Modest but rugged: How music at Prince Philip’s thanksgiving will strike the right note
At the time of the Duke of Edinburgh's funeral almost a year ago, church music-making was a shadow of its normal self, with choral and congregational singing not allowed under Covid rules.
Now restrictions have been lifted, you might imagine Tuesday's service of thanksgiving would be more than usually lavish to make up for it – but that would be contrary to Prince Philip's personality.
He hated fuss, so the music will again be essentially modest, based on the choir and organ sound you can hear in any parish church on a Sunday. Its style will be what one would expect – conservative even when recent, consoling or upright in tone, sometimes redolent of Britain's martial and seafaring history, with a touch of pastoral nostalgia here and there.
These different strains will be heard before the service begins. The organist will play Charles Widor's charming Andante Cantabile, the tender aria Bist du Bei Mir, once thought to be by Bach, and a pastoral movement named after the weeping willow ("Salix") from the Portsmouth Sonata by Percy Whitlock.
Splendour of the Westminster Abbey organ
Then the mood becomes more rugged, with music from the score composed by Ralph Vaughan Williams for the wartime thriller 49th Parallel, played by the Band of the Royal Marines, followed by scores from more recent filmed tales including Men of Honour and Band of Brothers.
In the service, we can relish the full splendour of the Westminster Abbey organ and the choirs of the Abbey and the Chapel Royal. Together with the congregation, they will be singing three hymns that strike a similar note of fortitude, He Who Would Valiant Be, All Creatures of Our God and King and Guide me O Thou Great Redeemer.
Variety of tone will come from the dignified, radiant late 16th-century setting by William Byrd of words from the Book of Common Prayer, Prevent Us, O Lord, and from the irresistibly cheerful setting of the Te Deum made by Benjamin Britten in 1935, a personal favourite of the Duke's (not all his musical tastes were predictable).
After the service, Haydn Wood's folksong-flavoured maritime rhapsody The Seafarer, from 1940, will be played, and the final musical statement will be a movement from Charles Stanford's stirringly patriotic Sonata Britannica.
It's an apt ending to a musical programme that, in its complete defiance of fashion, seems very true to the man.
