When a position only comes available once every generation it is an extraordinary opportunity, when there are only four of them at any given time and it is to be a part of unique heritage of boys’ choirs down the ages, it is very select.
“When I arrived I was the youngest in the choir by some way, and the only one born in the 80’s. Four of the choir, three of the basses and one alto, had been in the choir longer than I had been alive.”
When Gareth Dayus-Jones took his place as a bass singer in the prestigious choir of St Georges’ Chapel, he freely admits he feels very lucky to have been “the right person at the right time.”
He is one of 12 professional Lay Clerks (a numerical evocation of the number of Christ’s apostles), who sing countertenor, tenor and bass, in a choir that was founded by Edward III, on August the 6th 1348.
There’s only been one bass place available at any one time in 25 years.
This is in keeping with a choir that, with the exception of the English Interregnum following the Civil War and regicide of Charles I (1649–1660), has sung continuously for nearly seven hundred years since it’s inception.
“It was impressive to be the one in a generation to become part of the choir, it was a huge achievement. It felt like the right thing.”
Gareth’s background was as a singer in the Choir of St John’s College, Cambridge, where he spent four years while studying music at Kings College Cambridge.” He graduated in 2001, stayed on an extra year, then came to join the St George’s Choir, Windsor.
He was put through a rigorous interview by audition, “It is very much an audition, you are thoroughly vetted as to your musical ability, you need to a vocal quality with good range, to be able to sight-read exceptionally well, a voice that can fit into a choir, and to lead the congregation.” To that end the audition also means you are interviewed on your beliefs and your personality, with a view to fitting into the community.” As a small choir living in the cloisters obviously the community is a very strong part of St Georges and, as Gareth emphasises, “You need to be able to fervently lead other people in worship, so if your beliefs don’t match it’s not the right job for you.”
St George's Chapel Quire
St George’s is an outstandingly beautiful Chapel; the Quire area in the Chapel is particularly impressive with carved stalls for the monarch and the Knights of the Garter. The walls of the Quire are decorated with woodcarvings that record the history of the Knights. It was amongst the most important and prestigious in medieval England. It is at the heart of a living community of people who are committed to offering service to the sovereign’s principal order of chivalry, the Order of the Garter.
“In fact, the choir was appointed to sing for the knights who were off fighting the crusades.”
“We are there everyday, every week, to provide spiritual nourishment for the Knights of the Garter, not for the Queen,” explains Gareth, “Even though it is by royal appointment. We only see the Queen 3/4 times a year, most importantly at the largest state occasion in the country – the Garter ceremony.”
The choir is made up of 12 professional singers and, as is traditional in cathedral choirs, it is all male, with boy trebles singing the sopranos lines. The choir is directed by the Director of Music and accompanied on the organ by an Assistant Director of Music, plus an organ scholar, who is selected by audition on an annual basis.
The chapel is also special because, as Gareth explains, “We don’t have a diocese, the services are public, we are not a cathedral, we are not a parish, we don’t have our own diocese outside of the castle walls, so we rely very much on our own regular worshipers, and we rely on tourism. Although the castle closes at 4 or 5pm and evensong is at 5.15, so not many come back. We do have a regular attendance, it’s through word of mouth and the local community, but on a cold Thursday evening in January we don’t have very many people.”
Windsor Castle
“St George’s choir is unique because it is the only choir that is behind castle walls which, in turn, is the largest continually inhabited castle in the world, dating back to the time of William the Conqueror. “Windsor is a residential position. You have your choir community all in one place, living in the bounds of the castle. Your life comes with the job.”
The choir lives in the Horseshoe Cloister, one of the oldest surviving parts of the castle, with the College of St George being one of the earliest examples of a college built around a quadrangle, which became the model for the colleges of Oxford and Cambridge universities.
The daily routine involves coming in at 4.30 every day, three times on Sundays, there is a twenty-minute rehearsal for each service. “You don’t always know the music, there is a repertoire but it is a wide one, we have access to 100s of years of church music up to contemporary, including negro spirituals – we don’t do secular music, it does have to have some bearing upon religion, faith, god, it has to be sacred.”
“We have a cross section but the choir boys do have to be able to sing it.” To the north of the castle, stands a private school, St George’s, Windsor Castle, which was established to educate the boy choristers of the Chapel. “No matter how good the men in the back row are, the boys obviously have to be able to sing it as well. It is useful to rotate music in regularly, so that they get to know it really well. We’d rather repeat a piece twice in the space of six months and do it well, than do a new piece every day and the boys never really have a chance to get to grips with it.”
The Dean and Chapter want to see their choir in front of them on a daily basis. “A minimum 75% attendance is what we all, jointly, feel is an appropriate level of attendance for our choir.” There are only ever a maximum of 3 people away at any one time. “There is a leave system, but we don’t just have gaps, we get in substitutes who are known to the choir, who are all security checked with child safety laws and the castle considerations.”
“There is no hierarchy in the choir. I am a lay-clerk, there is no role to move up to. You can’t become clergy without ecclesiastical training. The director of the choir is usually an organist, and appointed separately. Singers are singers.”
This is perhaps the only downside to the whole job. If you want your career to take off, that would be as a soloist. To do that you have to leave the choir. Young members come, strengthen their voices and then go on to solo careers.”
For Gareth the key part of St George’s Choir is the community, a friend once described him as gregarious without being extrovert. “I am gentle on the world and then I expect it to be gentle back. So I love being part of the team, and it’s socially a very happy place. When I first joined quite a few of the choir were single, we socialised together and we always have done. As the people that stayed got married and had children, and those that left were replaced with people that had family too, we became part of a family atmosphere. The wives are friends as well, there is nobody in the choir I wouldn’t want to spend a whole day with.”
However because accommodation is included with the job, the salary is not particularly high. “At the time of audition the clergy ask if we will seek employment outside, and encourage us to do so. We have the whole of the day until 4.30, to do whatever we want. I have worked with Windsor Festival since I arrived, and often work in London or on tour with other choirs such as The King’s Consort.”
Gareth was very keen to take part in the local amateur opera scene and performed several major roles. “I take part in solo work too and recently six of us in the choir set up our own group, “The Queens Six”. The repertoire we initially based ourselves on is from the time of Queen Elizabeth I, hence the name. There were six prominent composers of her era and now the six of us together in the castle.” The Queens Six generally perform the ‘lighter’ music that a full choir would not be able to perform in chapel, and “as we sight read, sing together everyday and the six of us rehearse together every week we are very adaptable. It makes functions fun. We have a demo disk out, and a few Spanish tours on the cards.” Recently The Queen Six gave a fund-raising concert in the Waterloo Chamber for staff and residents of the castle in order to raise money for the DEC Haiti Fund.
Gareth Dayus-Jones and The Queen's Six, in the Horseshoe Cloisters of Windsor Castle
“It is very important to have friends outside of the choir, one foot outside the castles walls or it can be … cloistered.” Windsor is quite tourist-oriented so if feels that it closes down when they’ve gone, but we do have lots of friends and it’s a walkable town, we go out to see them and walk back inside the castle at the end of the day. I love photography; one of my pictures of the Long Walk in the snow has sold three times. I couldn’t live somewhere without water, I love the river flowing through the town. When I went to Cambridge, I had intended to do languages and to row, three times a day. Then I had back problems and stared singing more. So I have gone from rowing three times a day, to singing three times a day.”
“As you can see it is a position that allows an enormous amount of flexibility, it is remarkable; there are very few jobs that allow for all that. It’s a fantastic job to have.”
The one thing that makes it such a special job for me right now is that, as a singer, I have a very secure, caring environment for my family. That is a key thing that I can flourish from within as a family. It is a wonderful place to bring up a young family. It is one of the most secure places you could possibly imagine. My children can play outside without worrying about cars, compared with my childhood there seems to be a lot more concern about security and we’re within a castle, it is very safe.
The priority is my family. I love being a dad. St George’s choir uniquely affords me that.
Since giving the interview, Gareth Dayus-Jones has announced that, after nearly 8 years in the choir, he and his family will be moving to Winchester to be nearer to his wife’s family. In keeping with his values, Gareth will concentrate on his family commitments and his freelance singing. His work with Windsor Festival and The Queen’s Six will see him return to Windsor on a regular basis.
Services in St George’s Chapel are open to the public, evensong or evenprayer is at 5.15pm every day. The Chapel is open to visitors at 10.30am everyday.
A little snippet of history
A petition was submitted to Parliament
in 1586
which prays that …
… all Choir Churches may be put down, where the service of God is grievously abused by piping the organs, singing, ringing, and trowling of Psalms from one side of the Choir to another, with the squeaking of chanting choristers disguised in surplices; some in corner caps and filthy copes, imitating the fashion and manner of Antichrist the Pope, that Man of Sin and Child of Perdition, with his other rabble of Miscreants and Shavelings.
So there you have it.
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