"With Cheerful Voice"
The Introduction by Martin Cooke
During the Summer of 2006 as I have been putting the finishing touches to this new collection of hymns for Clayesmore – With cheerful voice - it has been a delight to hear from so many members of the Clayesmore community about their favourite hymns or the hymns which have meant most to them.
As both a singer and an organist, and the son of a country clergyman, hymns have played a part in my life from an early age and I have got to know a great number of them over the years. As an eight-year-old probationary chorister of St Paul’s Cathedral, London, I attended the annual performance of Handel’s oratorio, the “Messiah” which was sung by the cathedral choir in early December. It was the custom at St Paul’s in those days for there to be a collection hymn during the performance which, in my first year was, “Lo! He comes with clouds descending!” With the cathedral packed full, almost every stop on the wonderful 5-manual Henry Willis organ was needed to support and inspire the singing, and I was overwhelmed by it. Immediately after the performance, I travelled with my sister on the night train from Paddington to Par, in Cornwall, where we were met by my father just before dawn. Within an hour or two, I had pestered my father to open the organ in the beautiful old church of which he was Rector, and, with all the stops out, my career as an organist was born.
I look back on two special occasions when we have heard hymn-signing at its best in the Clayesmore chapel. In the church as a whole, Ash Wednesday would be a time for penitence and quiet solemnity. Not a bit of it at Clayesmore! Under the baton of our Director of Music, Keith Pigot - (whose tune Devine is published here for the first time and for which we thank him most warmly) - our 380 girls and boys thundered their way through four mighty hymns at the late afternoon Eucharist. Then more recently, at the memorial service for our much-loved and widely-respected former governor, Lady Meriel Salt, the great and the good from across Dorset sang some of the finest examples of hymnody so that they could surely be heard in the Isle of Wight!
Hymns have the power to invoke all our emotions but there is no doubt that Clayesmorians prefer their hymns to be powerful and uplifting. Two hymns deserve special mention and are reproduced here for the first time. I am most grateful to the Reverend Michael Arnold, a former Chaplain of Clayesmore, now Senior Chaplain of St John’s College, Johannesburg, for the new Clayesmore School Hymn, Look down in love on Clayesmore, which is set to the tune of the Dambusters’ March. I am sure that it will become a great favourite with all members of the school. Then we have our fine new hymn tune, Clayesmore, composed especially for us by the Director of Music of St Paul’s Cathedral, Malcolm Archer, to words written by Bishop Timothy Dudley-Smith, perhaps the most prolific hymn-writer of our era. (Several other hymns by the Bishop are also included in this book, as, indeed, is another hymn tune by Malcolm Archer.) Clayesmore is a fine and noble tune of which we can all be proud and Mr Archer’s choice of words could not be more appropriate for a congregation of young people in a fast-moving and ever-changing world. There are two other hymns, or parts of hymns, with Clayesmorian interest, as it were: one is the remembrance-tide hymn, Lord God of hosts, let warring factions cease, by the Venerable David Walser, Old Clayesmorian, former Council Member, and sometime Archdeacon of Ely, which has kindly been contributed by Old Clayesmorian Society President, David Anderson. The other is the lovely and very successful descant for O Come, O come, Emmanuel, by one of our former Directors of Music, Christopher Mahon, which is also included here. In recent years, it has been our delight and custom to use this descant at our Carol Services. Incidentally, whilst we have incorporated hymns for the seasons of Advent and Epiphany, you will find none of the traditional Christmas hymns here as we always use carol sheets in chapel for Christmas services.
This book has been created through the generosity of the Old Clayesmorian Society and I hope that Clayesmorians of all generations will find their favourite hymns within its covers. The Chaplain, the Reverend Jonathan Edwards, and I, and indeed the whole Clayesmore community, are deeply indebted to the Society for this momentous gift to the chapel and the School.
November 2006 marks the 50th anniversary of the opening and dedication of our memorial chapel and I suspect that many Old Clayesmorians are reading these words for the first time as they await the start of the special service that will commemorate that occasion.
It is my hope that With cheerful voice will inspire Clayesmorians past, present and future, to want to worship Almighty God, and to remember the sacrifice paid by their friends and forebears who gave their lives in the two world wars of the last century and to whose memory the Clayesmore School chapel is dedicated.
These stones that have echoed their praises are holy,
And dear is the ground where their feet have once trod.
Martin Cooke
Headmaster
September 2006.