Music at St Paul's

The Chaplain’s View

The sole purpose of music in Church is the worship of God and therefore it is a form of prayer. At St Paul’s our Director of Music composes specific arrangements and settings to help us to express this during our services.

Excellence matters and so while we enjoy the wonderful contribution of the Ristretto singers, everyone is invited to engage with music during the service, offering their best to God.

What does that mean? In this context it means you don’t have to be a great singer to be part of a musical triumph that takes us to a higher plane and elevates us all toward the divine.

The Musical Director’s View

I was honoured to asked to take up the position of St Paul’s Director of Music in 2020 as I believe music in church worship is an offering to God, deserving the best resources that are available. Music is also an act of sharing – which includes listening together as well as singing together.

In Monaco we are lucky to have access to a wide range of talented professional performers through the ballet, opera and symphony orchestra, so our offering can range from hymns and simple congregational Mass settings to sacred works by composers from the Renaissance to the present day.

The Ristretto Singers

Formed by Errol Girdlestone in 2012 this group of professional and gifted amateur singers from across the region joins us regularly to lead music during worship.

The vocal ensemble is joined by instrumentalists on special occasions in the church’s calendar as well for performances of Masses by Haydn, Schubert and the renowned annual concert presentation of Handel’s Messiah.

Look out for a programme of music that profiles the church’s musical literature including Baroque composers and the resumption of the series of Bach’s cantatas and motets inaugurated prior to the Covid-19 pandemic.

Music for July

Sunday 6th 10.30am Holy Communion

Setting

Darke – Communion Service in F / Gloria from Missa in Tempore Alligatum

Hymn

358, 807, 664, 765

Motet

Cantique de Jean Racine (Fauré)

Sunday 13th 10.30am Holy Communion

Setting

Merbecke

Hymn

623, 262, 451, 702

Sunday 20th 10.30am Holy Communion

Setting

Girdlestone – Missa in Tempore Alligatum

Hymn

3, 387, 403, 595

Motet

Parce Domine (Obrecht)

Sunday 27th 10.30am Holy Communion

Setting

Stanford

Hymn

357, 809, 692, 650

Motet

Jesu, joy of man’s desiring (Bach)rt)

Music Matters

John Keble 1792-1866 - by Errol Girdlestone

On the fourteenth of July we celebrate the Lesser Festival of John Keble – priest, Tractarian and poet. It was on that day in 1833 that Keble preached his assize sermon National Apostasy in the University Church of St. Mary in Oxford, which in its turn gave rise to the Oxford Movement.

I am only speaking from the point of view of a musician – having myself studied at Keble College, Oxford, and during my final Schools year acted as organist at the neighbouring Pusey House. As a consequence, I can but duly acknowledge the considerable influence of the Oxford Movement, stretching as in does well beyond the confines of the Church.

Elgar’s magnificent oratorio The Dream of Gerontius perfectly reflects the philosophy of Cardinal Henry Newman, himself a founder member of the Oxford Movement, who wrote the poem upon which the oratorio is based. In his turn, Elgar was profoundly influenced by the music of Richard Wagner, something which is clearly audible during the Prelude to Gerontius, with its inextricable connection to the latter’s final opera, Parsifal.

Just to complete the picture, at John Keble’s funeral a group of his friends and supporters, including a certain Dr. Pusey, decided to found an Oxford college in his memory – you can imagine its name – and in its turn, Pusey House was opened in 1884 as a memorial to Pusey himself.

Errol Girdlestone BIOGRAPHY

Church music has been important to Errol all his life – you might even say it was in his genes! Errol’s family has strong theological, academic, musical and even medical connections that coalesce through music, so he was a boy chorister and trained initially as an organist.

Church music has provided the foundation for Errol’s rich and varied international career that has spanned many countries and an exciting range of genres, all featuring performances at the highest professional level. Here is a brief summary of the highlights:

Religious music – Royal College of Church Music, London Trinity College, Vicar Choral at St Paul’s Cathedral, London, Founder member of The Hilliard Ensemble.

Opera – English National Opera (Wagner’s Ring Cycle and EMI recordings with the legendary Reginald Goodall), conductor at the Nice Opera, Syrinx Concerts Orchestra in Vence and Monaco, Musique Cordiales in the Var, Festival Georges Auric in Montpellier. Plus, permanent posts in South Africa and Norway.

Freelance conductor and chorus master – Aix-en-Provence, Baden Baden, Cologne, Chicago, Montevideo, and the Wexford festival in Ireland.

Symphony and oratorio conductor – Leipzig, Vienna, the Bregenz Festival, Canterbury Festival, and at the Yehudi Menuhin Festival in Gstaad, alongside artists such as Giuliano Carmignola and Alison Balsom.

Commercial recordings – English National Opera, Pink Floyd.

Compositions – Concerto for two flutes and orchestra Pièce de Concert was premiered at the Louvre in Paris, while his Rivers of Time (scored for solo cello, symphony orchestra, and large chorus) was given at the Cathedral on the Rock in Monaco.

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