The OT Society had its man in the St George's Chapel organ-loft at the wedding of Charles and Camilla. His name is Roger Judd (HS 1958 - 63), and he has been organist there for the past 20 years. This is his report.
SERVICE OF PRAYER AND DEDICATION
FOLLOWING THE MARRIAGE
of
HIS ROYAL HIGHNESS
THE PRINCE OF WALES
and
HER ROYAL HIGHNESS
THE DUCHESS OF CORNWALL
St George’s Chapel
Windsor Castle
Saturday, 9th April, 2005
2.30pm
A VIEW FROM THE ORGAN-LOFT
Life in the organ-loft at St George’s Chapel became increasing crazy in the days following Easter Day, leading up to the service on the 9th. On Tuesday of Easter week the chapel became an off-shoot of the BBC machine when scaffolders moved in to put up the lighting gantries that will carry the vast array of flood and spot-lights necessary for such an outside broadcast. Believe it or not the vertical scaffold poles are painted a stone colour to blend in with the pillars of the Nave. The next two days saw the arrival of a huge quantity of cabling for the lights and the camera positions - I was told that something like 45 miles of cable was laid around the castle.
By the end of Easter week all the infrastructure for the broadcast was in the Chapel. In the organ-loft all was ready for the arrival of two cameras and two remote control camera operators and our usually quite spacious loft seemed much smaller with something like a dozen lights pointing in all directions, four of them sitting on top of the organ console - I hope Harrisons (the Durham-based organ builder) won’t need to get at the works!
Also, at the end of the week we heard of the death of Pope John Paul II, and I said to my wife “Bet his funeral is on Friday” (the orginal day for our service), and so it was - it was quite clear that the Windsor service would have to be changed. Miraculously the change was made without much difficulty - only two members of the Philharmonia Orchestra, of which Prince Charles is Patron, couldn’t do the changed date, but there was a great deal of hurrumphing from the local Thames Valley Police, and The Met who have responsibility for security at the Castle.
The beginning of wedding-week marked the start of focusing the lights; it took over two days because there are well over a hundred of them - and the arrival of carpenters who tried, rather successfully, to hide the more unsightly aspects of the set-up. Diesel generators suddenly disappear behind mock stone walls - I wish they could do something about the smell eminating from the generators - the chapel smells horrible. The cameras started to arrive; most of them have their own operator, but there are four which work by remote control, including two in the doorway under the organ that leads into the Quire, where the service will take place. These two are controlled from the organ-loft, each with its own operator.
With four days to go before the service an extraordinary scene was enacted - the arrival of trees in full blossom, some of them between 12 and 15 feet in height. These were in large pots and were positioned inside the chapel to “cover up some of the chapel’s rough spots” as I was told. Excuse me, but this building is fabulous before a single flower is taken inside - but I might be prejudiced. I was reassured to learn that all the trees and plants that will decorate the chapel will be planted at Highgrove and Birkhall after the service - a classic example of Prince Charles’ care for the environment. Huge quantities of cowslips, fritillaries and heathers, all in pots, will go the same way.
The organ was fine-tuned on Tuesday afternoon and evening, and by the Wednesday everything is in place. It seems that although the date of the service has been changed, the schedule for the rig could not be altered, so we have a welcome day of relative peace. I had two and a half hours rehearsal time on the Wednesday evening and four hours on Thursday evening in total peace, which, after the frenetic activity during the day in the chapel, was a wonderful period of tranquility.
Wedding Day minus one was spent in rehearsal with the orchestra, choir, organ and BBC. Pieces were carefully timed, and the difficulty of having the orchestra playing just outside the Quire with their conductor, Christopher Warren-Green, synchronising with the Chapel Choir and our Director of Music, Timothy Byram-Wigfield, was gradually overcome, highly successfully as it turned out on the day. On the organ console I had three TV monitors to watch, one showing Warren-Green, one showing Byram-Wigfield and the third showing me the picture of the BBC transmission. Out in the town the TV companies from all round the world have descended and are interviewing all and sundry. Crowd barriers have been put up on all the streets near the Castle and the Guildhall, and there was a ‘nutter’ wandering around with a large model ram on his shoulder, hoping that Prince Charles would give him a lift to Rome for the Pope’s funeral.
April 9th was a sunny day, with quite a strong wind that filled one of the largest Royal Standards that is flown from the Round Tower - it is something like 35 feet by 22 feet in size - it looked fabulous. There was another musical rehearsal in the morning with the orchestra and choir - final timings were checked and checked again, and after a quick lunch I returned to the organ-loft to get the chapel part of the proceedings under way. Organ music by William Walton, Frank Bridge and J.S.Bach was followed by the orchestra playing Handel, Finzi, Maxwell Davies, Elgar, Grieg and Albinoni.
The timings worked out well, all the processions happened when they should, and I launched the service with the first hymn, 'Immortal, Invisible', just on 2.30pm. The Russian contralto, Ekaterina Semenchuk (of the Marinsky Theatre in St Petersburg), sang Gretchaninov’s Creed absolutely gloriously. The choir and orchestra performed the first movement of a Bach cantata (No.62, Nun komm der Heiden Heiland), and the ensemble was perfect. And the service ended with the first performance of a specially commissioned Celebration Fanfare for two trumpets (in the loft with me), organ and strings by the distinguished Welsh composer, Alun Hoddinott. The orchestra played some more Handel, I played some more Bach, and it was all over.
Everything had gone without a hitch, so all the rehearsing had paid off, and I went back home, opened a bottle and watched it all through on the video. I was not surprised that the organist was not mentioned either during the broadcast or in the credits. Similarly I was not surprised that I didn’t appear on the screen during the service. As well as the four cameramen already mentioned, the organ-loft was home to our excellent organ-tuner, on stand-by in case anything goes horribly wrong in the organ (it hasn’t yet, but the moment he is not there, it will!), our organ scholar turning my pages, a still photographer, and two artists immortalising the scene in pen and ink, so there was no opportunity for a shot of the organ or organist at work.
I am in my twentieth year at Windsor and I have been privileged to play at some memorable services, including the funerals of the Duchess of Windsor and Princess Margaret, at which I was asked to play movements from the ballet music for Swan Lake (but that is another story!), the wedding of Prince Edward and Sophie Rhys-Jones, and this most recent one was certainly the most fascinating for its historical and constitutional implications.
Roger Judd,
Organist of St George’s Chapel,
Windsor Castle
(HS 1958-1963)