Three Choirs Ambassador?! That’s what I feel like, when I discovered the marketing staff had quoted part of my blog from last year’s Festival in Worcester!

I had just come from hearing a one-of-a-kind performance of the Saint-Saëns Organ Symphony and I was higher than a kite!

Here’s the outside of a brochure I found.

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And here is what I found inside on page 24! My quote is listed under “Press Reviews”!

In case you can’t read it because it’s too small:

Saint-Saëns Organ Symphony. “Never have I heard such a performance! The fact that it was done in a cathedral with reverberant acoustics and a massive cathedral organ contributed to the overall scale and impression of this popular work, Saint-Saëns’ only organ symphony. Wayne Marshall, the organist, pulled out all the stops literally and figuratively to contribute to a fantastic performance, the likes of which I’ll probably never hear again.” Katherine Crosier, Insanity Blog

Wow! I’m flattered!

At Sunday’s reception for the American Friends, a woman on the marketing staff said that she had been reading my blog and wondered if they could use any future comments of mine in their promotional materials?

Most certainly!

Yesterday was Sunday at the Three Choirs Festival in Hereford and I attended both the Holy Eucharist and Evensong in the Cathedral.

In the morning the Cathedral was packed as the Hereford Cathedral Choir sang Hayden’s Harmoniemesse as the Ordinary (with the fabulous Philharmonica Orchestra) making the service one hour and forty-five minutes!

We also heard the famous Laudate dominum and Ave verum corpus by Mozart during the distribution of communion. Even though there were five stations where people could take communion, the large crowd necessitated that the organist improvise for a bit to cover the silence.

I did go on a historical walking tour of Hereford yesterday and learned all about King Ethelbert for whom Hereford Cathedral has as its patron saint. Seems he was ingloriously killed and beheaded—and somehow his head got separated from the body when it was being carried over bumpy streets in a cart. When the head was found later, water spouted from the king’s eye and restored the sight of a blind man! He was then named a saint.

Here are some of the picturesque parts of Hereford.

Apologies in advance for these tardy posts— I am several days behind in my blog writing because I am having terrible WiFi connections!