Colin Mawby KSG (9 May 1936 – 24 November 2019) was an English organist,

choral A choir ( ), also known as a chorale or chorus (from Latin ''chorus'', meaning 'a dance in a circle') is a musical ensemble of singers. Choral music, in turn, is the music written specifically for such an ensemble to perform or in other words ...

conductor and composer. From 1961 he was Master of Music at

Westminster Cathedral Westminster Cathedral, officially the Metropolitan Cathedral of the Most Precious Blood, is the largest Catholic Church in England and Wales, Roman Catholic church in England and Wales. The shrine is dedicated to the Blood of Jesus Ch ...

, then from 1981 he was the choral director at Radio Telefís Éireann. He composed masses dedicated to specific choirs, including in Germany. He was awarded Knighthood of the Order of St. Gregory in 2006.

Early life and education

Mawby was born in

Portsmouth Portsmouth ( ) is a port city status in the United Kingdom, city and unitary authority in Hampshire, England. Most of Portsmouth is located on Portsea Island, off the south coast of England in the Solent, making Portsmouth the only city in En ...

Hampshire Hampshire (, ; abbreviated to Hants.) is a Ceremonial counties of England, ceremonial county in South East England. It is bordered by Berkshire to the north, Surrey and West Sussex to the east, the Isle of Wight across the Solent to the south, ...

, on 9 May 1936. He received his earliest musical education at

choir school, where he acted as assistant to George Malcolm at the organ from the age of 12. The boys sang 14 or 15 services a week and had 10 hours of rehearsals a week, learning

plainchant Plainsong or plainchant (calque from the French ; ) is a body of chants used in the liturgies of the Western Church. When referring to the term plainsong, it is those sacred pieces that are composed in Latin text. Plainsong was the exclusive for ...

and

polyphony Polyphony ( ) is a type of musical texture consisting of two or more simultaneous lines of independent melody, as opposed to a musical texture with just one voice ( monophony) or a texture with one dominant melodic voice accompanied by chord ...

. He subsequently studied at the

Royal College of Music The Royal College of Music (RCM) is a conservatoire established by royal charter in 1882, located in South Kensington, London, UK. It offers training from the undergraduate to the doctoral level in all aspects of Western Music including pe ...

with

Gordon Jacob Gordon Percival Septimus Jacob CBE (5 July 18958 June 1984) was an English composer and teacher. He was a professor at the Royal College of Music in London from 1924 until his retirement in 1966, and published four books and many articles about ...

and John Churchill. During this time he worked with

Adrian Boult Sir Adrian Cedric Boult, CH (; 8 April 1889 – 22 February 1983) was a British conductor. Brought up in a prosperous mercantile family, he followed musical studies in England and at Leipzig, Germany, with early conducting work in London ...

and

Malcolm Sargent Sir Harold Malcolm Watts Sargent (29 April 1895 – 3 October 1967) was an English conductor, organist and composer widely regarded as Britain's leading conductor of choral works. The musical ensembles with which he was associated include ...

Career

He became Assistant and then in 1961 Master of Music at Westminster Cathedral. Whilst there he conducted the first performance of the early music vocal ensemble Pro Cantione Antiqua. He also collaborated with the

London Mozart Players London Mozart Players (LMP) are a British chamber orchestra founded in 1949. LMP are the longest-established chamber orchestra in the United Kingdom. Since 1989, the orchestra has been Resident Orchestra at Fairfield Halls, Croydon. History Begin ...

, the Wren Orchestra, the Belgian Radio Choir and the

BBC Singers The BBC Singers is a professional British chamber choir, employed by the BBC. Its origins can be traced to 1924. One of the six BBC Performing Groups, the BBC Singers are based at the BBC Maida Vale Studios in London. The only full-time profes ...

. He performed for the

Queen of the United Kingdom The monarchy of the United Kingdom, commonly referred to as the British monarchy, is the form of government used by the United Kingdom by which a hereditary monarch reigns as the head of state, with their powers regulated by the British cons ...

St Paul's Cathedral St Paul's Cathedral, formally the Cathedral Church of St Paul the Apostle, is an Anglican cathedral in London, England, the seat of the Bishop of London. The cathedral serves as the mother church of the Diocese of London in the Church of Engl ...

, for President

John F. Kennedy John Fitzgerald Kennedy (May 29, 1917 – November 22, 1963), also known as JFK, was the 35th president of the United States, serving from 1961 until his assassination in 1963. He was the first Roman Catholic and youngest person elected p ...

, and at

St. Peter's Basilica The Papal Basilica of Saint Peter in the Vatican (), or simply St. Peter's Basilica (; ), is a church of the Italian High Renaissance located in Vatican City, an independent microstate enclaved within the city of Rome, Italy. It was initiall ...

for

Pope Paul VI Pope Paul VI (born Giovanni Battista Enrico Antonio Maria Montini; 26 September 18976 August 1978) was head of the Catholic Church and sovereign of the Vatican City State from 21 June 1963 until his death on 6 August 1978. Succeeding John XXII ...

and

Pope John Paul II Pope John Paul II (born Karol Józef Wojtyła; 18 May 19202 April 2005) was head of the Catholic Church and sovereign of the Vatican City State from 16 October 1978 until Death and funeral of Pope John Paul II, his death in 2005. In his you ...

. In 1976 he moved to

Dublin Dublin is the capital and largest city of Republic of Ireland, Ireland. Situated on Dublin Bay at the mouth of the River Liffey, it is in the Provinces of Ireland, province of Leinster, and is bordered on the south by the Dublin Mountains, pa ...

where he became choral director at Radio Telefís Éireann in 1981. He founded the RTÉ Philharmonic Choir and the RTÉ children's choir (RTÉ Cór na nÓg) in 1985. He also founded the RTÉ Chamber Choir. Mawby retired to

East Anglia East Anglia is an area of the East of England, often defined as including the counties of Norfolk, Suffolk and Cambridgeshire, with parts of Essex sometimes also included. The name derives from the Anglo-Saxon kingdom of the East Angles, ...

in 2001 but returned to County Dublin in Ireland briefly, moved to London, then Dublin again before returning to London. In 2006, Mawby was awarded by Pope

Benedict XVI Pope BenedictXVI (born Joseph Alois Ratzinger; 16 April 1927 – 31 December 2022) was head of the Catholic Church and sovereign of the Vatican City State from 19 April 2005 until resignation of Pope Benedict XVI, his resignation on 28 Februar ...

the Knighthood of the Order of St. Gregory, "in gratitude for past and continuing services to church music".

Works

Mawby's music for the English

Catholic The Catholic Church (), also known as the Roman Catholic Church, is the List of Christian denominations by number of members, largest Christian church, with 1.27 to 1.41 billion baptized Catholics Catholic Church by country, worldwid ...

liturgy Liturgy is the customary public ritual of worship performed by a religious group. As a religious phenomenon, liturgy represents a communal response to and participation in the sacred through activities reflecting praise, thanksgiving, remembra ...

is prolific. He composed several

mass Mass is an Intrinsic and extrinsic properties, intrinsic property of a physical body, body. It was traditionally believed to be related to the physical quantity, quantity of matter in a body, until the discovery of the atom and particle physi ...

es,

motet In Western classical music, a motet is mainly a vocal musical composition, of highly diverse form and style, from high medieval music to the present. The motet was one of the preeminent polyphonic forms of Renaissance music. According to the Eng ...

antiphon An antiphon ( Greek ἀντίφωνον, ἀντί "opposite" and φωνή "voice") is a short chant in Christian ritual, sung as a refrain. The texts of antiphons are usually taken from the Psalms or Scripture, but may also be freely compo ...

s and hymn settings. His ''

Ave verum corpus is a short Eucharistic chant that has been set to music by many composers. It dates to the 13th century, first recorded in a central Italian Franciscan manuscript (Chicago, Newberry Library, 24). A Reichenau manuscript of the 14th century attri ...

'' for choir and a setting of

Psalm 23 Psalm 23 is the 23rd psalm of the Book of Psalms, beginning in English in the King James Version: "The Lord is my shepherd". In Latin, it is known by the incipit, "". The Book of Psalms is part of the third section of the Hebrew Bible, and ...

won fame in the recording by

Charlotte Church Charlotte Maria Church (born Charlotte Maria Reed, 21 February 1986) is a British singer-songwriter, actress, and television presenter from Cardiff, Wales. As a child, Church was a popular classical singer with a less-successful attempt to mov ...

. His ''Requiem of Hope'' for soprano, mixed choir and organ, composed from 1995 to 2002, is based on texts by

Henry Vaughan Henry Vaughan (17 April 1621 – 23 April 1695) was a Welsh metaphysical poet, author and translator writing in English, and a medical physician. His religious poetry appeared in ''Silex Scintillans'' in 1650, with a second part in 1655.''Oxfo ...

John Henry Newman John Henry Newman (21 February 1801 – 11 August 1890) was an English Catholic theologian, academic, philosopher, historian, writer, and poet. He was previously an Anglican priest and after his conversion became a cardinal. He was an ...

and anonymous texts. In 2002, his ''Prayer of Forgiveness'' was awarded "Top Honors" in the competition "Waging Peace Through Singing" in the US state of Oregon. A

Te Deum The ( or , ; from its incipit, ) is a Latin Christian hymn traditionally ascribed to a date before AD 500, but perhaps with antecedents that place it much earlier. It is central to the Ambrosian hymnal, which spread throughout the Latin ...

for soprano solo, chorus, organ and brass ensemble was premiered in

Cambridge Cambridge ( ) is a List of cities in the United Kingdom, city and non-metropolitan district in the county of Cambridgeshire, England. It is the county town of Cambridgeshire and is located on the River Cam, north of London. As of the 2021 Unit ...

in 2006 to mark his 70th birthday. His setting of '' Laudate Pueri Dominum'' was premiered in 2011 at Westminster Cathedral Hall. BD 20121003-Bonifatiusmesse-A0296

His secular works include two operas for young people, ''The Torc of Gold'' (1996) and ''The Quest'' (2000, premiered in 2001), both on a

libretto A libretto (From the Italian word , ) is the text used in, or intended for, an extended musical work such as an opera, operetta, masque, oratorio, cantata or Musical theatre, musical. The term ''libretto'' is also sometimes used to refer to th ...

by playwright

Maeve Ingoldsby Maeve Ingoldsby McDonagh (1947 – 29 September 2021) also known as Maeve Nic Giolla Iosa, was an Irish writer of the Raidió Teilifís Éireann (RTÉ) radio comedy show '' Only Slaggin and writer on RTÉ television soap operas '' Glenroe'' ...

, commissioned by the National Chamber Choir and premiered in Dublin under his direction. On a commission by

St. Bonifatius, Wiesbaden St. Bonifatius in Wiesbaden, Germany, is the central Catholic parish and church in the capital of Hesse. The present building was designed by architect Philipp Hoffmann in Gothic Revival style and built from 1844 to 1849. Its twin steeples of 68&n ...

, he composed in 2011 the

Missa solemnis is Latin for Solemn Mass.Mass
, ''Catholic Encyclopedia''. N.p., Appleton, 1910. 797. and is a genre of < ...

''Bonifatius-Messe'' for soprano, choir, children's choir, oboe and organ, premiered in his presence on 3 October 2012 to celebrate the 150th anniversary of the Chor von St. Bonifatius, with the choir and children's choir conducted by

Gabriel Dessauer Gabriel Dessauer (born 4 December 1955) is a German Cantor (church), cantor, concert organist, and academic teacher. After studies with Diethard Hellmann and Franz Lehrndorfer, he was responsible for the church music at St. Bonifatius, Wiesbaden ...

. Mawby commented on his writing for choirs in 2006: "I cannot write choral music unless I work with choirs. Now that's a subjective judgement: I know that lots of people can do these things; I can’t. I have to write for particular people." His works are published internationally, in Germany by Dr. J. Butz, and in Italy by Eurarte and Casa Musicale Carrara. Mawby died on 24 November 2019.

References

External links

*
Choir Training with Colin Mawby
Collated Writings

Butz Verlag

Zimbel Press

(in German) Biederitzer Kantorei 2007 {{DEFAULTSORT:Mawby, Colin 1936 births 2019 deaths Musicians from Portsmouth Alumni of the Royal College of Music English cathedral organists English composers English male conductors (music) English classical organists Knights of St. Gregory the Great Composers awarded knighthoods Conductors (music) awarded knighthoods Musicians awarded knighthoods RTÉ Performing Groups 21st-century English conductors (music) 21st-century English organists English male classical organists