Recently we had the pleasure of being present as a group of young singers from the Pimlico Musical Foundation visited to Magdalene College, Oxford. This included a masterclass with Magdalene’s director of music Mark Williams and then the group joining the Magdalene College choir to sing evensong. This visit was partly funded by a large grant from the Brereton Memorial Fund.

During the masterclass the young singers learned all about the organ, how it works and how it sounds. The ability of the organ to imitate the sounds of many different instruments certainly surprised some, and all were impressed when the organ scholar pulled out all the stops!

Later the children sang a full evensong in collaboration with the Magdalene College Choir. It was wonderful to see how engaged the singers were with such an important choral tradition. The young singers, the choir, and Magdalene chapel’s state-of-the-art organ (which was rebuilt in 2023) combined beautifully. It was a privilege to see so many young people brought together to engage with choral music in part due to funding from our fund.

We would like to thank the Pimlico Musical Foundation for their continued work in engaging young people with music, and for inviting us to see the workshop. If you would like to find out more about their work, click here.

The Brereton Memorial Fund supports organ playing and choral singing at all level sand ages. Please consider leaving a donation to support more projects like this: click here for more information.