‘A Century of Song’

This event is CONFIRMED.  St. Mary’s is following a COVID Safe Policy. This event will be restricted to 90 minutes, and there may not be an interval. Refreshments will be available.
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A Talk by Prof. Bill Tamblyn on congregational music in country chapels since 1920.

Notes by Prof Bill Tamblyn:

This talk was first given at St George’s Church, Heybridge Basin. St George’s was 100 this year. I found this a challenge initially, until I visited the church and realised it was really an army hut converted into an Anglican chapel. It reminded me of many chapels I knew from my Methodist years. It has no pretentions. What it lacks in solidity of stone it more than compensates for in the solidity and enthusiasm of the congregation.

There is a small brick-built church of similar size at St Barnabas in Colchester.

And of course, built to satisfy the needs of the local lord of the manor, there is our little church – St Mary’s in Peldon. This was always ‘owned’ by someone else, a lord of the manor – the Teys, the Nevilles, the Darcys, and so on. We were their village chapel too, even though the local nineteenth century non-conformists also built their own chapels – long since gone by 2020. St Mary’s remains!

My talk will be illustrated with songs you will remember. I will sing lots of Anglican chapel songs (almost certainly sung in the past, and now in the present at St Mary’s).