Honorary Members
The Dean of St. Albans, The Very Reverend Jo Kelly-Moore
Our Patron
Dr Stephen Darlington
President
After attending King’s School, Worcester, Stephen Darlington became Organ Scholar at Christ Church, Oxford, studying under Simon Preston. In 1974, he was appointed Assistant Organist at Canterbury Cathedral, where he stayed for four years before being appointed as Master of the Music at St Albans Cathedral in 1978, where he was also music director of the International Organ Festival.
In 1985, he returned to Christ Church as organist and tutor in music, holding the post for 33 years until September 2018. At Christ Church he maintained the highest choral traditions in the Cathedral whilst also developing the College as a centre of academic musical excellence.
An extensive discography, comprising over sixty CDs, includes several award-winning recordings which have excited the critics and the listening public over the last forty years. There have been many awards, including a Grammy nomination for An Oxford Elegy by Vaughan Williams (Nimbus), a Classical BRIT Award for Howard Goodall’s Eternal Light: A Requiem (EMI Classics) and several Gramophone nominations, including five volumes of Music from the Eton Choirbook (Avie) released in 2019.
He has travelled widely both with Christ Church choir and as an organist and conductor, performing in all the major concert halls in the U.K., as well as in prestigious venues throughout the world. He has also developed a strong media profile on television, featuring as conductor in over sixteen documentaries in the last fifteen years. He remains in demand as a visiting lecturer, in particular at the Universities of Western Australia, Melbourne and Sydney the College Conservatory in Cincinnati and at the University of Bordeaux. He has collaborated with many distinguished contemporary composers such as Judith Weir, John Tavener, Howard Goodall, Robert Saxton, Francis Grier, Gabriel Jackson and Mark Simpson.
Stephen was President of the Royal College of Organists from 2000 to 2002 and until recently was Choragus of the University of Oxford. He is the holder of a Lambeth Doctorate in Music and is the Chairman of the Ouseley Trust. He is also an Honorary Member of the Royal Academy of Music, Fellow of the Royal School of Church Music and Emeritus Honorary Canon of Christ Church Cathedral, Oxford. He remains Emeritus Professor of Music at Oxford and Emeritus Student (Fellow) of Christ Church.
He was appointed a MBE in 2019 for services to Music.
Vice Presidents
Andrew Lucas
Andrew Lucas has been the Master of the Music at the Cathedral and Abbey Church of St Alban since 1998. His career began St Paul’s Cathedral in 1980 as organ student and he became subsequently Assistant Sub-Organist (1985) and Sub-Organist and Assistant Director of Music (1990–1998).
Born in Wellington, Shropshire in 1958, Andrew studied organ at the Royal College of Music with John Birch, and composition with Herbert Howells. He graduated with a BMus from the University of London and continued his organ studies after college with Peter Hurford. The award of the W T Best Scholarship from the Worshipful Company of Musicians then enabled him to study with Piet Kee at the Sweelinck Conservatoire, Amsterdam.
As an organ soloist he plays concerts throughout the UK and has given recitals in Norway, Sweden, Belgium, Germany, France, Italy, the Netherlands, Australia, Bermuda and the USA. In 1997 he spent three months on sabbatical as Organist and Master of the Choristers at St Andrew’s Cathedral in Sydney, Australia.
As conductor, Andrew has been Chorus Master of the London Concert Choir, Assistant Conductor of the City of London Choir and deputy chorus master with the Royal Choral Society, the Brighton Festival Chorus, the Academy of St Martin’s-in-the-Fields Chorus and the Philharmonia Chorus. In 2007, he directed the annual Choir Directors’ Course at St Thomas Church, Fifth Avenue, New York.
Since Andrew took up his position as Master of the Music the Cathedral Choir has toured Sweden, France, The Netherlands, Rome and the Eastern seaboard of the USA, made several broadcasts (including Choral Evensong on Radio 3 and morning service on ITV) and sung at the late Queen Mother’s 100th birthday celebrations.
Andrew was made an Honorary Fellow of the Guild of Church Musicians in 2006.
Dr Barry Rose OBE
Born in Chingford, East London, Barry Rose grew up playing hymns on the piano at his local Sunday school and later accompanying the choir on the harmonium at the mission church of St Anne’s Chingford Hatch. Leaving the Sir George Monoux Grammar School, Walthamstow, at the age of 16, he set out on a career in commerce, working in the insurance departments of W.H.Smith and Joseph Rank Ltd.
In 1956 he joined Martindale Sidwell’s choir at Hampstead Parish Church as a bass, going on from there two years later to become organist and choirmaster at St Andrew’s Church, Kingsbury, North West London. It was while he was at Kingsbury that he decided to leave the world of commerce, and despite not having any of the required qualifications for entry, the principal (Sir Thomas Armstrong) offered him a place at the Royal Academy of Music to study organ with C. H. Trevor. In April 1960, whilst still an unqualified academy student, at the age of 25 he became the then youngest cathedral organist in the country when he was appointed as the first Organist & Master of the Choristers at the new Guildford Cathedral. At Guildford he founded a choir to sing the daily services, their first public appearance being the service of consecration on 17 May 1961 in the presence of the Queen, the Duke of Edinburgh and other members of the Royal family. Just four years later, his new choir was ‘discovered’ by EMI, and through the enthusiasm and commitment of producer Brian Culverhouse, they made several best-selling recordings in the Cathedral.
In 1974, Barry was invited to move to St Paul’s Cathedral, initially as sub-organist, and in 1977 was appointed to the specially created post of Master of the Choir. He took over those duties at the Silver Jubilee Service for HM Queen Elizabeth on 3 June 1977, for which he wrote a setting of Psalm 121 and from then on directed the choir in their daily Worship Services, several State occasions, as well as a highly successful visit to USA & Canada in June, 1980.
After leaving St Paul’s in 1984, he became Master of the Choirs at the King’s School, Canterbury before being appointed as Master of the Music at St Albans Cathedral in 1988 from which he retired on 25 December 1997.
From 1971 to 1990, he was Religious Music Adviser to the BBC’s Head of Religious Broadcasting in succession to George Thalben Ball.
He was appointed OBE in 1998 for his services to cathedral music.
Dr Colin Walsh
During his career, Colin Walsh has always been associated with long established choral foundations. He has been Assistant Organist at St. George’s Chapel, Windsor Castle, Christ Church Cathedral, Oxford, and Salisbury Cathedral, and was Master of the Music at St. Albans before being appointed Organist of Lincoln Cathedral. Since January 2003 he has been Organist Laureate at Lincoln (where he presides over the fine Father Willis organ) and plays regularly for the Cathedral’s services. He has served as a Council Member of the Royal College of Organists and is a visiting organ teacher at the University of Cambridge.
His teachers have included Simon Preston, Nicholas Danby and Jean Langlais. His three year studies in France with Jean Langlais at St Clotilde inspired him to specialise in French symphonic and modern music, in particular the works of Franck, Vierne and Langlais. This has brought him wide acclaim throughout the world. In 1988 he played Messiaen in front of the composer himself.
He has played many recitals in the UK including two at the Royal Festival Hall and widely around the world. In 2006 he toured New Zealand as European artist of the Organists’ Congress and has recently given concerts in the Svetlanov Hall, Moscow, Cologne Cathedral, Notre Dame de Paris, Saint Sulpice and the Hong Kong Cultural Centre. He recently appeared as organ soloist in the BBC Radio 3 ‘Live in Concert’ series. His many recordings on the Priory label include two early recitals of modern French music from Salisbury, Vierne and Duruflé from St Albans and Vierne from Lincoln.
He holds an honorary doctorate from Lincoln University.
Andrew Parnell
Andrew started his cathedral career as Third Organist at St Albans Abbey in 1976, having been invited by Peter Hurford to assist John Clough during Peter’s absence while on recording and concert tours around the world. Since Peter’s departure from the cathedral in 1978, Andrew was appointed as Assistant Master of the Music, working with Stephen Darlington, Colin Walsh, Barry Rose and Andrew Lucas. In 1996, he founded the Abbey Girls’ Choir (now the Cathedral Girls Choir) which has gone from strength to strength in recent years. While in St Albans, he also directed the music at St Albans School, conducted the St Albans Symphony Orchestra and fulfilled many engagements with the BBC.
Since 2001, Andrew has embarked on a freelance life as organist, conductor, and composer. He has helped out as Acting Assistant Organist at nine cathedrals, including Ely, Canterbury (three times), Wakefield, Rochester, Peterborough, St Edmundsbury and Southwell.
In 2015, Andrew joined the staff at Ely Cathedral as Assistant Director of the Octagon Singers. In addition, he is frequently invited at home and abroad to play as soloist or accompanist, and currently enjoys his association with Brian Kay and The Really Big Chorus, for whom he has played in the Messiah from Scratch in the Royal Albert Hall, and has travelled to Cologne, Tenerife, Guernsey, Mallorca, Riga and Trieste.
Andrew directs Ely Choral Society, Ely Youth Choir and Wymondham Symphony Orchestra, which could perform up to 15 varied concerts each year.
Andrew’s compositions, both sacred and secular, have been performed in venues as widespread as St Paul’s Cathedral, St Thomas’ 5th Avenue in New York, St Petersburg and Krakow.
Andrew is honoured and delighted to have been invited to serve as Vice-President of the St Albans Ex-Choristers Association.
Honorary Life Members
Malcolm Bury
Moira Dean
David Ireson
Honorary Members
Christine Blackie
Rogers Covey-Crump
Anthony & Rosalind de Rivaz
Simon Johnson
Dr Simon Lindley
Tom Winpenny