NO.122
T H E T R U S T Y S E RVA N T
Inspired by Win Coll music
David Wilson (I, 50-54) fondly remembers:
I did not realise it at the time but Win
Coll started me on a musical journey
which has still not ended. I am basically
not a musician: I had a go at the piano
under the eagle eye of Mrs Blake, but the
dullness of my brain and my lack of manual
dexterity meant that I advanced only as far
as ‘Drink to me only’. While doing
National Service in Nigeria, a Nigerian
bandsman tried to teach me the clarinet
but found it as hard as Mrs Blake had done.
But the love of music was there and
only needed to be released. This is what
Winchester did. My tégé was Harry Bates
(I, 50-55), who introduced me to Glee
Club: my first performance was of
Brahms’s German Requiem, a work which
even now does something to me. I went
on in Glee Club to sing many works in
the choral repertoire.
I owe a lot to Harry: we had a
gramophone in mugging hall and he
would play records which introduced me
to many of the great orchestral works. If
my memory serves me right, he was
particularly fond of baroque music and
especially Handel. Whenever I hear the
overture to Samson, my mind goes back
to Hopper’s.
But the greatest influence on my
musical life was Chapel, in the days when
Henry Havergal was Master of Music.
How could one forget the singing of
hymns and psalms under his direction?
Hymns such as ‘O quanta qualia’ and
‘Veni Sancte Spiritus’, from Hymnarium in
Usum Wiccamicorum, are still fresh in my
memory. And the psalms: language and
the chants still entrance me. The high
spot of the week’s music was Saturday
evensong, then compulsory, which always
began with Psalm 122 – ‘I was glad when
they said unto me’ – sung to the same
unvarying chant. Whenever I now hear
that psalm sung to something other than
the Winchester (Beethoven) chant, my
feeling is that it is the wrong one.
Almost as impressive were the
canticles, Stanford and Walmisley among
others. These were meticulously rehearsed
by Henry Havergal and the end result was
the unforgettable sound of 500 boys
singing the works lustily and to a
reasonably high standard.
Then there were the termly services
held in the Cathedral, and I remember
going there one evening to hear Isobel
Baillie as one of the soloists in The
Messiah. I am still a frequent attendee at
Sunday choral evensong in the Cathedral.
What has this musical background
done for me? It started me off listening to
the great classical works; and it has given
me an abiding love of Church choral
music, which was enhanced at New
College. There I would go to choral
evensong every evening and little did I
know that years later I would be singing
many of the works I heard there.
Finally, I thank Win Coll for giving
me a love of choral singing, which has
played a large part in my life. For over 25
years I sang with a good choral society
and for many years, as chairman, I took
the choir to sing in some of the great
cathedrals and churches of Europe.
I think Francis Gordon Clark
(G, 48-53) may share my musical views.
To celebrate a noteworthy birthday he
organised a service in Chapel with a good
choir and the Cathedral’s assistant
organist, where we sang so many of the
hymns and psalms so well known to so
many generations of Wykehamists. It was
a memorable and nostalgic occasion.
I owe a huge debt to Win Coll, and
particularly to Chapel, for giving me one
of the great passions of my life.
■
OW Pilgrimage to the Somme
PA Davis (E, 55-60) records:
Way back in early 2014, The Trusty
Servant told us of a commemorative visit
to the Somme from Monday 9th to
Thursday 12th May 2016 to be led by
Michael Wallis. Those of us who were
lucky enough to read and act on this were
rewarded with a wonderful, moving and
informative few days.
The Battle of the Somme lasted from
1st July to mid-November 1916 and cost
the greatest number of casualties in a
single campaign in the British Army’s
history. In a little over four months, there
4
were 420,000 British casualties (dead and
wounded) as well as 200,000 French and
around 680,000 Germans. On Day 1 we
had 57,000 casualties, including over
19,000 dead. Small wonder then than the
Somme has attracted attention from
military historians, politicians, poets and
the public ever since. Small wonder too,