Another English Cathedral allows girls to sing
News
One by one, the great places of Anglican worship are opening their doors to equal opportunity and common sense.
Chichester Cathedral has just invited girls to audition for places in its world-renowned Choir.
Charles Harrison, Organist & Master of the Choristers, said: ‘We are delighted now to offer the chorister experience to girls as well as boys. Having one team of choristers singing 7 services each week is a wonderful, immersive training for the children, and it plays to the high musical standards that we aspire to. Rather than running two choirs, we will continue with one, inviting girls and boys to work side-by-side on equal terms.’
The Cathedral was inaugurated in the year 1078, replacing a chirch founded in 681.
It is in no rush to be trendy.
But boys’ voices are fundamentally different from girls’ voices. Might as well give oboe parts to the flutes in orchestras. ‘Equal opportunity’ has nothing to do with it.
York University did an extensive study using blind tests and found that boys, girls, and mixed children’s choirs are indistinguishable.
https://www.theguardian.com/science/2003/sep/09/sciencenews.genderissues
Not only blind tests, but deaf ones as well.
“It is alleged that boys have a purer sound when they are singing treble, and that girls have a more husky or breathy voice. Certainly that is borne out if you take one girl and one boy. Chorally, it is not borne out,”
Obviously more complex than you (predictably) claim. And we don’t know who the “listeners” were. No agenda involved, naturally.
A spectrum of listeners were selected ranging from experts to lay people. There is an agenda excluding girls. It’s thousands of years old….
https://www.yorkpress.co.uk/news/7899676.giving-new-voice-to-boys-versus-girls-argument/
“Certainly that is borne out if you take one girl and one boy.”
So, at the very least, solo parts would sound different?
Really? Depends on the choir of boys perhaps – Kings College v the Vienna Boys Choir v Westminster Cathedral Choir v All Saints Anglican Cathedral, Nairobi. They are all ‘different’ in the same way as is the sound of the Chicago Symphony v the London Symphony v the Halle Orchestras v the Vienna Philharmonic, yet the same configuration of instruments. But Malcolm Archer knocked the nail on this head a very, very long time ago – heard him being interviewed live on Classic FM many years ago. Totally indistinguishable as York proved as well. I would have given anything to have been able to sing in a London Cathedral choir when I was a young girl, but I wasn’t allowed simply because I was a girl, not because I couldn’t sing well – possibly sung better than some of the boys that were allowed! So at last … the next generation of fine voices regardless of gender, gets the chance.
“Totally indistinguishable as York proved as well.”
“Proved” in circumstances we know relatively little about. Many disagree with this “proof”.
It’s not about your grievance – several people here have suggested ways in which girls can be given the same opportunities without destroying what is, IMO, a distinctive sound.
And the concern about driving out boys entirely is a reasonable one.
Another report on the study.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/3091666.stm
So what? Same source.
It won’t be on equal terms, musically or otherwise. If there are any boys left within five years Iwill be pleasantly surprised.
Great for the girls, but sad to see the end of the unique sound of the boy treble.
Meanwhile in Germany, the courts have ruled that choirs can exclude girls.
https://www.rnd.de/panorama/jungen-bleiben-unter-sich-maedchen-darf-nicht-in-knabenchor-singen-UW4KI6KDXFUYVB324OTEA4I63U.html
Germany will eventually catch up on the children’s choir issue, but as usual in its classical music world when it comes to gender issues, it will be 20 years behind. Sorry to say it so bluntly, but that’s the reality.
It’s “trendy” when it’s British. But when it’s the Vienna Philharmonic (which began integrating, belatedly, years ago)…
I fear that this move may have been driven by ISI (Independent Schools Inspectorate) themselves under pressure from OFSTED. Other choir schools have been failed by ISI over equal opportunities. This situation has been developing for some time. I doubt very much if this latest move by Chichester Cathedral really sees this as progress. It’s great for the girls of course, but many in the world of choral music fear that boys will be even harder to recruit, as choral singing will be seen increasingly as a girls’ activity. For those of us, like myself, who were lucky enough to have the opportunity to perform at a excellent level on a daily basis at a very young age it is a sad day. Let’s hope I’m proved wrong.
It’s a tricky one this. Those of us like myself who were fortunate enough to sing as Choristers back in the day can quite easily be seduced by a certain nostalgia for the ‘good old days’ of the all male choir. But I can think of two reasons why mixed choirs can be a good thing. In the hands of the right choirmaster the voices can complement each other when correctly trained to deliver a similar purity of tone. Also, we want church / cathedral choirs to not just survive, but flourish, and if mixed choirs can help with this I cannot be against it in the long term.
All of the so-called “issues” have been solved decades ago. Have a boys’ choir, have a girls’ choir, and let them sing together if and when they wish to. One can make life as complicated as possible if one tries.
The result of this is that boys are still given favored treatment since their choral programs are far more established. Separate and unequal.
It’s tradition that people hate, not girls that they especially love!!
I agree with you Sue. That makes me doubt myself.
This is just another tragedy of political correctness. The sound and effect are absolutely not the same. I believe there will come a time when the pendulum swings back and people realise the mistakes that are being made in this era, but I am afraid that it will be hard to recover some of the fine traditions that are being lost.
I agree with many of the points raised in previous postings. Of course, we need to encourage ALL young people to sing but in a way that is not being done for political or trendy reasons. Cathedral choirs are a precious part of our great musical and choral tradition and it is a pity when one hears comments stating that a sole boys’ choir is a threat to girls. That is utter nonsense.
I agree with a previous post in that provision should exist for a separate boys’ and girls’ choirs within our Cathedrals and mix them for major services, i.e. Christmas and Easter.
Life on the continent has always been a bit different as there are many fine exclusively boys’ choirs, Vienna, Tolz, and the wonderful boys’ choir at St. Thomas’s Church in Leipzig – for example – therefore making rules that forbid girls from such choirs makes absolute sense in my humble opinion.
Life in Parish Churches will be different where many church choirs struggle to exist and whether a young chorister is a boy or girl with a trainable voice they will be eagerly snapped up.
Having recently watched the BBC Young Chorister of the Year, and I’m not a fan of music competitions, I was disappointed when the panel of eminent musicians on the judging panel chose two girls as winner and runner-up. If two boys had been chosen, the equal opportunities brigade would have voiced their concerns immediately.
We have to be very careful to honour both. Why not have a Young Boy Chorister of the Year AND a Young Girl Chorister of the year? This would provide genuine equality as well as giving both boys and girls an incentive to sing.
More significantly, Ely has just appointed its first female lay clerk. The real breakthrough will come when a major cathedral realises that children’s choirs are a throwback to the sexism of the pre-reformation and appoints a fully adult SATB professional choir to lead the daily round.
I had always understood that the reason for admitting girls into cathedral choirs in recent years has been nothing to do with political correctness or being trendy, but simply that, for whatever reason, cathedrals and similar institutions are finding it difficult to recruit – there are simply not enough applications any more (perhaps changing demographics or the prevalence of other interests). So it’s simply a question of survival – admit girls or cease to exist.
I’ll be interested to see what if any effect this might have on the recruitment of new clergy. In years past, many in Crockfords had been choirboys which helped inculcating the attendance at church.