I said goodbye to my family at London Heathrow Airport and met up with Joan Ishibashi, and together we waited for Bill Potter to arrive from Honolulu. It took us about four hours to drive to Gloucester owing to the bad traffic—ordinarily it would take only 2-1/2 hours to drive the 100 miles, but we did stop about 45 minutes for fish and chips.

Today is Day 1 of the 298th Three Choirs Festival which always starts with an Opening Service, full of pomp and ceremony with a grand procession of about 100 local dignitaries in ceremonial dress or liturgical garb. Some of the men were wearing bench wigs (made of horsehair), worn for ceremonial occasions and symbolizing authority. Others wore military uniforms.

If you’d like to see a short reel from the official Three Choirs Festival office, which shows a portion of the grand procession and shares audio clips from the service, click here.

We were reminded that the Three Choirs Festival is based on music for worship, as evidenced by this statement by the Dean: We gather in this sacred place, where music has echoed around these ancient stones for countless generations, to join in harmony with the saints and angels in rendering to God the praises due to his name; to give thanks for all that gives voice to our prayer, instruments of music, choirs and musians, our own voices, moved to sing together of God’s love, made known in Jesus Christ; and to dedicate ourselves afresh to using the gifts and talents with which we have been blessed to the greater glory of God.

The entire Festival Chorus and the choristers from the three cathedrals (Worcester, Gloucester and Hereford) combined to sing grand music including the Te Deum by William Walton, originally commissioned for Queen Elizabeth II’s coronation in 1953. The work was used again for King Charles’ coronation in 2023.

The very first concert we attended was by the popular a cappella ensemble, Voces8, my second time hearing them in person. You may remember that it was in 2019 that I heard them live at Cadogan Hall in London, and although the acoustics were dead as a door nail, I still was blown away by their fantastic choral blend and nuanced singing.

Today’s performance was even more outstanding because of the ambient acoustics of Gloucester Cathedral. The music chosen was by British and American composers in celebrating America’s 250 years as a nation. The group sang with exquisite sensitivity, and to me, the most impressive parts were when they were singing extremely softly. I really appreciated that the audience was super quiet, allowing the music to gently roll over us.

One of the selections performed was an arrangement of Simon and Garfunkel’s “Sounds of Silence.” Out of the blue, the group received an unexpected email titled, “Hello from Paul Simon!” And ever since they have been happy to collaborate with him on several projects.

The applause for Voces8 was loud and long. We were rewarded with an encore.

One of the pieces we heard on this afternoon’s concert was Voces8’s performance of “Shenandoah.” Here’s their YouTube version:

By the way, every member of the group this afternoon used iPads to read the music. However I didn’t see anyone in the big chorus using digital devices.

After the concert, we ate Korean food for a late lunch. Gloucester now has so many more food options than the first time I came to the Festival.

The evening concert began at 8 pm with Gavin Higgins’ “Fanfare Americana” and Edward Elgar’s “Symphonie No. 1.” The main work, however, was William Walton’s “Belshazzar’s Feast,” a “spine-tingling work” with a large orchestra and chorus.

Here’s a description of the work from the program book: Walton makes much play with jazz rhythms. It begins with a march portraying gold whose ‘Pomp and Circumstance’ character adds an uneasy irony; then silver (female voices, triangle and glockenspiel), heightened by syncopated rhythms that sound all the more jazzy through the prominent saxophone timbre; then iron (male voices, anvil, trumpets); wood (strings playing col legno, on the wood of the bow), xylophone and woodblock; stone (slapstick) and brass (magnificent effects from the panoply of brass instruments blazing away!).

I pitied the poor sopranos who sang up in the stratosphere most of the work!