I had written that I was going to stop watching the Liturgies from Saint Thomas because of the frustrating camera work being obsessed with the stained glass windows.
Of course at the time I wrote that article, it was about time for the Summer event known as the Saint Thomas Girl Chorister Course which is every Summer. The auditioned girls live in the Saint Thomas Choir School for the 8 days they’re in Manhattan. This year dates were from 22 July – 30 July 2023. And this year the choristers had Jared Johnson as their Director. He was recently hired by San Francisco’s Grace Cathedral (Anglican Communion), and based on what I heard from the Girl Choristers, Grace Cathedral made a very wise move in hiring Jared.
The Saint Thomas Girl Choristers were superb, singing with perfect intonation. Absolutely splendid. They sounded like they had sung together for years rather than a few days of training in the Choir School. As I was telling my friend, here you have these girls who sound like this. Then you have the sopranos of the Boston Symphony Orchestra’s Tanglewood Festival Chorus who are the permanent fixture of the Chorus and they can’t sound like these girls no matter what they do or who trains them. I don’t normally use the over-used pop culture words of our day “amazing and awesome.” But in the case of the Girl Choristers, they were amazing considering their performances over a period of 8 days.
I’m assuming the Girl Choristers — ranging in age from 11 to 18 — are choristers in other parishes or cathedral churches of the Anglican Communion on the US East Coast. But I don’t know for sure. There’s not much info on the Saint Thomas website about this, but I’ve been familiar with it because it’s been going on for years. It was good to see girls of this age interested in choral excellence and Anglican Cathedral music. Their Evensong service music was entirely for treble voices. Will Jeremy F. at Saint Thomas have the trebles of the Saint Thomas Choir of Men and Boys learn those settings? I don’t recall them ever singing these pieces. Or did Jeremy even know they sang these pieces?
I sense that Jeremy Filsell (the Organist and Director of Music at Saint Thomas) didn’t have much contact with Jared because the girls did not sing the second response after The Gospel reading that the trebles usually sing. Nor did the girls sing some of the other service music that the trebles normally sing. I don’t understand that. When there are highly-skilled voices to replace the vacationing trebles, I expect those voices to sing the same music as the trebles. Why not? But that was not the case. So for example, the response before and after The Gospel reading was the same both times. Boring. One of the guest Choirs a few weeks ago sang the second response after The Gospel, so they knew about it, somehow.
For the Evensong, was that Janet — formerly of Trinity Wall Street — serving as Organist for that Liturgy? I believe so. She played well. I’m glad she played the Dubois as her Organ Voluntary. Janet is a graduate of The Juilliard School. I presume she studied with Paul Jacobs.
Below are links to two of the videos where the Girl Choristers sang the Liturgy. They should be delighted with their work this Summer.
Did the congregation appreciate them? I don’t know about that. I wonder whether today’s Low Church congregation appreciates the superb Choir of Men and Boys. It’s hard to appreciate them if one has no trained ear for choral excellence or for music. I suspect most see them as “they’re just the Choir” unfortunately. Saint Thomas Church has the only residential Choir School in the United States. Does that mean anything to the congregation? I suspect not.
Festal Eucharist:
https://www.saintthomaschurch.org/events/festal-eucharist-2023-07-30/
Choral Evensong:
https://www.saintthomaschurch.org/events/choral-evensong-2023-07-26/
Comments for this post should be about choral excellence, and not about religious proselytising or quoting parts of the Liturgy as is usually the case with articles of this type elsewhere.