The Choir

July 31, 1995
As in the music that pervades the plot of Trollope's (The Rector's Wife) absorbing novel, contrapuntal technique results in a brilliant composition. Like her ancestor Anthony, Trollope focuses on an English cathedral town and its dissonant voices. Hugh Cavendish is dean of Aldminster Cathedral. The father of mutinous, unorthodox children, he is a bitterly disappointed man who craves administrative and spiritual authority. The prized boy's choir, however, is under the authority of King's School headmaster Alexander Troy and music master Leo Beckford. When the cathedral needs a quarter-million pounds worth of roof repairs, all matters of God, pedagogy, politics and music become matters of funds. Cavendish prefers to pay off the roof costs by sacrificing the expensive-to-maintain choir. Meanwhile, socialist/atheist city councilman Frank Ashworth wants the town to buy the headmaster's house out from under him to use as a community facility. Into the fray fall Sally Ashworth, married to Frank's long-absent son and in love with Leo; Sally's young son, Henry, the choir star; Alexander's untethered wife, Felicity; and Hugh's daughter Ianthe, an up-and-comer in the music business, who helps give her father what he deserves. Sacred music, the perfect treble of pre-pubescent boys and delicious deadpan understatement create a uniquely rich soundtrack on the pages of this beautifully crafted tale, which was first published in Britain in 1978. Author tour.

March 1, 1997
Trollope (b. 1943), descendant of 19th-century English novelist Anthony Trollope, is herself an award-winning writer of fiction who has published widely in historical and contemporary British fiction. In this novel, she, like fellow novelist Barbara Pym, pinpoints an institutional setting and highlights the self-absorbed characters within it. The setting is the Aldminster Cathedral and the attendant King's School, situated in the Close, a park-like place ringed with the institution's buildings. The dean, a formidable authority, proposes to eliminate the expense of the boy's choir when he finds that the Cathedral needs extensive repair. The dean could not anticipate the ever-expanding impact of his decision, which comes back to haunt him in various ways through the players: a local politician and grandfather of the lead singer, the organist who falls in love with the singer's mother, the headmaster with his amazing reappearing wife, and various motley others including the dean's own wayward children. Reader Nadia May is perfect for this book, with her sprightly British intonations. She offers a sense of wryness in keeping with the tale. This recording is very much recommended wherever low-key, nicely written contemporary novels are popular.--Don Wismer, Cary Memorial Lib., Wayne, Me.