Choirs

Wallingford Parish Church choir has 45–50 members, aged from under 8 to over 80. We do not have auditions and welcome anyone into our choir family who would like to sing. 

 

We sing weekly services on Sundays at our two churches, St Mary-le-More and St Leonard. Sunday Holy Communion at St Mary’s is at 10:00 and usually lasts around an hour. We sing hymns, the service mass setting and an anthem during communion. The second Sunday of the month is generally reserved for the shorter family service when the junior choir leads the singing accompanied by a band, and on the fourth Sunday there is an all-age communion service, again with input from our juniors.

 

The choir maintains a tradition of sung weekly Evensong services at 18:30 at St Leonard’s, which feature sung responses, a psalm, canticles (Magnificat and Nunc Dimittis), an anthem and hymns. At a monthly Choral Evensong the choir also sings the canticles to a special setting.

 

There is a tradition of singing special music to mark significant events in the Church’s year, such as Good Friday, Easter, Remembrance, All Soul’s, Advent, Christmas and Epiphany. In addition, we sing in concerts, weddings, funerals and at civic services.

 

We undertake at least one cathedral tour each year during the school holidays to sing all the music-lead services while the resident choir is on vacation. Recent tours have included Salisbury and St Albans in 2024, Coventry in 2023, Durham in 2022 and Norwich in 2021.

 

We rehearse in St Mary’s on Friday evenings. Junior choristers practise from 19:00 until 19:45 when the younger children leave, with older ones staying until 20:30 to rehearse with the adults. The adult rehearsal starts at 20:00 and we sing until 21:30.

 

Organ

The organ in St Mary’s is recorded in the National Pipe Organ Register as having been built new for the church in 1877 and was rebuilt in 1916 by the well-regarded Norwich firm of Norman & Beard, including the installation of a new tubular-pneumatic mechanism operating on wind- pressure — a Norman & Beard speciality. Two more low-key sessions of repair work took place in the 1950s and 60s, undertaken by Hill, Norman & Beard. The most recent major rebuilding work in 2009/10 was undertaken by FH Browne of Canterbury, when, in addition to nine new or substituted stops, the mechanism was modernised to work electrically, and the console refurbished and adapted to suit.

 

At St Leonard’s, the organ was installed in 2006 by FH Browne. The console was formerly in Saint Peter's, Limpsfield and the pipework was formerly in Saint Alban's, Dartford. The case is a West Gallery pipe rack, with gold painted display pipes; 34 notes of the Bourdon rank are displayed on either side of the main case.

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Contact the Director of Music: Judith Ward