Talk:Evening Prayer (Anglican)

Settings

Both here and at Morning Prayer I've taken out references to the preces and responses having ferial and festal settings. I've done this because it makes it sound like these are the only possible settings whereas many composers have set them. Where the same composer has set them more than once, those terms are sometimes used to distinguish between them e.g the settings by Byrd? (or is it Tallis) in the old "Cathedral Prayer Book" use this terminology, but normally just the name of the composer is used. If you must refer to ferial and festal, it would be useful to provide an explanation of the difference (or a link to an appropriate article). See the current listing for BBC Radio 3's regualr broadcast of choral evensong at [1].

Separate articles

Is there really a need to have distinct articles for the CW and BCP varieties of Evensong? No such distinction is made for Morning Prayer. Indeed, as this article refers only to the English edition of 1662, perhaps there should be separate articles for Morning Prayer in the USA 1979, the Canada 1959, the Book of Alternative Services.... Carolynparrishfan 18:00, 9 September 2006 (UTC)

Agreed. For those of us in ECUSA, the 1979 BCP is the BCP--for many of us, it's they only one we've ever known. Combining the articles would be appropriate.Rockhopper10r 18:48, 9 September 2006 (UTC)

• That's not entirely true (about the ECUSA), most of the more high church and anglo-catholic parishes use 1928, and remote few still use the 1892 prayer book. While I think combining the articles might be a good idea, some research might need to be done before justifying such a move —ExplorerCDT 00:40, 18 January 2007 (UTC)

Vague statement

"With the virtual disappearance of the service of Morning Prayer, Evensong takes on a special character it formerly lacked." I understand this (I think), but someone who is not familiar with the intricacies of Anglican liturgy may well not. What exactly is this "special character"? I think it bears defining. Carolynparrishfan 17:56, 27 September 2006 (UTC)

Choral Evensong

Why do the readings (OT & NT) in the Choral Evensong on Radio 3 never follow the BCP readings?? On what basis are the readings chosen? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 62.64.234.128 (talk • contribs)

• According to the BCP, there are two different years' worth of text selections, one year of readings for odd-numbered years 2005, 2007, etc. and another set for even-numbered (2006, 2008). Sometimes churches (and likely because of Radio 3 presenting evensong at several different churches you get a mishmash of schedules) will opt to do the schedules for the odd-numbered years on even-numbered years and the even-numbered years on odd-numbered years. —ExplorerCDT 00:38, 18 January 2007 (UTC)

I think it's actually because most cathedrals in particular now use the cycles given in the Revised Common Lectionary/Common Worship for all services, rather than BCP (1662). It also seems that an increasing number of broadcasts are tied into patronal festivals or other significant feasts (which gives an excuse for more elaborate music if nothing else) and so the readings will reflect that. David Underdown 09:11, 18 January 2007 (UTC)

look at the CW Lectionary and the Radio 3 Choral Evensong - they don't match either. If there are 2 years for the readings - is there a link to it? The calendar in my copy of the BCP only has a listing for one year. How would Wednesday evensong be tied to a nearby feast/festival?88888 16:47, 18 January 2007 (UTC)

Pass on that specific example. I think ExplorerCDT may have been thinking of the American BCP with his reference to a 2 year cycle. What I was thinking of with the feast is that on the eve of a festival, it certainly appears that often readings appropriate for the festival are used, rather than the readings of the day, particularly where that festival is of particular importance for the cathedral concerned (St Alban's is one particular example from last year's broadcast off the top of my head). Some cathedrals just like to do there own thing. Roger Arguile may be able to shed more light. David Underdown 17:01, 18 January 2007 (UTC)

It was the American BCP I was initially thinking of, but there are a few other CoE sources, i.e. various editions of the Breviary over the centuries (especially pre-1940) etc. And (for 88888) as to special days and feasts, this most recent Wednesday, 17 January, was the eve of the festal "Confession of Peter" (18 January), next week the "Conversion of Paul" (25 January). December 20 was the eve for the feast of St. Thomas the Apostle (21 December). Tons of feasts. But I don't think that affects evensong so much, with the exception of an additional collect. Oddly, the Radio 3 service had the same psalm (89) as did evensong at my parish, Saint Thomas Church (New York City) (see: [2]) but the other readings were from Genesis chapter 9 (starting at v.18) and a passage from St. Mark, chapter 4. —ExplorerCDT 18:51, 18 January 2007 (UTC)

The psalm was right(=BCP) for the 17th of the month - sometimes they aren't - for no apparent reason. This is the BCP Table of Lessons and RevisedTable - neither seems to fit.88888 21:42, 18 January 2007 (UTC)

as I said some cathedrals just like to be different, that is certainly the case for psalms where I know I have seen in info for visiting choirs that "we use our own cycle of psalms". I can't think of a specific example right now though. this is really beyond the scope of the article anyway, might I suggest http://www.churchmusic.org.uk/phpBB2/ or http://www.bbc.co.uk/dna/mbradio3/F2620064?thread=3809196 for more detailed discussion about choral evensong on Radio 3. Or, since those tend to concentrate more on the musical aspects of the broadcast and your query is more of a liturgical nature http://forum.ship-of-fools.com/ may get you a better answer. David Underdown 09:27, 19 January 2007 (UTC)

ship of fools - useless. 88888 22:39, 23 January 2007 (UTC)

this week live from Durham - nothing matched the BCP (old or revised) or CW. What other prayer book might the cathedral be using??? 88888 16:41, 8 February 2007 (UTC)

As was mentioned before (and during) the service, it was a "special" to celebrate the 100 and somethingth anniversary of the University of Durham, so I guess psalms and readings were chosen to reflect that (hence also the presence of the BBC Phil). David Underdown 16:52, 8 February 2007 (UTC)

Thank you. So it seems they (bishops? vicars?) do whatever they want - slash and burn the BCP or CW as they like. How depressing. It is the kind of flabbiness that keeps people out of the pews. 88888 17:13, 8 February 2007 (UTC)

Image

Have to say I'm not entirely convinced by the image. It's almost certainly a rehearsal for Evensong, rather than a service (the choir aren't wearing surplices; there doesn't seem to be anyone in the congreagtion; which is possible at some places - but not York in my experience; there are no clergy in evidence - could be out of shot; it's a visting choir - the cathedral choir wears red - not necessarily a bad thing, but it's not entirely typical - particularly the size of the choir; finally I hope no-one would be taking photos durign the service anyway). Anyone else? David Underdown 08:35, 24 May 2007 (UTC)

I concur that it is certainly a rehearsal, so the caption is misleading. Additionally, though this image was taken in 1999, the majority of cathedrals forbid the photographing of choristers for whatever purpose: it is against the diocesan child protection policy. I recommend deleting this. Stefan (talk) 00:53, 18 January 2008 (UTC)

The image details suggest it was an American choir on tour, so the application of Diocesan child protection rules is perhaps moot. But I still don't tink it's representative, so since no-one else ahs spoken either way since my original comment, perhaps now is the time to remove it. David Underdown (talk) 10:49, 18 January 2008 (UTC)

dab

Does anyone else think that this should be a disambiguation page, and that "Evensong" should take us to what is currently "Evening Prayer (Anglican)"? How many people are going to be looking for a novel that doesn't even have its own page, or for some RE programme practiced in a few UU congregations? (Confession circle: in my experimental teen years, I was - briefly - a UU, and I never encountered an "Evensong" class). Carolynparrishfan (talk) 01:21, 3 March 2008 (UTC)

St. John's Cathedral

The St. John's Cathedral mentioned under the Music heading does not have a location. I did a search on List of cathedrals in the United States and Denver might be the one - see the St. John's Cathedral, Denver website evensong page at http://www.sjcathedral.org/internal/?page_id=63 Its Wikipedia page is Cathedral of St. John in the Wilderness, Denver
--User:Brenont (talk) 11:23, 29 June 2008 (UTC)

I don't think it's worth guessing, the lsit was never intended to be exhaustive in any case. I've removed it. David Underdown (talk) 09:21, 30 June 2008 (UTC)

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Unannounced Merge

I am reverting this merge on the basis that it has not been done correctly.

It is normal procedure to put {{Mergeto|Daily Office (Anglican)}} onto the article to allow other editors to express a view. Please see WP:MERGE for an outline of the procedure. Note that Talk pages need to be reconciled too. This merge into Daily Office (Anglican) has come as a complete surprise.

The merge may or may not be a good idea - the new article looks good, and I appreciate much work has gone into it, but a little discussion would be preferable. Thanks. Cnbrb (talk) 11:42, 20 June 2019 (UTC)

First, apologies for the surprise merger. Since I didn't see any evidence that these pages were being actively maintained or watched, so I thought this would be a good opportunity to be bold and make a real improvement.

Here's my reasoning. Neither the old Morning Prayer articles nor the Evening Prayer article are very good, in my opinion. There’s inevitably a lot of duplication between them because the two services are very similar, have identical origins and history. Also, they were very badly cited. (I realize my new article does not have FA or even arguably GA quality of citation, but far more of it is cited.) The evening prayer article had (and indeed, has, as reverted) a large section of churches offering choral Evensong, which is essentially a directory and not encyclopaedic. It’s hard to keep a list of that many church’s services up to date and cited (who knows how many of those churches still offer Evensong since they were added to the list?), so I cut it down to mention only those churches by name which are probably not likely to drop Evensong from their schedules at any time in the near future — i.e. those that are most renowned for it.

I decided to keep Evening Prayer under a new name, Evensong, because I expect that's what most people who are completely new to it will be looking for it under (and they'll probably be puzzled about getting a load of information about morning prayer, the English Reformation, etc if they just want to know what it is). I cut down the liturgical description and referred people to the new Daily Office article with the intention of maintaining Evensong as an article specifically about the choral tradition.

Hope this explains things! Daphne Preston-Kendal (talk) 12:25, 20 June 2019 (UTC)

Thanks Daphne, fair enough reasoning. I'm not actually opposed to the merger, but would like just to cross-check on content. I've been concerned that this Evening Prayer page has become too much of an indiscriminate directory of churches all over the world that offer sung evensong - this content really belongs on choralevensong.org, not Wikipedia (as per WP:NOTDIRECTORY).

On Daily Office (Anglican), to my mind a bit too much of the music content has apparently been lost - or is this on Evensong?

Do any other editors have thoughts on this? Cnbrb (talk) 13:29, 20 June 2019 (UTC)

Since it's now been over a month, I've re-instated the re-direct. I don't know how to merge the talk pages though. Daphne Preston-Kendal (talk) 08:01, 22 July 2019 (UTC)

OK fair enough. There are tags you can use to put on the talk pages: Wikipedia:Merging#How_to_merge Cnbrb (talk) 08:20, 22 July 2019 (UTC)