Stephen Cleobury, who has directed the choir since 1982, will select one of the 16 choir boys to start A Festival of Nine Lessons and Carols with a solo of Once in Royal David’s City. He makes the last minute decision to avoid any jealousy among the boys, aged between 9 and 13, and to prevent any unnecessary nerves.
Even at the rehearsal the first verse of the hymn is not sung by a particular boy and instead a pre-recording is played. Many visitors queue overnight for one of the prized seats inside King’s College Chapel, where the service has taken place for 103 years. The choir boys will line up in the chapel in front of the choral scholars, made up of altos, tenors and basses, who are all undergraduates, shortly before 3pm this afternoon. Afterwards the boys and their families will enjoy a tea and the next morning they are back in the chapel for the Christmas Day service.
The service was first held at King’s College in Cambridge in 1918. The idea originated in Truro, Cornwall, where a service consisting of nine carols alternating with nine lessons had been held since 1880 with the intention of keeping the men out of the pubs on Christmas Eve. It was later introduced to King’s by the college’s new Dean, Eric Milner-White, who wanted to make worship more imaginative. Every year Mr Cleobury commissions a new carol and this year's is called The Flight, with music by Richard Causton and words by George Szirtes.
Mr Cleobury said: “When I came to King's in the autumn of 1982 I had the idea that a great tradition needed nourishing with new material, rather like a great oak tree sprouts new green leaves each year. We've had an enormous variety of music over the years. I'm really pleased with this year's carol.”
This year’s service also includes two carols written by British composer John Rutter, who is celebrating his 70th birthday this year. Since 1928 the service has also been broadcast live on the radio by the BBC every year, except 1930. It was even held during the war years when the chapel was freezing because its glass and heating had been removed. Today the carols can be heard from New Zealand to Nigeria and from Barbados to Bangladesh. The service is broadcast live on BBC Radio 4 and repeated on BBC Radio 3 on Christmas Day.
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