Account of life as a chorister in the nineteenth century

urn:iso:std:iso:639:ed-3:eng

10-11

text excerpt

While I was a boy at Windsor I always made a wish when I tasted any particular kind of fruit or vegetable for the first time in the season, as I believe people do now, I always wished the same wish & I never told it anyone in order that it might come true but it didn’t. My wish was that my voice might be good enough when a man to again get in a Cathedral Choir. I only tried once & that was for Gloucester Cathedral but the compass of my voice has always been a note short of what it should be to enable me to take the usual tenor solos as sung generally in Cathedrals. The quality of my voice was considered very good but the inability to reach A with any certainty prevented my being eligible for Cathedral service altho’ Sir George Elvey in his testimonial of me said “He possesses a very pleasing tenor voice & is fit to take the place of Lay Clerk in any Cathedral” but I don’t think he knew of my inability to reach that (to me) unfortunate A. One thing I never could do well either as a boy or man. My voice was never flexible in a run, tho’ I’ve often sung “Every valley” Messiah, yet have never satisfied myself & I was never able to make a good and true shake.

While I was a boy at Windsor I always made a wish when I tasted any particular kind of fruit or vegetable for the first time in the season, as I believe people do now, I always wished the same wish & I never told it anyone in order that it might come true but it didn’t. My wish was that my voice might be good enough when a man to again get in a Cathedral Choir. I only tried once & that was for Gloucester Cathedral but the compass of my voice has always been a note short of what it should be to enable me to take the usual tenor solos as sung generally in Cathedrals. The quality of my voice was considered very good but the inability to reach A with any certainty prevented my being eligible for Cathedral service altho’ Sir George Elvey in his testimonial of me said “He possesses a very pleasing tenor voice & is fit to take the place of Lay Clerk in any Cathedral” but I don’t think he knew of my inability to reach that (to me) unfortunate A. One thing I never could do well either as a boy or man. My voice was never flexible in a run, tho’ I’ve often sung “Every valley” Messiah, yet have never satisfied myself & I was never able to make a good and true shake.

While I was a boy at Windsor I always made a wish when I tasted any particular kind of fruit or vegetable for the first time in the season, as I believe people do now, I always wished the same wish & I never told it anyone in order that it might come true but it didn’t. My wish was that my voice might be good enough when a man to again get in a Cathedral Choir. I only tried once & that was for Gloucester Cathedral but the compass of my voice has always been a note short of what it should be to enable me to take the usual tenor solos as sung generally in Cathedrals. The quality of my voice was considered very good but the inability to reach A with any certainty prevented my being eligible for Cathedral service altho’ Sir George Elvey in his testimonial of me said “He possesses a very pleasing tenor voice & is fit to take the place of Lay Clerk in any Cathedral” but I don’t think he knew of my inability to reach that (to me) unfortunate A. One thing I never could do well either as a boy or man. My voice was never flexible in a run, tho’ I’ve often sung “Every valley” Messiah, yet have never satisfied myself & I was never able to make a good and true shake.

excerpt from 'Account of life as a chorister in the nineteenth century' pp. 10-11 (242 words)

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1524230295463