1962 was appointed to the position of Assistant Director of Programs at the Nigerian Broadcasting Corporation, Lagos (now Federal Radio Corporation of Nigeria). He served in this capacity until 1981. Oyesiku taught music and directed choirs at the Oyo State College of Education, Ilesha, from 1981 to 1987, and the Department of Theater Arts, University of Ibadan, from 1987 to 1994. He was well known in Nigeria, West Africa, and Great Britain as an extraordinary bass singer. He is popularly referred to as “Tarzan” at the Cathedral Church Choir for his deep and beautiful bass voice. Oyesiku performed the bass solo in several cantatas, oratorios, and variety concerts. One of the high points of his career was the opportunity given him to perform before several dignitaries in Nigeria and the Royal Family in England. He was also an outstanding choral conductor as well as music educator. He is presently retired from active music career and now lives with his wife in London, England.
Samuel Akpabot (1932–2000) was a choir boy at the Cathedral Church under Thomas Ekundayo Phillips in the early 1940s. Akpabot received a most significant introduction to European classical music as a chorister at the Cathedral Church. Akpabot sang many standard choral works such as Messiah and Elijah at the Cathedral Church before going to England to study music. He did advanced studies in music at the Royal College of Music, London, Trinity College of Music, London, the University of Chicago, and Michigan State University, where he received his Ph.D. in ethnomusicology. He was a composer, ethnomusicologist, organist, pianist, trumpeter, and music educator. Akpabot was the author of five books and several scholarly articles on Nigerian music. He taught at the University of Nigeria, Nsukka, Obafemi Awolowo University, Ile-Ife, the University of Ibadan, and the University of Uyo, where he retired as a professor of music and eventually died there. He served as organist and choir director in several churches in Lagos, including St. Savior’s Anglican Church. Akpabot composed choral and vocal solo songs, and orchestral works.
Ayo Bankole (1935–1976) was a choir boy at the Cathedral Church of Christ in the early 1940s. It was Bankole’s father who encouraged him to join the renowned Cathedral Choir. Bankole became a private organ pupil of Thomas Ekundayo Phillips, and also studied organ with Phillips’s protégé, Fela Sowande. Bankole rose to the position of school’s organist at Baptist Academy (one of the famous high schools in Lagos) at the age of thirteen, in 1948. In the late 1950s, Bankole went on to study music at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama, London, University of Cambridge, London, and the University of California, Los Angeles. In 1963, Bankole became the second Nigerian to receive the Fellowship of the Royal College of Organists (FRCO) diploma. He was an organist-composer, ethnomusicologist, pianist, and music educator. Bankole was a lecturer of music at the University of Lagos, and organist/choir director in several churches as well as several high schools in Lagos. Bankole composed mostly sacred music for choir, solo voice, organ, and orchestra.
Lazarus Ekwueme (1936–) is a Nigerian musicologist, composer, choral conductor, singer, and actor. He is one of the pioneer lecturers of music in Nigeria. As a scholar, he has authored several articles and books on African music and the diaspora. Ekwueme was a chorister at the Cathedral Church under Thomas Ekundayo Phillips in the 1940s. He studied music at the Royal College of Music, London, Guildhall School of Music and Drama, London, and Yale University, where he obtained the Ph.D. degree in music theory. In the area of composition, he is well known for his tuneful choral works based on Igbo idioms and African-American spirituals. As a music educator, Ekwueme taught at the University of Nigeria, Nsukka, and the University of Lagos. Ekwueme retired as a professor of music from the University of Lagos in the early 2000s; he is presently a traditional ruler in his home town in the southeast region of Nigeria.
Godwin Sadoh (1965–) joined the Cathedral Choir as an adult to sing tenor in 1980 under Charles Obayomi Phillips, and he was a chorister until 1994. In 1982, Phillips appointed Sadoh as an Assisting Organist, gave Sadoh private lessons in piano, organ and general musicianship, and prepared Sadoh for all the piano and general musicianship external examinations of the Associated Board of the Royal Schools of Music, London. Sadoh became the Organist and Choirmaster of Eko Boys’ High School, Lagos, at the age of sixteen in 1981. He occupied this position until he graduated from high school in 1982. Sadoh later studied music at the Obafemi Awolowo University, Ile-Ife, the University of Pittsburgh, the University of Nebraska-Lincoln, and Louisiana State University, Baton Rouge, where he became the first African to earn the Doctor of Musical Arts degree in organ performance in 2004. He studied organ and composition at Louisiana State University. Sadoh taught at the first three institutions mentioned above and also at Golden West College, California, Thiel College, Pennsylvania, Baton Rouge College, Louisiana, and LeMoyne-Owen College, Memphis, Tennessee. He was appointed professor of music at Talladega College, Alabama State, in 2007. Sadoh is the author of several books and articles on modern Nigerian music, church music, ethnomusicology, and intercultural musicology. He is one of the leading authorities on Nigerian church music and African art music. In the area of composition, he has composed for every genre—vocal solo and choral works, piano, organ, electronic media, and orchestra. Sadoh’s compositions have been performed all over the United States, Europe and Nigeria; some of his works have been recorded on CDs. He has been a recipient of the ASCAPLUS Award in recognition of the performances and publications of his music since 2003 to the present. Sadoh has served as organist and choir director in several churches in Nigeria and the United States.
Recently, the Cathedral Choir has proudly given two more graduates to the professional world of music. Jimi Olumuyiwa, who now sings bass, joined as a choir boy in the early 1970s. Olumuyiwa was the librarian of the Cathedral Choir for many years, and he has participated in several grand concerts including singing the bass solo in Messiah. In addition to his strenuous schedule at school and the Cathedral Church, he directs the Golden Bells Chorale Group, in Lagos, a choir founded by Godwin Sadoh in the 1980s. Olumuyiwa was a former Choir Director of Eko Boys’ High School, Lagos, from 1982 to 1983. Olumuyiwa recently received the Bachelor of Arts degree in music from the University of Lagos, and he rose to the position of Assisting Choirmaster at the Cathedral Church. Tunde Sosan joined the Cathedral Choir as a choir boy under the leadership of Charles Obayomi Phillips in the late 1980s. He continued singing with the choir after Tolu Obajimi took over the baton in 1993. In addition to singing and accompanying the choir, Sosan received private lessons in organ from Obajimi. Sosan’s faithfulness to rehearsals, services and concerts by providing piano and organ accompaniment when there was no one else to do so has earned him favor with Obajimi, who has blessed him with several promotions: from Assisting Organist to Assistant Organist and presently Sub-Organist. Sosan will be completing his studies at Trinity College of Music, London.

Conclusion
As the premiere choir in Nigeria, the accomplishments of the Cathedral Church of Christ Choir are immense, and it has played a major role in shaping the direction and development of church music in Nigeria, especially in the Anglican Church. The choir continues to play a leading and model role in Lagos and in Nigeria as a whole. The magnitude of musical excellence filtered into the ears and minds of the Lagos congregations is felt not only in the Anglican church, but in other denominations as well. The annual choir festivals, Advent carol services, festival of lessons and carols, variety concerts and the choir picnics continue to attract choristers and music enthusiasts from the Methodist, Baptist, Catholic, Lutheran, Presbyterian, Reformed, African, Evangelical, and non-denominational churches from different parts of the southwest regions of Nigeria to the Cathedral Church of Christ. The choir rightly connects the American culture with Nigeria through the use of spirituals in the compositions of its ex-choristers and their musical training in American universities. As they celebrate their ninetieth anniversary in November 2008, they can certainly look forward to many more years of outstanding and meritorious accomplishments in the Nigerian church music ministry.

The author is grateful to his very good friend, Jimi Olumuyiwa, for providing most of the documents used in writing this essay.

Photos are used with kind permission of Christopher Oyesiku.

 

John Courter, organist and carillonneur at Berea College and retired professor of music, died June 21, at the age of 68. Courter joined the Berea College faculty in 1971. After retiring from teaching in 2007, he continued to serve as college organist and carillonneur. In addition, he was organist at Union Church and had been a long-time contributor to the music of St. Clare Catholic Church, both in Berea.
A native of Lansing, Michigan, Courter earned a bachelor’s degree in choral music education from Michigan State University in 1962 and a master of music degree in organ in 1966 from the University of Michigan. He had also studied at the North German Organ Academy and held diplomas from the Netherlands Carillon School.
During his 39 years at Berea, Courter contributed to the musical life of the campus and larger community. He taught organ, piano, chime, and carillon performance, church music, and music theory, and was a former director of the Harmonia Society. A well-known organist in the region, he was dean of the Lexington AGO chapter. He was involved in the renovation of the Holtkamp pipe organ in Gray Auditorium at Berea and the recent restoration of the 10-bell chime in Phelps Stokes Chapel. He was the driving force behind Berea’s 56-bell carillon, the largest in the state of Kentucky.
In 1995 Courter received Berea College’s Seabury Award for Excellence in Teaching, and in 2006 received the Elizabeth Perry Miles Award for Community Service for his numerous contributions to the campus and community as a musician and for volunteer service with Madison County’s public radio station. In 1993, he was awarded the Berkeley Medal for Distinguished Service to the Carillon as a performer and composer. He was a Fellow of the American Guild of Organists and a member of the Guild of Carillonneurs in North America.
Courter won several international prizes for his carillon compositions, and his works have been published in Germany, the Netherlands, and the United States. He has written works commissioned by the Palace of Government in Barcelona, the cities of Utrecht, Kampen, and Almelo (the Netherlands), the Arts Council of Ireland, the University of Michigan, and Grand Valley State University.
In 2005, Courter established the Summer Carillon Concert Series at Berea College, which continues to bring international carillonneurs to Berea’s campus. In his will, Courter provided for the ongoing maintenance of Berea’s carillon, which will be dedicated as the John Courter Carillon during the college’s homecoming this fall.
John Courter is survived by two brothers, two sisters, seven nieces and nephews, nineteen great-nieces and nephews, and special friend and caregiver at the end of his life, Rev. Dr. Theresa Scherf. A memorial service took place June 24 at Union Church in Berea. There will be a special memorial concert later this year.

David Sanger, concert organist, teacher, and past president of the Royal College of Organists, was found dead on May 28. Born in London, Sanger was educated at Eltham College and the Royal Academy of Music, and also studied privately with Susi Jeans, Marie-Claire Alain, and Anton Heiller. He became well known as an organ recitalist when he won first prize in two international competitions: St. Alban’s, England in 1969 and Kiel, Germany in 1972. He recorded over 20 CDs, including the complete organ works of César Franck at the Katarina Church in Stockholm for BIS, and Vierne’s six organ symphonies for Meridian. He acted as consultant on a number of organ projects, including the new Cavaillé-Coll-style instrument at Exeter College, Oxford, and new, restored, or rebuilt organ projects at Bromley Parish Church, Haileybury College, St. Cuthbert’s and Usher Hall in Edinburgh, Sheffield Cathedral, and Trinity Hall, Cambridge.
Sanger also composed music for organ, and for strings and choirs. He authored an organ method book in two volumes for beginners, entitled Play the Organ, which has become the most widely used in Britain in recent years. Together with Jon Laukvik he edited the organ works of Louis Vierne, comprising 13 volumes in a boxed set, published by Carus Verlag, Stuttgart. From 1980–89 David Sanger was professor of organ at the Royal Academy of Music in London, serving as chairman of the organ department from 1987–89. Between 1989–97 he was a consultant professor at the Royal Academy of Music.

Kenneth Vernon Turvey died March 4 in Huntsville, Alabama. He was 81. Born in Dayton, Ohio, his first organ studies were with Frank Michael, and during high school, with Parvin Titus at the University of Cincinnati Conservatory of Music, to which Turvey made a 50-mile bus trip each week for lessons, and where he completed bachelor’s and master’s degrees. After finishing his degrees in 1951, he served in the Army during the Korean War. In 1955, Turvey began a 50-year career as music director for the First United Methodist Church in Huntsville. He also pursued doctoral organ studies with Oswald Ragatz at Indiana University. Turvey served for 42 years as director of the Huntsville Community Chorus, and conductor of the Decatur Civic Chorus for 17 years. He also taught at Athens State University and the University of Alabama in Huntsville, and was a co-founder of the Huntsville AGO chapter. Kenneth Turvey is survived by his wife, Janet, five children, seven grandchildren, and a great-grandaughter.

Jerry P. Whitten, 82 years old, died February 7 in Memphis, Texas. Born in Muskogee, Oklahoma, he received a bachelor’s degree from the University of Oklahoma, studying with Mildred Andrews, and a master’s degree in sacred music from Union Theological Seminary in New York City, studying with Vernon de Tar. Whitten was employed by Tarpley Music Co. in Pampa, Texas, for 43 years, and served as organist-choirmaster at St. Matthew’s Episcopal Church in Pampa for 15 years. Jerry Whitten is survived by his wife Nancy, four stepchildren, three step-grandchildren, three brothers, and two sisters.

Richard Hillert died February 18. He was Distinguished Professor of Music Emeritus at Concordia University Chicago, River Forest, Illinois, and was best known for his work as a composer and composition teacher. One of his most noted works is Worthy Is Christ, of which “This is the Feast of Victory” has been widely published in various worship books.
Hillert received his bachelor’s degree in education from Concordia, and master’s and doctoral degrees in composition from Northwestern University. He also studied composition with Italian composer Goffredo Petrassi. Hillert taught at Concordia from 1959 to 2003. He edited eleven volumes of the Concordia Hymn Prelude Series and was associate editor of the journal Church Music (1966–80).
Hillert’s compositions and publications include liturgical music for congregation, choral motets, hymns and hymn anthems, psalm settings and organ works, concertatos, and cantatas, including settings of The Christmas Story According to Saint Luke and The Passion According to Saint John. Richard Hillert is survived by his wife Gloria Bonnin Hillert, and children Kathryn Brewer, Virginia Hillert, and Jonathan Hillert.

Rev. Richard D. Howell died January 26 in Dallas, Texas. Born June 24, 1932 in Great Bend, Kansas, he earned a master of sacred music degree from Southern Methodist University, and was ordained a deacon in the United Methodist Church. He started playing for church services at age 13, and went on to serve numerous United Methodist congregations in Texas and taught elementary music for the Richardson and Dallas school districts. He played for children’s, youth, and adult choirs and directed handbell choirs, serving as the chairman of the Dallas Handbell Festival. He was active in many organizations, including the American Guild of Organists, Choristers Guild, and the Fellowship of United Methodist Musicians. Richard D. Howell is survived by his wife of 52 years, Bradley Sue Howell, children Mark and Teri Howell, Celeste and Martin Hlavenka, and Jane Walker, along with grandchildren, sisters-in-law, and numerous nieces and nephews.

Richard Proulx died February 18 at age 72. From 1980 to 1994, he was organist–music director at the Cathedral of the Holy Name in Chicago, where he was also responsible for the planning and installation of two new mechanical-action organs for the cathedral: Casavant II/19 (Quebec, 1981) and Flentrop IV/71 (Holland, 1989). Before coming to Chicago, he served at St. Thomas Church, Medina/Seattle (1970–1980), and was organist at Temple de Hirsch Sinai. Previous positions included St. Charles Parish, Tacoma; St. Stephen’s Church, Seattle; and 15 years (1953–1968) at the Church of the Holy Childhood in St. Paul.
A native of St. Paul, Minnesota, he attended MacPhail College and the University of Minnesota, with further studies undertaken at the American Boychoir School at Princeton, St. John’s Abbey, Collegeville, and the Royal School of Church Music in England. He studied organ with Ruth Dindorf, Arthur Jennings, Rupert Sircom, Gerald Bales, and Peter Hallock; choral conducting with Bruce Larsen, Donald Brost, and Peter Hallock; composition with Leopold Bruenner, Theodore Ganshaw, Bruce Larsen, and Gerald Bales.
Proulx was a widely published composer of more than 300 works, including congregational music, sacred and secular choral works, song cycles, two operas, and instrumental and organ music. He served as consultant for The Hymnal 1982, the New Yale Hymnal, the Methodist Hymnal, Worship II and III, and contributed to the Mennonite Hymnal and the Presbyterian Hymnal.

Phyllis J. Stringham, of Waukesha, Wisconsin, died February 12 at the age of 79. Born January 30, 1931 in Grand Rapids, Michigan, she earned her Bachelor of Arts degree from Calvin College and a Master of Music degree in organ performance at the University of Michigan. Her organ teachers included John Hamersma, Robert Noehren, and Marilyn Mason. She pursued additional study at the American Conservatory in Fontainebleau, France, studying with Nadia Boulanger and André Marchal. In 1966 she studied with Marie-Claire Alain and Anton Heiller at the Summer Academy for Organists in Haarlem, Holland. While on sabbatical leave in 1972, she spent five months studying at the Hochschule für Musik in Vienna, Austria. Further study was done at the Eastman School of Music with Russell Saunders, and with Delbert Disselhorst at the University of Iowa.
For 43 years, Stringham was Professor of Music and College Organist at Carroll University, Waukesha, Wisconsin (1959–2002). After retirement from teaching, she retained her position as College Organist and Curator of the Organ. In 2007 she was named Organist Emeritus. Her earlier teaching career began at Chatham Hall, an Episcopal school in Virginia. She is listed in Who’s Who in the World of Music. From the late 1960s to 2007 she operated the Phyllis Stringham Concert Management agency. She served the AGO as dean of the Milwaukee chapter and as Wisconsin State Chair.
Phyllis Stringham is survived by her brother James A. (Gladys), nephews, many grandnephews, nieces, other relatives and friends. A memorial service was held February 18 at St. Luke’s Lutheran Church, Waukesha.

Gail Walton, director of music at the University of Notre Dame’s Basilica of the Sacred Heart, died February 24 in Indianapolis after a long illness. She was 55 years old. Dr. Walton had served as director of music in the Basilica since 1988, directing the Notre Dame Liturgical Choir as well as the Basilica Schola, which she founded in 1989. She held degrees from Westminster Choir College and the Eastman School of Music, where she earned the doctor of musical arts degree in organ performance, and was awarded the performer’s certificate. Before joining the basilica staff, she taught organ at Goshen College.
Gail Walton performed throughout the midwestern United States and played concerts in the German cities of Bonn, Heidenheim, Mainz, and Rottenburg/Neckar in the summer of 1991. In the summer of 1995, she took the Notre Dame Liturgical Choir on a tour of Italy, giving performances in Florence, Milan, Assisi, and Rome. She frequently played duo recitals with her husband, organist and Notre Dame music professor Craig Cramer.

Allan Wicks, a leading cathedral organist of his generation, died February 4 at age 86. He played a crucial role during the 1950s and 60s in bringing modern works by Messiaen, Maxwell Davies, Stravinsky, and Britten into the regular cathedral repertory. Born in Harden, Yorkshire, on June 6, 1923, the son of a clergyman, Wicks became organ scholar at Christ Church, Oxford in 1942, where he studied under Thomas Armstrong. He became sub-organist at York Minster in 1947, then in 1954 organist and master of the choristers of Manchester Cathedral. During his time there, he oversaw the rebuilding of the war-damaged organ, and championed the music of Peter Maxwell Davies and Malcolm Williamson. He also regularly conducted Stravinsky’s Canticum Sacrum.
In 1961 he was appointed organist and master of the choristers of Canterbury Cathedral, a post he held until 1988.There he regularly performed music by such composers as Messiaen, Ligeti, Tippett, Lennox Berkeley, and Alan Ridout. Wicks made several recordings, released on LP but yet to be issued on CD, of works by Alan Ridout, Messiaen (notably La nativité du Seigneur), Bach, Mendelssohn, Liszt, Franck, Widor, Alain and Reger. Wicks retired from Canterbury in 1988, having served under three archbishops and taught several generations of choristers.

Henry August “Hank” Elling died October 10, 2010, in Catawba, North Carolina, at the age of 85. He was music director and principal organist at St. Paul’s Lutheran Church and School in Rockford, Illinois for 36 years. Born into a long line of Lutheran pastors, he first played the organ at age 15, for his sister’s wedding. Following service in the Philippines in World War II, he earned a bachelor’s degree in organ and piano from Augustana College, Rock Island, Illinois, a master’s from Wayne State University, and worked toward a Ph.D. at the University of Southern California. Elling served as choir director at Chicago’s Luther North High School, where the award-winning choirs concertized in Europe and sang at Christmas programs organized by Mayor Richard Daley. He was a longtime member of the Rockford AGO chapter. Henry August Elling is survived by his wife of 50 years, Martha, sons Henry J. (Cathy), Kurt A. (Jennifer), daughter Suzanne (Rev. Gregory) Alms, brother Rev. Norman (Selma) Elling, daughter-in-law Kerry Osley Elling, and grandchildren, nieces, and nephews.

Gilbert Mead died November 25, 2010 of complications from congestive heart failure at his home at Windsor Park Manor in Carol Stream, Illinois, at the age of 83. He was well known particularly in the Chicago area for his involvement as a musician on WMBI, the flagship station of the Moody Radio Network.
Born April 4, 1927, Mead began playing as a church organist when just a boy in his hometown of Battle Creek, Michigan. His fascination with pipe organs led him to seeking books on organbuilding from libraries some distance from Battle Creek. He particularly remembered the E. M. Skinner organ (Opus 720, 1928) at the First Presbyterian Church of Battle Creek, where his first piano teacher was the church’s organist. Battle Creek had many E. M. Skinner instruments of this period (1928–1932), with installations at the Kellogg Auditorium, St. Phillip Catholic Church, and St. Thomas Episcopal Church. Mead’s first organ lessons were at St. Thomas. He recalled the impeccable pedal technique of their organist who, according to his memory, played in highly polished white shoes that showed no sign of scuffing between the feet.
Gilbert Mead earned a Bachelor of Music degree in piano performance at the American Conservatory, where he studied with Leo Sowerby, Stella Roberts, Irwin Fischer, and Bruno Glade, and a master’s in organ performance from Northwestern University, where his instructors included Barrett Spach, Richard Enright, and Grigg Fountain.
Mead came to Chicago to study at the Moody Bible Institute in 1945 and gradually became involved at WMBI. Upon completion of a course in Biblical studies, he became a full-time staff musician, working in radio from 1950–1962. He logged thousands of hours in varied programming as a solo organist, pianist, accompanist, and director of various choirs. In 1962 Donald Hustad invited him to join the Sacred Music Department of Moody Bible Institute when the trend in radio was away from “live” music toward pre-recorded music. He joined a faculty with some renowned organists—Donald Hustad, Robert Rayfield, Lillian Robinson, Lester Groom, and Preston Rockholt.
Mead was known for his polished performance style at the organ, and was revered by a host of fine students on both piano and organ. He had a passion for providing engaging and sympathetic accompaniment to congregational singing. His approach caused one colleague to quip that Gilbert Mead always “played the words”.
Mead served four churches in the Chicago area over a period of about 55 years: Judson Baptist Church in Oak Park (1950–1968), First Baptist Church of Elmhurst (1968–1973), Wheaton Bible Church (1973–1989), and College Church in Wheaton (1990–1996). He filled the dual role of organist-choirmaster at Judson Baptist and First Baptist Churches. At Judson Baptist, he oversaw a large rebuilding of the church’s original Estey organ (10 ranks) into a much larger 3-manual organ with 31 ranks of new pipework from Aeolian-Skinner (Opus 1466). He finished his church music career as organist for five years at the College Church in Wheaton, where he served as consultant for the installation of the new 3-manual Schantz (1992).
Mead was well respected in the Chicago area for his conscientious work as an organbuilder and restorer. His weekends, apart from Moody Bible Institute and his church work, were filled with service calls to dozens of Chicago-area churches and colleges in tuning and in some rebuilding work. There are a handful of organs in the Chicago region bearing the nameplate “MEAD AND SONS, Elmhurst, Illinois.” His work in maintaining the historic Reuter organ at Moody Memorial Church was well on display when that organ was a featured instrument in the events held by the Romantic Organ Music Symposium in the summer of 1988. In preparation for a recital by Robert Glasgow when the weather had been extremely hot, and in an un-air-conditioned church, Mead managed to keep the organ in tune, to the delight of all.
Gilbert Mead is survived by his wife of 59 years, Martha (Jennison), four sons: Stephen (Marjorie Lamp), Robert (Connie Blaschke), David (Brenda Simms), and Donald (Karen Sarasin); and a sister Beverly (Mead) Todd.
—Donald Mead

Andrew Seivewright, master of music at Carlisle Cathedral for more than 30 years, died December 10, 2010, at age 84. He served as cathedral master of music from 1960 to 1991. He founded the Abbey Singers in 1962 and took the group on tours throughout Europe and the USA. He was an established composer whose latest choral CD, If Winter Comes, was released last year. He was also a pianist, organist and conductor.
Following his retirement, Seivewright was organist at Crosthwaite Church in Keswick for four years and then, from 1994, at Grasmere. The son of a clergyman, he began playing the organ when he was 10 years old. He studied at Denstone College before going on to read classics at King’s College, Cambridge. In World War II he joined the RAF, training as a navigator in Canada. After the war he returned to Cambridge and studied music. He and his wife Nora lived in Yorkshire, where he had teaching posts, and then, in 1960, they moved to Carlisle. In June 2010 a concert was held to mark Seivewright’s 50 years as a church musician.