Girls’ Voices features on BBC Radio 4’s ‘Woman’s Hour’
Girls’ Voices features on BBC Radio 4’s ‘Woman’s Hour’
Girl choristers were introduced to the Cathedral Choir in 2024 for the first time in its 900-year history, marking a significant shift in the Cathedral’s musical tradition and improving access to our renowned choral programme.
Among those interviewed during the episode was our very own Director of Music Andrew Carwood, who discussed the significance of our first Easter with girl choristers. “The great thing about Easter is it’s such a joyful festival anyway,” Andrew told Woman’s Hour. “In a sense, without having had girls in the past, we’ve been incomplete, so having them here for the first time is brilliant. It’s a key part of what we are and what we’ve been moving towards for a little while.”
He also reflected on how “surprisingly easy” it has been to recruit girl choristers, with lots of girls and their families keen to join the programme.
“It’s been a very smooth start,” he added. “The church hasn’t always been very good at inclusivity and equality, and it’s been much, much better in the last (…) 20 years. We’re a bit late to the party on this one, but then we are now setting up the largest and busiest Cathedral foundation, I would say, of anywhere in the world.”
Carris Jones, Vicar Choral and Girls’ Voices Project Manager, also spoke on the episode about her experience leading the programme.
“It’s been one of the great privileges of my career to be in the right place at the right time to help bring girls into the choir,” Carris shared. “We’ve been establishing what we think is a truly equal and equitable offering, so that girls can benefit from these extraordinary transformational experiences as choristers. That’s involved all sorts of things, from looking at providing new boarding space in the school to recruiting new choristers, and indeed, new staff to support them.”
For more information on how to join the choir, details of the application process can be found here.
We are also currently fundraising for new, world-class boarding accommodation for our girl choristers, as well as for the scholarship programme that enables any child to become a chorister, whatever their background. If you’d like to make a donation towards this life-changing opportunity, you can do so here.
