Press Releases
Church of Ireland Notes from 'The Irish Times'
Summer Music
One of the most effective forms of ministry in the Church of Ireland is that of music. This takes various forms – the regular parish liturgy, splendid cathedral services, organ recitals and popular praise services. In addition Church of Ireland churches and cathedral are frequently the venues for recitals and performances for visiting choirs and instrumentalists who appreciate the period buildings and fine acoustics.
Tomorrow (Sunday) evening offers a good example of this. In the context of the seventh Carrick on Shannon Water Music Festival, in the beautifully restored St George’s Church, Heritage & Visitor Centre, the choir of St Paul’s Church, Glenageary, Co. Dublin, will sing Choral Evensong under their director, Derek Verso. What makes this unique is not only is the this first time that Choral Evensong will be sung in this building since its restoration in 2008, but it also marks the first time to hear the church’s famous William Telford pipe organ, dating from 1847, since its restoration earlier this year. The organist next Sunday is a young Dublin student, Paul Mullen, who won all the major organ prizes at the Dublin Feis Ceoil this year and last year, and is organist in St Patrick’s Church, Greystones Co Wicklow. The service will be jointly led by Canon Bill Atkins, Rector of the Mohill group of parishes and the Revd Fr Tulough Baxter, Curate of St Mary’s church.
There will be music from the 8th century to the 21st century including Thomas Tallis’s setting of the Magnificat, a new arrangement of the traditional Irish hymn Bi Iosa Im Chriosa by the young Belfast music director and organist Philip Stopford, psalm 65 sung to music by C V Stanford as well as hymns by Charles Wesley. The service will end quietly with the 8th century words and plainsong melody of Before the ending of the day. Organ music to include Bach’s Prelude & Fugue in a minor and the Irish composer Eric Sweeney’s Secret Rose.
On Tuesday there will be a lunchtime concert in St Mary’s Church, Killarney, given by the Mansfield University Choir. The choir of Exeter Cathedral will sing Evensong in St Fin Barre’s Cathedral, Cork, on Tuesday at 5pm and on Thursday will give a concert of Anglican Choral Classics in beautiful Pugin church of St Peter & St Paul.
The choir of Christ Church Cathedral, Dublin, is on its summer recess and during this interval the Cathedral will seek to appoint a new Director of Music and a new Organ Scholar. Details of these posts may be had from [email protected]
Tomorrow (Sunday) morning RTE Radio 1 will broadcast the closing service of the Girls’ Friendly Society World Council which was held in Christ Church Cathedral, Dublin last Sunday. The preacher at the service was the Rt Revd Kay Goldsworthy, Assistant Bishop of the Diocese of Perth in Australia. At 11am tomorrow (Sunday) morning the National Day of Commemoration will be held at the Royal Hospital, Kilmainham, where the Church of Ireland will be represented by the Archbishop of Dublin.
Tomorrow (Sunday) afternoon a Service of Thanksgiving for 450 years of shipping from Holyhead to the Dublin area will be held in St Philip’s Church, Temple Road, Dartry. The location has been chosen as over a century ago, what is now Stena Line, Dublin, erected a stained glass window in St Philip’s in memory of W.G. Winkworth, a popular Irish Traffic Manager. The window is the work of J.B. Earley, whose family established a stained glass studio on Dublin in 1852.