Above
"Children of the choir of Westminster in number 8;
the sergeant porter; the sergeant of the vestry;
children of his Majesty Chapel Royal, in number twelve at the
coronation of King James II
public domain by courtesy of the
In Quires
and
Places where they sing...
At a time when many choirs have been unable to sing
and when the very survival
of the historic choral tradition in Anglicanism
may now be in danger,
(See the article in The Times of London this last week "Good riddance to insanely expensive cathedral choirs" in which the author wrote: "The crisis is a great opportunity for radical change. Of course, our cathedral choirs are amazing. So they should be, given the insane expense of maintaining them. But the whole tradition is completely desiccated.” ny Benedict King
it was a great pleasure to have welcomed
our 2000th listener
this last week to the
Choral Evensongs with Sermon
and
Reflections
which the
Prayer Book Society USA
has carried and promoted since the pandemic
first caused widespread lockdowns
These have been prepared with much gratitude and in association with the Church of the Advent in Boston and its sound Archive
and the Grosvenor Chapel of Mayfair in London and its choir.
Despite the current peril, the vibrancy of the tradition is well attested by the long running BBC broadcasts of Choral Evensong which go back to October 1926 and down to this day and they command a listening audience of 250,000 or more.
The PBS USA is keen to sustain our Anglican choral tradition with its deep roots in the Book of Common Prayer
and hopes to add additional churches and choirs in future webcasts
Some of our most recent webcasts are presented below
together with links to the audio files available on Soundcloud
AM-R