I received an interesting email from a former parishioner in response to my last post. He is a very accomplished musician – an organist and male tenor with a very well-trained voice. He sang in one of the Cambridge University choirs -- if I remember correctly, St. Clare College.

He has a very strong interest in liturgy. Raised in the Anglican Church in England, his first encounter with the Episcopal Church was in Palo Alto while working on a Post-Doc at Stanford University. His career and his faith have given him a rich appreciation of worship in the Anglican tradition – in both Great Cathedral and local parish settings.

He has been following the development of our ministry for the past year. I found his comments thoughts about our Choral Eucharist Study Group of interest.

Kevin,

Glad to see (via your blog and the web site) that the 9am liturgy is off to such a good start - congratulations! Now I'm interested as to your thinking in suggesting two discrete options as part of the work of the new study group for the 10.45.

I'm definitely one who wants to make great music with the minimum of 'effort'. Effort is in inverted commas because I've been in a situation where the music was great. The time commitment was huge (daily choral evensongs, with 45 minutes rehearsal beforehand).

The 'effort' (= perceived inertia) was minimal. The BEST music in that context happened spontaneously, and often in the most mundane moments. The recitation of the psalms was a perfect case in point. We rarely rehearsed them specifically, but because we were together daily our collective musicianship enabled transcendence. In other words, it was all about community and relationship, not 'effort'. That having been said, there was a lot of innate musical giftedness and there were some very fine voices involved as well, and I don't think those are readily accessible in a parochial context.

Tying together this topic and education: the typical cathedral/college all male choir involves boys, as you know, and usually in a boarding school from age 7-8. That model is struggling to survive, and all girl and even mixed trebles are becoming more and more common, driven by availability.

I have reservations about sending children away to board at such a young age. But I DO see a benefit in inculcating the notion of routine community and communal activity as a norm. I didn't see the boys themselves being aware of it at the time, but I'm absolutely certain that it's a huge advantage to them in retrospect, because it's not a norm that they have to learn as an adult in this highly individualistic age.

Back to what 'good' music can offer in a parish: serving as the parish organist in the UK while doing my PhD I experimented with doing the odd Lenten compline with just 4 or 5 male voices, lots of plainsong and the occasional polyphonic motet as an offering for those who wanted to experience it - as an adjunct in a parish where the liturgical agenda was definitely your option 1. (See previous post).

It seemed to work pretty well.

Thanks for the perspective Will. Stay in touch.