all day saturday, culminating in an evening concert, i 'sang' with the raucus norfolk gallery quire [pictured from their website: http://www.wyldesnoyse.co.uk/foe/quire.html
the music, i was told, was an english parent to shape note singing in america. four parts sung pretty much as loudly as one can. robust! very fun! [that's why the victorians told them to stop, according to music director, chris gutteridge] like becoming a pipe organ with 15 other people---recommended! i really thought of my friend hugh a lot...
the program was named 'church going' after the philip larkin poem, whose last stanza i'll include:
A serious house on serious earth it is, In whose blent air all our compulsions meet, Are recognised, and robed as destinies. And that much never can be obsolete, Since someone will forever be surprising A hunger in himself to be more serious, And gravitating with it to this ground, Which, he once heard, was proper to grow wise in, If only that so many dead lie round.
an earlier stanza wonders what churches will become after no one worships in them---a present problem in england. the present answer is for curches to become cafes, museums and music venues. norwich, with the highest concentration of stone churches in europe also has a high concentration of...cafes, museums and music venues!
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