EVENTS, DEAR BOY...

Eminent Victorians

We were delighted to be able to host the Victorian Society for an event last week. The idea was that they should be able to experience our new extension and appreciate its architectural logic and beauty, but of course the builders hadn't finished, so we had to concentrate on the Victorian building (which was in truth what they wanted anyway). We would give them a talk about G.E.Street, and a talk about the new building, I would take them on a guided tour, and they would get food and drink.The theory was that there should be a limit of thirty for the group, as we could then sit them down in the education studio and talk to them there with all mod cons, but as that possibility receded into the middle distance, so the number wanting to come increased. In the end we had sixty, and sat them down in the nave, with slightly ad hoc audio-visual arrangements.

We will be getting a sound system, but not just yet, so speakers have to overcome the acoustic, which I am used to. People know that it is a good acoustic for music, and so assume it helps you, but actually the spoken word on the floor of the nave can be really hard work. You become much more audible if you are elevated, which is why I now always use the pulpit, and why, despite being a bit further away, placing the altar in the chancel makes sense. We used to have a block that readers stood on, (legacy of a film crew) but that was discarded with the junk when we emptied the church for the builders. I realised soon after our return that readers were now much less audible than before, but I am reluctant to have more blocks made, as we shall eventually have the sound system, and blocks would be constantly being moved and stored (in a building with no storage space). I think sometimes I give visiting speakers a false sense of security, as I am reasonably audible (when making the effort) but they then talk down into their notes and are completely muffled. It's actually annoying when you are trying to have a conversation across an empty church in normal life, and find the echo obscuring what your interlocutor is saying; it encourages the good discipline of actually going across to people and talking directly to them. So, for Vic Soc, we hired a sound system as well as a projector and screen (which would have been in the completed education studio).

Anyway, the Vic Soc event went well. Geoff Brandwood, an architectural historian, talked about Street, with some nice pictures, and set the building in context. Biba Dow, the architect of the extension, gave an excellent presentation explaining its relationship to the Victorian building, which seemed to meet with some understanding. I stressed to them how grateful we were for their (eventual) support in negotiating the process of getting permissions, because it was thanks to Chris Costelloe (their current Director) that we were able to demonstrate that we weren't actually vandals. I hope we communicated our love for the building.

I was expecting them to drink lots of wine, but they were quite moderate in their intake; much more respectable than clergy. I had the great pleasure of seeing again a chap who had been on my trip to Sicily; it seemed like a great coincidence when we discovered he was booked in for this, but of course (as the odious Cecil explains in "A Room With A View") it shouldn't be any real surprise, as we're the sort of people who like these sorts of things.


Cum Jubilo

I am now sending out the invitations to our Mass in celebration of the completed works. I know the loos will be usable, so it doesn't seem too premature (at last). On Thursday 13th June (at 6.30pm, do come!) we shall welcome the Bishop of Fulham (an old friend and neighbour from my time in Reading) and shall have the benefit of the school choirs of Caldicott (where James, the organist, teaches) and Sussex House (whose head is supremo of the Music Society). We shall celebrate St Anthony of Padua, a great and popular saint, whose lovely shrine I have visited with pleasure and devotion, and give thanks for the conservation and new building. The choirs will sing the Cum Jubilo Mass by Maurice Durufle, whose first British performance happened at St Mary Mags in 1968 under the composer's direction. They will also sing a setting of the Lord's Prayer which Durufle told Denis Hunt, the founder of the Music Society, was "for St Mary Magdalene's". Quite how we were going to use a Lord's Prayer in French seems not to have occurred to him! It is, apparently, a beautiful piece.

The secular celebrations, with "official opening" of the new extension, will happen in the autumn, and I expect we'll have a service of some sort then as well, but I knew that if we were to get the boys' choirs then June was the ideal time, after Common Entrance but before activity weeks and trips, and with long enough to practice. It will, of course, be unlike our normal worship, but it is really important to affirm our musical heritage, and our continuing relationship with Sussex House. It is also important to do something which is a full-throated affirmation of our Anglo-Catholic identity; we can do something which is vanilla on another occasion.


A Turning Point

When I was in Bologna for the start of the Giro I was struck by the number of fans of Primoz Roglic, the Slovenian rider, there were. Many were wearing matching mint-green teeshirts in their support of the ante-post favourite, who duly took the lead with an imperious time trial up to San Luca. It's great to be able to watch the highlights programme on Quest, and so I have been watching out for Slovenians in teeshirts, but haven't spotted any, possibly because the weather has been pretty foul and everyone has raincoats on. Roglic finally began to look vulnerable on that magnificent stage into Como on Sunday (when he nearly went over the crash barriers on a descent) and then was actually distanced by his rivals on the fearsome Mortirolo yesterday. But for me, the turning point was when Sean Kelly on the commentary began to pronounce his name the same way as the rest of us. Well, except for Italians, obviously, who pronounce it "Rolyee". The rest of us say "Rog-litch", but Sean Kelly, for the past fortnight, has been sticking to "Rodj-lik". Now Kelly is a great man, a hero of mine when I first discovered bike racing thirty-five years ago, and one of the hardest athletes you could ever find. I imagine he must have spoken at least French when he was riding, and probably Spanish and Dutch too (given who he rode for) because in those days no-one spoke English in the peloton as they do now, but he doesn't strike one as a natural linguist, and I don't suppose he had any occasion to learn any of the Slav tongues. I rather admire the cussedness that continues to broadcast a totally unique pronunciation, and rather hope that "Rodj-lik" may come back into the race.