A melancholy anniversary today – one that seems to get worse each year as it triggers ever more naked displays of Jew-hate. However – a big, welcome 'However' – today is also the centenary of the first radio broadcast of Choral Evensong, the world's longest-running outdoor broadcast. Radio 3 is marking the occasion with a live broadcast from Westminster Abbey – where the first Choral Evensong was recorded back in 1926 – at 3 this afternoon.
Choral Evensong is one of the great British institutions, a product of the unique tradition of choral singing and education in our cathedrals and collegiate churches that is one of the glories of our national culture. Indeed, English Evensong has been submitted to the UK Living Heritage Inventory, with a view to getting UNESCO Intangible Cultural Heritage Listing. Whether it gets that or not, let's hope it – and Radio 3's weekly broadcast – last another hundred years.
Here's a taste of that Intangible Cultural Heritage – the Magnificat from the service known as Stanford in A, sung by the choir of St John's College, Cambridge –
Wednesday, 7 October 2026
Evensong
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After attending Evensong at King's, Cambridge my brother floated the idea of forming Atheists for Evensong.
ReplyDeleteYes Western civilisation is rooted in Christianity and Christian ethics, as Tom Holland recently acknowledged.
DeleteWhy not? The walking group I walk with – not all of them believers, by any means – now plan two-day walks around attending choral evensong, preferably in a cathedral.
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