Westminster Cathedral Choir: Ubi Est? II

Where's Wally? Easier to find than Westminster Cathedral Choir

[Note: it pains me to have to make the below observations. To watch the great Westminster Cathedral Choir crumbling before one's eyes is devastating. Those in charge say they care about the Choir as much as the Society and all its vast number of supporters do, but I look at the other great cathedral choirs and how their music departments and clergy are bending over backwards to get their full choir, including their boys' and girls' voices, singing routinely again, safely. There I see proper, tangible and responsible care for and nurturing of the musical and other welfare of the choristers and the musical tradition of their respective churches. At Westminster Cathedral, that same sense of urgency seems to be almost entirely missing.]   

St Paul's Cathedral Choir is the latest professional church choir to return to something more or less approaching its usual size and pattern of singing: indeed it was ready to return with its full choir singing daily choral services on the very day the UK Government's updated guidance on singing in religious worship came into effect (17 May 2021), which places no limits on the  number of professional singers who can sing during worship. See here for a sample list (accompanied by video proof) of the great choirs that have resumed singing regularly in their full choir form (hint: all the big names are there except Westminster Cathedral).  

St Paul's: A music department that knows what it is doing.  

So what has the (also professional) Westminster Cathedral "Choir" done? Well, as usual latterly, basically nothing. There is no indication whatsoever that it will re-form as a full choir anytime soon. Indeed, if you look at the lamentable state of the Westminster Cathedral music lists, what you find is dispiriting in the extreme:

- Monday: cantor

- Tuesday: boys' voices and cantor (in other words, the Assistant Master of Music has the boys - perhaps not even all of the choristers - singing a mere half a service per week, sharing singing duties with a cantor - not even I had imagined they would take such a novel and bizzare approach to not singing as a full choir, and also, what a kick in the guts to the trebles)

- Wednesday: cantor

- Thursday: cantor

- Friday: (yes, you guessed it) cantor

- Saturday: cantor (it's tedious isn't it?)

- Sunday: mens' voices (three or four lay clerks)

A Bishop Sherrington, one of Cardinal Nichols' subordinates apparently, meanwhile issued some extremely misleading guidance to "all clergy" and "all parishes", in which he declared that only six singers may be permitted to sing (without distinguishing professional from amateur, nor disclosing that the latest government guidance places no limits on professional singers singing during worship).  

When asked about this, he said: "The clergy have access to the various documents which provide guidance and consult as and when questions occur in particular circumstances."

No doubt, the Apostles would be immensely proud of such illustrious successors.  

Apostolic Leadership in technicolour

And it's not just the Westminster Cathedral "Choir" that has been consigned to the scrap heap for the indefinite future. Westminster Cathedral as a whole seems to be in the grips of some existential crisis, banning all servers (yes, there are no assistants whatsoever at the Sunday choral Mass and I assume that applies to other Masses too) and pathologically banning the cantor / mens' voices from singing anything that could potentially be joined in by the great unwashed in the pews.  Therefore, a sung Sanctus is banned, despite: (a) the people being fully aware they should not be singing, (b) the almost physical impossibility of this feat through the mandatory masks, and (c) the general unwillingness of Catholic congregants in particular to sing even without such restrictions / impediments in place.  

We therefore have the odd spectacle of almost no-one except the priest and mens' voices saying the Sanctus in English. It may come as a surprise to those in charge, but very few Catholics even bother to say the parts of the Mass that pertain to them. Thus, I and a few other brave souls, mutter slightly louder than everyone else, wondering why a chant Sanctus isn't floating down from the Apse, and why we are living through this dystopian nightmare (Westminster Cathedral's bizarre self-inflicted policies) within a dystopian nightmare (the overall pandemic). 

Westminster Cathedral - both its clergy and its music department - are becoming increasingly isolated in their extremist practices, which have no basis in science, law or government guidance, which are pastorally unsound, and which are in fact doing immense damage to their reputation, not to mention to the viability of its musical heritage. Simon Johnson, the newly appointed Master of Music, had better pray there is something left for him to conduct when he starts his role in September 2021.  

Westminster Cathedral is financially struggling, as most churches and cathedral across the country are, but it is Westminster Cathedral that seems to be unique in pursuing openly kamikaze policies. If they want money to start flowing again, they need to follow those places that are making much better attempts to offer as much of their previous routines of worship as possible. And this means bringing back the full choir without further delay - which is permitted by the law and the guidance and common sense! But it won't happen, sadly. Plod plod plod with as few singers as possible (presumably leaving the remainder of the lay clerks on furlough for as long as possible) is the only plan they currently seem to have:

If you look hard enough, you can see the trebles sing half a service once a week. O how far the music has fallen at Westminster Cathedral. An immense tragedy. History will not remember those responsible kindly.