Private School News

LANCING COLLEGE MARKS THE CENTENARY OF THE BIRTH OF SIR PETER PEARS

A major celebration of one of our finest tenors on Tuesday 22 June with
Nick Prettejohn, Chairman of the Britten-Pears Foundation as guest speaker

“Lancing was a very heaven: the beauty of its site, the country around, the Downs in all their glory and this marvellous chapel and an atmosphere which was filled with art – the arts – and love”. – Peter Pears

Sir Peter Pears was educated at Lancing and sang in the choir here. He remained devoted to the school throughout his life, and a great supporter of its musical tradition. Pears and Benjamin Britten were regular visitors to the College, which a number of OLs (former pupils) remember vividly. Through Pears’s influence, Britten was commissioned to compose the Saint Nicolas Cantata for the centenary of the College.

At the celebration on Tuesday 22 June, guests included former pupils, some of whom are now professional musicians, and former winners of the College’s Sir Peter Pears Music Prize, such as His Honour Judge Peter Birts, who won the first award in 1964.

A service in the famous Chapel at 12 noon featured Lancing’s celebrated choir, and performances of sacred and secular music, sung by the school’s Music Scholars. Lancing’s Director of Chapel Music, Neil Cox, conducted Britten’s Te Deum and Jubilate in C, and God moves in a mysterious way from Saint Nicolas.

At the beginning of the service a single white rose was placed on Pears’ choir seat which bears the inscription “Hic olim sederat Peter Pears princeps cantatorum” (Here, once upon a time sat Peter Pears, a prince among singers). College Registrar, Jeremy Tomlinson who remembers meeting Pears during one of his last visits to the Chapel, spoke of the great influence that Lancing had had on the singer’s life. He quoted Peter Pears’ own words: “Lancing was a very heaven: the beauty of its site, the country around, the Downs in all their glory and this marvellous chapel and an atmosphere which was filled with art – the arts – and love”.

In his speech after lunch, Nick Prettejohn, Chairman of the Britten-Pears Foundation, addressed guests, staff and pupils. He was delighted to have been invited to Lancing and was enormously impressed with the quality of singing by the choir of Lancing College Chapel and its former pupils. He spoke of the wonderful legacy of Britten and Pears and how the Foundation is proud to be the custodian of such a national treasure. The Foundation is used for research purposes by people all over the world and continues to fund talented musicians of the future.

Lancing College Music Scholars sang a very moving selection of Britten’s folk songs to round off the occasion accompanied on the piano by Adrian West, a piano teacher at Lancing, an old boy of the school and a former winner of the Pears Music Prize.