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Programme Note

This piece was commissioned by the City of London Festival for the opening concert of their 1994 season. It was first performed in St. Paul’s Cathedral by the St. Paul’s Cathedral Choir conducted by John Scott on 3 July 1994. It had previously been recorded by them for Hyperion on 30th June; and it was issued as part of volume 5 of their series on The English Anthem. The BBC Singers conducted by James Morgan gave it an excellent performance which was broadcast in December 2008.
The commission gave me an opportunity which is unlikely to be repeated: to write for the vast choral space of St. Paul’s with all its problems and advantages. I had always loved this poem – after ‘The Hound of Heaven’ the best known of all Francis Thomson – and had recognised in it a completely genuine mystical quality entirely suitable for the place and the occasion.
The musical problem was how to handle, indeed to exploit, the resonance of the building, and my most exciting memory is perhaps not of the performance itself but of the final rehearsal when St. Paul’s lay silent and empty under its dome in the dark. Then the echoes clear away as slowly as they wished before being replaced by fresh waves of choral sound.
Hugh Wood