Later on, in 1932, at the age of eight, having attended junior school and learned some hymn tunes, my parents applied to All Saints Choir School, in the hope that I would be accepted as a pupil and chorister at the church in Pembroke Road. After an interview with Mr. Poad the headmaster and a voice test by Mr. Kirby who was the full time organist and choir master, it was agreed that I could start as a probationer.

The life was quite demanding and the discipline as strict. We sang at evensong every weekday at 5.30 pm after school, which finished at 4.30 pm. There was choir practice each school morning at 9.15 am to 10.15 am, followed by normal lessons. The school was located at number 9 All Saints Road (see photograph below) and had about eighty pupils, all boys, of whom twenty were choristers. The ordinary fees were five guineas a term, but the fees for choristers were paid by the church.

During my years at All Saints there were four full time Priests. They were Canon Gilson, Father Nash, Father Gurney, and Father Haddow who was quite young and left to become a missionary abroad.

The music in the church was varied. Psalms were sung as plainsong chant, as were the Magnificat and Nunc dimittis. Responses were also chanted with various readings. Masses were sung with full parts, including those by Stanford, Schubert, Palestrina and Byrd. Sunday evensong usually ended with an anthem or an organ recital.

At weekend services we were joined by a part-time men's choir of twelve voices comprising altos, tenors, and basses, with whom we sang at 11.00 am and 6.30 pm each Sunday. We also sang at special services such as weddings or funerals and with the Bristol Madrigal Society in conjunction with boys from Bristol Cathedral under Dr. Hubert Hunt. Sometimes the choir was employed for special services away from All Saints, quite often at St. Monica's Home at Westbury on Trym, and I remember we once sang at a wedding in the chapel at Tyntsfield near Bristol, which was the home of the very wealthy Gibbs family.

All these duties had to be fitted in around the ordinary school term, which prepared us for the School Certificate; this was taken at 16. A great change occurred in September 1939 when the war started, and I left school in July 1940. At that time most of the BBC was evacuated from London to Bristol, and All Saints Church Hall, now converted to living apartments, was often used by them as a studio for broadcasts etc. A year or so later the hall was used for church services after All Saints was destroyed by fire bombs during an air raid in November 1940.

At present, a lifetime later, in my eighties and living in Wiltshire, I am seldom able to visit All Saints, now splendidly r ebuilt. However, when I do so, I can stand on the same ground and relive many of the bright memories of those boyhood years. I feel that I now more fully understand the words - "I was glad when they said unto me we will go into the House of the Lord".

Roger Gilmour, Great Somerford, Wiltshire, September, 2006.

THE CHOIR SCHOOL - FOUNDED 1869

Many boys in the families of those attached to the church gladly gave their services to assist with the singing, but the requirements of daily choral Mattins and Evensong naturally clashed with educational and other arrangements. These boys long continued to be most useful on Sundays but the Precentor and Organist were determined to form the nucleus of a choir on a surer basis.

A house was taken in Alma Road, and there they went to reside themselves. They took in boys with good voices, and trained them, procuring besides the help of an efficient school-master. The Sacristan and his wife assisted in the attendance and the cooking until the school became further developed by the advent of Mr. Walter Smith from Oxford, bringing with him an additional number of scholars.

During the time of Mr. Cedric Bucknall the school was housed in what is now the Parish Hall, and consisted of about thirty boys, all choristers except two. In 1884 a house in All Saints' Road was bought and here the school flourished for many years.

The number of pupils rose to approximately 160, all being day-boys. Those in the choir numbered about 15 and by a rota system they sang at Evensong on most weekdays, as well as for the two services on Sundays.

Regrettably, the school did not see its centenary. After increased financial hardship it was forced to close at the end of 1962. For about two years the number of boy choristers was maintained with outside help. This was not to last, however, and the Choir now consists of twelve Lay Clerks.

Extracted from The Clifton Sound, a booklet published by All Saints in the 1960s.