Tuning in…
Tuning in…
Castaway
1 appearance
Musician and choir master, Director of Music at King's College, Director of the Royal College of Music, and Conductor of the Bach Choir.
On the island
Eight records
Choir of King's College, Cambridge / English Chamber Orchestra / Sir David Willcocks
that is one of the pieces of music which I remember vividly singing as a boy in Westminster Abbey with the King and Queen there.
Choir of King's College, Cambridge / Philip Ledger
in remembrance of Boris Ord, who was my mentor when I was an undergraduate at Cambridge and taught me everything I think that I ever learnt about choir training.
Bach Choir / London Symphony Orchestra and Chorus / Benjamin Britten
because that will remind me of my comrades during World War Two and also of the benefit I think that I personally achieved through service in the army for six years.
Fantasia on a Theme by Thomas Tallis
Sinfonia of London / Sir John Barbirolli
It'll remind me of a man who influenced me greatly when I was at Worcester. He was a wonderful composer, but a beautiful character.
Roy Goodman / Choir of King's College, Cambridge / Sir David Willcocks
a piece of music which we always sang in King's College Chapel on Ash Wednesday. Roy Goodman then, I suppose, was aged about thirteen, and I think on the day when we recorded it, he'd been playing football and ran all the way to the chapel in order not to be late for the recording session, having had no time to change, arrived with muddy knees and sang most beautifully as though he'd been lying down resting for three hours, which was not the case.
O Sacred Head Sore Wounded (from St Matthew Passion)Favourite
Bach Choir / Thames Chamber Orchestra / Sir David Willcocks
because I would love on my desert island to remember the choirs with whom I've worked and the people with whom I've worked. I'd like, I think, the chorale, O Sacred Head from the St. Matthew Passion, which the choir performed three times a year in recent years and two times a year throughout most of my time.
This is played by the Hanover band, and I wonder if any of your listeners will guess who's conducting. It's none other than the little boy, Roy Goodman, whom we heard singing part of Allegri's Miseri a few moments ago.
Bach Choir / Graham Ashton Brass Ensemble / Sir David Willcocks
one which will remind me of my family, of the joy I've had from them all. and um the only one of them has actually composed anything, and that is my son Jonathan Wilcox.
In conversation
Presenter asks
1:14Your career does sound like a kind of lifetime's labour of love. Is that how you feel about it?
Well, looking back on it, I feel how lucky I've been to be doing just what I love and being paid for it as well. ... It's something you share with others. And I think that if somebody is occupied in their life doing things which they really enjoy in the company of other people, they can't ask for anything more.
Presenter asks
1:45What kind of character or personality do you need to be a good choir master?
I think first of all you must have natural talent. You've got to have a good ear for music and you've got to love music and try and convey that love to others. And I think if your task is to extract from other people the very best of that they can give.
Presenter asks
2:09Have you modelled yourself on anybody? Because I know when you were very small, a choir boy, you were conducted by Elgar himself, weren't you?
That was just on one occasion in St James's Park when I think I was probably ten years of age. ... Elgar, as Master of the King's music, came dressed in his court dress and conducted the choirs of Westminster Abbey, St Paul's Cathedral and the Chapel Royal. And I'll never forget the charisma of that man. ... I remember distinctly that military looking figure directing us. I can't say whether he conducted well or badly, but I certainly was awestruck.
The keepsakes
The book
because it's a subject I know absolutely nothing about, and I think it'd be wonderful on the desert island to be able to look up at the sky and learn about it.
The luxury
I shall be able to sit there looking at the the sun streaming through the windows. I never had time when I was there to look at those windows carefully. I'll be able to see the carvings in the stone and wood. I'll be able to examine them, because when you're living in a place you don't have time to get to know it in the same way.
Presenter asks
19:58In 1957 you were offered the job of Director of Music at King's College, Cambridge. You've been quoted as saying that it was the most important part of your life. Why do you feel that?
Well, I think each chapter of my life has been enjoyable, but I think the i importance lay in the fact that the long playing record was being developed during those years, and it was the excuse to record a great deal of music, some of which hadn't been sung perhaps for four hundred years
Presenter asks
29:44What's very interesting for a man who's spent a lifetime in cathedrals and chapels making religious music is you're not, I think I'm right in saying, particularly religious?
Well, it depends what you mean by religious. I think I feel deeply the beauty of the religious poetry and the religious music which has been composed. ... much of the Christian creed I accept without any reservation, some I find great difficulty in accepting. And I think on my desert island I shall hope to have the space and the quiet to think things through, because I think the whole of one's life is a search for truth, and it's no good trying to delude yourself if you don't really believe things.
“I do try and embrace everybody in my gaze because I think everybody in a choir and everybody in an orchestra is important.”
“I think if you're singing in a choir or playing in an orchestra, it's that shared experience about which we spoke.”
“I know what I like, and I work towards that always.”