For centuries choirs of men & boys have sung in the services of the church. It was only men & boys singing for the same reasons that only men were ordained to the priesthood, misogyny. In modern times, many cathedrals and churches have choirs of mixed voices, both male and female. Now, in a first for the Southern hemisphere, St Paul’s Cathedral in the Diocese of Melbourne in Victoria Australia, in southeast Australia, has added an all-girls choir to the choirs serving that diocesan seat.
After an 18 month selection process 18 young women from the Lowther Hall Anglican Grammar School were chosen. The dean of the Cathedral, the Very Revd Dr Andreas Loewe, says that they plan to have the girls team up with a small select group of women choristers and to sing in specific services, apart from the men & boys. As well, the girls & women will join with the men & boys for festival occasions.
Lowther Hall principal, Elisabeth Rhodes, is pleased that the girls from Lowther Hall were selected because it will now allow the school to expand its offerings in music with the addition of the cathedral choir group.
The image and the original story are from the Episcopal News Service.
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That´s a breakthrough…especially when we are supposed to keep our mouths shut in church
I went to ENS, and they state that this is the first all-girl CATHEDRAL choir in the Southern hemisphere. I suppose that is more likely to be true.
Yes, to my mind it was apparent that we were talking about church choirs first and this being the first cathedral choir.
I share Paul’s question. The Southern hemisphere includes almost all of South American, half of Africa, Australia and New Zealand, and even Indonesia (choirs don’t have to be Christian). What did you base your conclusion that this all-girls choir, which seems to be the first in Australia, is also the first (and only?) in all places south of the Equator?
It’s amazing that they never had all-girl choirs in the entire Southern Hemisphere until now.
Are you being snarky, or do you have a better suggestion of how to state it?
Neither. I am amazed by the fact that there were no all-girl choirs in the entire Southern Hemisphere until now.