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Choral Evensong 11/16/25
Sunday November 16, 2025 at 5:00pm
Commemorating the 400th Anniversary of Orlando Gibbons (1583-1625)
Officiant – The Rev. Eric Hungerford
Sung by the Adult Choir of St. Paul’s Church
Music Director – Dr. Andrew Kotylo
Organ Scholar – Andy Brown
A reception in the Parish Hall follows the service, all welcome.
Watch the livestream.
Organ:
Responses – William Smith
Psalm 46 (chant: after Martin Luther)
Short Service – Orlando Gibbons
There is an Old Belief – C. Hubert H. Parry
Organ:
Orlando Gibbons (1583-1625)
Orlando Gibbons was the most illustrious of a large family of musicians that included his father, William Gibbons and two of his brothers, Edward and Ellis. In 1603 he became a member of the Chapel Royal and later the chapel’s organist, a post that he retained for the remainder of his life. In 1619 he was appointed one of the “musicians for the virginalles to attend in his highnes privie chamber,” and in 1622 he was made honorary doctor of music of the University of Oxford. The following year he became organist at Westminster Abbey, where he later officiated at the funeral service of King James I.
Gibbons is best known for his anthems, madrigals, and motets. He was a master of the polyphonic idiom of his day, and among his many masterpieces are the well-known The Silver Swan and What Is Our Life? His Fantasies in Three Parts Compos’d for Viols (c. 1610) is believed to have been the first music printed in England from engraved copperplates. Gibbons was famous as a keyboard player, and toward the end of his life he was said to be without rival in England as an organist and virginalist.
Orlando Gibbons’ Short Service was first published in 1641, after the composer’s death in 1625. It is a set of musical pieces for Anglican morning and evening services, including this Magnificat and Nunc dimittis.
