Day 6: Mar sin leat, Edinburgh!

(Goodbye, Edinburgh!)

Sunday, July 9, 2023

Waving goodbye after the morning Eucharist! (photo: Chris Thackery)

Day 6: Assistant Director of Music Mark McDonald recaps the choirs' busy day singing services, and his adventures trying to get to London on time!

"Today was our biggest music day on the tour with the choirs starting the day by singing the morning Eucharist at St Mary's Cathedral. The highlight for me was playing Jonathan Dove's ecstatic and sublime Missa Brevis, which has become a favourite in our choirs' repertoire. The congregation seemed to like it too, with many of them showing their appreciation to us at the post-service coffee hour. This morning service was livesteamed, so you can watch it by clicking the video below. If you'd like to skip right to the Dove Gloria, it's at the 10 minute mark (it's definitely worth a listen!)

After the service, we had one last group lunch at St Mary's Music School -- the homebase for most of the choristers this week. After lunch, the choristers, bags packed and tickets in hand, departed Edinburgh by train to take the long journey south to London. Having been on the train to York the day before, the choristers were well prepared to navigate the station and everything went like clockwork!

The Cathedral Choir stayed behind in Edinburgh to sing the afternoon Choral Evensong service at St Mary's. Organ Scholar Amiel Elfert helped me out with several parts of the service including the Psalm in which he took full advantage of the cathedral organ's many beautiful colours. I was also really pleased to be able to go out into the nave for a moment during the rehearsal to hear the choir singing Stanford's Beati quorum via. I'm amazed at the how good the choir is sounding these days!

With Evensong wrapped up, Sunday evening was a well-deserved night off for the Cathedral Choir. They will board the train to London tomorrow while the choristers get ready for their service at Westminster Abbey. As you can imagine, I had quite a bit of preparation to do before playing the services at the Abbey, so I boarded a flight from Edinburgh to London right after Evensong in order to get to the Abbey for a late-night practice session.

Unfortunately for me, not everything went to plan! My flight was delayed about an hour which was just long enough for me to miss the curfew at Westminster Abbey. I arrived at the Abbey, tired but still hopeful, at 10.30pm but sadly everyone had already gone home for the night! Fortunately, the well oiled machine that is the Abbey music staff arranged for me to come back tomorrow night to prepare for the Tuesday service with the Cathedral Choir. The Abbey's sub-organist Peter Holder will play the Monday service with the choristers.

What a day, and what a time we've had in Edinburgh! I'll miss it already, but there's lots to look forward to next week. Tomorrow: Westminster Abbey!"

Check back here tomorrow for the update on our first day in London! Know someone that would like these emails? Forward them this link!

bit.ly/3XCaGXU