Georgians in Stone

GEORGIANS IN STONE

“Georgians in Stone” has been developed by the Parochial Church Council of St John the Baptist Church, and is being organised by Caring for God’s Acre – caringforgodsacre.org.uk – with support from South West Shropshire Historical and Archaeological Society (SWSHAS) and Bishop’s Castle Heritage Resource Centre (BCHRS).

In 2020 John Kirkpatrick was asked to contribute to a celebration to mark the restoration of a number of tombstones in the churchyard of St John’s, Bishops Castle. The event was to bring together all sorts of local music groups, dancers, and craftspeople and it was suggested that Castle Carols members may want to be involved. This celebration was originally scheduled for Saturday June 6th but the onset of the COVID19 pandemic and subsequent lockdown measures meant that it was postponed. It is now planned to go ahead on Saturday, May 15th, 2021. We thought that despite the long lead time you might enjoy seeing and hearing John’s songs planned for the event and, for some of us, the more practice time the better!!

Words and scores are included in the songbook (apart from for ‘The African’s Grave’, which we’ve uploaded separately, as you will see) – tap on the cover to open it – and sound files for the various parts are also below, including recordings of all the songs made by a small group of singers, between lockdowns in 2020, in John’s garden between showers of rain (shown as ‘all voices’, below)!

Have fun!

(Please note: These songs have been specially created or arranged by John for the Georgians In Stone project. This online resource is designed to make the material easily available for anybody who would like to join in the singing at that event. For any further use outside that context, please make sure you consult with John first. The copyright in this music is owned by his publishing company, Squeezer Music, and any performance, recording, or broadcasting should not go ahead without John’s express permission. Drop him a line at squeezer@johnkirkpatrick.co.uk to discuss any plans.)

It has now been confirmed that the ‘Georgians in Stone’ Celebration, planned for 15th May will now be happening online.

We’re busily recording our singing and plan to film ourselves at one of our Zoom sessions, giving these wonderful songs what for, in order that they can be added to the programme for the day.

We’re also going to be joining our friends at The Marches Choir to sing The Hallelujah Chorus for the event – get us!.

If you fancy being involved in any part of this please let us know. The resources for John’s ‘Georgians in Stone’ music are below, and those for ‘Hallelujah’ are available on the BBC’s website at BBC – Sing Hallelujah – Resources

We’ve also added a quick guide to recording yourself for any part of this project – we hope it helps.

The Georgians in Stone project is supported by the National Lottery Heritage Fund