St Joseph's Society
My arrival at the College in September 1958, aged 18, coincided with the appointment of Mgr Sidney Breen as Rector. I had left the 6th Form at St Edward’s College, Liverpool and then spent 6 months as an unqualified teacher in a primary school in Kirkby. Coming from a ‘normal’ existence to the enclosed and tightly regulated community was something of a culture shock.
The shock was a combination of many changes including being fully away from home for the first time, the rigid timetable, the Great Silence, being clad in clerical gear, the rule not to acknowledge the female domestic staff in any way, which went against the good manners ingrained in me, as well as the rather plain food which was served up and in rather inadequate portions. This was partly because of the way in which ‘class order’ was organised. I joined a group of about 10 students who had come through the School for up to seven years and who had been finally graded on their Latin marks. My peers (10 in number) who had arrived at the same time as me were then marshalled in order of their diocese, Liverpool students coming first, and then in alphabetical order. This class order seemed very arbitrary and unwelcoming. We sat in this order in the refectory and it was used for all administrative purposes. The food arrived at the top of the table and often by the time the serving dishes reached me, there was very little left and even less for those further down, the ones at the top of the table having been rather greedy. After some days of this, I was bold enough to complain to the Prefect of Discipline, Fr Tom Worden, perhaps marking my card right from the start !
My musical abilities as a pianist and organist introduced me to Fr John Gaine, who taught Philosophy and was the priest organist, and led to my being allowed to practise on the chapel organ and to having organ lessons from a delightful tutor who visited the college from Emmanuel Church in Southport, one Robert Edmondson Moreton. This led to my becoming the student organist, playing for High Mass, Vespers, Compline and accompanying the choir, which was then directed by Fr Kevin Snape, including a BBC broadcast of Vespers. Another musician was Fr John d’Echevarria with whom I played piano duets and who also conducted the orchestra. I think my music making sustained me and led to my remaining at the college until 1963, before I realised this life was not for me. The monastic style of the seminary seemed a strange way in which to train clergy who were eventually to minister in parishes.
About four years after leaving the college I was invited to return to Upholland by John Gaine to teach organ to a number of students. Subsequently, Headmaster Fr Tom Cheetham asked if I would also teach music in the School through to ‘O’ level. This I did for several years, becoming good friends with Tom. I made some other good friends whilst at Upholland including a number with whom I am still in touch, including John Gaine.
A few years ago I visited the College to find it in the most dreadful state of decay, with damage to the fine stonework, fungal growths on the ceilings and weeds growing on some of the floors, with water ingress in many places. Thieves had broken in and stolen fittings. It was an upsetting state of affairs to see those wonderful and impressive Grade II listed buildings reduced to such a state of neglect and to see the fine chapel lying unused and the organ still in situ.
Soon after leaving Upholland in 1963 when Cathedral services were held in the Lutyens Crypt and the post of organist was vacant, I was invited to play there and had the great privilege of playing the wonderful Walker organ in the new cathedral at its opening in 1967 and being appointed its Organist, a post I held until 1993, later returning in 2004 as Director of Music for three more years.
Whilst an Upholland student, I had played for ordinations in the college chapel and I later found myself playing in the cathedral for the ordinations of some of my former fellow students, including among others in 1967, (Canon) Christopher Cunningham.