The Good Friday Choir sings William Lloyd Webber’s The Saviour.

Life is not easy for what would diplomatically be described as a ‘trainee tenor’ – i.e. someone who is still learning to connect the note to the music score and finds it impossible to hold his own part against the main tune without a strong tenor voice alongside him. We tenors are not quite an endangered species in the Good Friday Choir, but we lack the safety in numbers reassurance enjoyed by the sopranos – though not one has to admit, by the altos or the bases.

William Lloyd Webber’s The Saviour was new to all of the choir, and at first hearing not so inspiring. As we moved from workshop to the practice sessions, we became more confident, and the real value of the piece grew on us. We were so lucky to have Stephen Jones guiding us through the process, encouraging, improving and entertaining  us as we went on. I think we all left the practices sessions uplifted and with a sense of achievement (even if it was for one a slow process).

And yet, in our practice sessions we never heard the piece as a whole. And in the ‘tenor bunker’ we concentrated on delivering our part, not hearing the choir as a whole. I suspect it was the same for the other three groups of voices.

Coming in to set up the sound system gave me a taster of what our two soloists – John-Ellis (base) and Tobias (tenor) – would deliver. But as the whole is often greater than the sum of its parts, so it was on Good Friday when the audience and Stephen could hear the piece as it was intended to be.

So listening to the recording we made was for me a great pleasure, to be out of the ‘tenor bunker’ and hear the whole. Our soloists were simply mind-blowing.

So heartfelt thanks to the soloists, to Stephen for getting us there, and to our patient organist, Simon Worley, who also led one of the practices sessions, and to my mind held the balance between organ and voices to perfection.

To everyone who sang or who came to listen, our thanks. Put Good Friday 2025 in your diaries – we’ll be there with another piece to delight us all.