LAST WORD

Daniel Hyde

The Director of Music at King’s College, Cambridge takes us behind the scenes at the world-famous choir’s rehearsals as their iconic live radio broadcast on Christmas Eve, ‘A Festival of Nine Lessons and Carols’, approaches

7.50am My day begins with the choristers’ rehearsal in school, before they go to classes. As the new term starts, about a third of the choir are new, and ‘A Festival of Nine Lessons and Carols’ [‘A Festival’] is relatively early in the school year, so we have a lot of work to do. That said, we practice different music every day, learning over 400 different pieces each year, and we don’t begin day, learning over 400 different pieces each year, and we don’t begin rehearsing the speci c carols for ‘A Festival’ until late November. 9am The rst few hours of the morning are consumed by managing ongoing recruitment and administration. All of the adult choristers are from the university and the children are from King’s College School, so we have a speci c pool of talent from which to choose. We’re looking for potential, and we don’t expect people to be born with all the right skills! It’s my job to make sure that our sound and performance live up to our prestigious reputation. 11am I attend a meeting to discuss my proposed programme for an upcoming concert. The choir gets a lot of invitations to perform at events throughout the year and part of my role is to decide what we sing, accommodating any special requests, and how we deliver each piece. 1pm I cycle home for a quick lunch break. While there I make the most of the relative peace and quiet to learn some of a new score, pencil in hand. Music scores are often printed in heavy severalhundred-page books that are far from portable – sometimes I use an iPad instead. It helps to have some kind of keyboard nearby to run my ngers over. I need to be completely up-to-speed with new music before I start teaching it, so tting this in when I can is vital. 2pm Back in the of ce, I grab a coffee and another few hours are lled with email and other administration, which take up more and more of my time. The choir has its own record label now, so I spend a little while working with a colleague on plans for our next recording in the ‘studio’, aka the chapel. 4pm Every day the full choir – both adults and children – meet back in the chapel to rehearse before the public attend Evensong at 5.30pm. There is a lot of pressure to always deliver. Many people forget that we are rst and foremost an educational out t – the choir members are in-training, and they are not paid professionals. 6.30pm Rehearsals are over for another day and it’s time to head home. Preparing for ‘A Festival’ happens year-round, it’s a gradual learning process and there are many long days and commitments at weekends too. But in that moment when the red recording light switches off at the end of the live radio broadcast on Christmas Eve, it is all worth it. There is a huge sense of satisfaction to know that our voices reach an estimated audience of 120 million people around the world each Christmas. Afterwards, I seem to receive a huge postbag of ‘thank you’ cards, and I personally reply to every single one. A Festival of Nine Lessons and Carols is broadcast on BBC Radio 4 and the BBC World Service on 24 December at 3pm GMT.

IAN LITTLEWOOD/ALAMY/LEON HARGRAVES/KING’S COLLEGE, CAMBRIDGE © PHOTOS: