Scrapping of Cambridge college mixed choir ‘regressive’ for women

The St John’s Voices at Cambridge, one of the UK’s finest mixed choirs, is being disbanded to make room for a “broader” range of music – a move that is being condemned as “fundamentally regressive”.

While the main choir has existed at St John’s for 400 years, it has been supplemented by St John’s Voices since 2013. The college also has an all-women a cappella group but it is a “secular vocal ensemble” and not part of the choral tradition.

The move was criticised in a letter signed by the former Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams, British conductor Sir Simon Rattle, English mezzo-soprano Dame Sarah Connolly, and Welsh singer Aled Jones.

The college decided after a review in 2023 that it would stop funding St John’s Voices and that the step had been taken “to adopt a broader approach to the provision of co-curricular opportunities in music for our students, including in different genres”.

Choir director Graham Walker will lose his job and 14 women singers will be left without this outlet when the group is disbanded at the end of the Easter term in June.

An open letter, addressed to the college council states: “Terminating SJV will leave over 30 members without a choir, its director redundant, and a hole in the musical life of the college and the wider university”.

“We are devastated by this decision, which we believe is a fundamentally regressive move for the college, the choral community in Cambridge, and the wider arts provision for women in the UK,” added the letter.

Male-only choirs stem from a centuries-old belief that women should not be allowed to sing in church, and the issue continues to be contentious, especially for institutions that have signed up to equal opportunities charters. The main St John’s college choir started admitting women in 2021.

There have been reports suggesting that this battle is between traditional and more progressive principles of diversity and inclusion.

In a statement, St John’s College said that “preferences and experiences in music today are different from those of previous generations” and that the new “direction reflects our students’ feedback on their needs and aspirations”.

However, the choir responded saying that the decision was unreasonable. “A British choral tradition with equal opportunities is something that St John’s Voices should be championing, not looking to diminish,” they said.

“It is upsetting that a remarkable step forward in the choral world (the admission of female singers into SJCC) has been weaponised against the very existence of another ensemble, supposedly in the name of broadening opportunities.”

The letter, which was posted on Wednesday and asks for the decision to suspend funding be reversed, has also been signed by broadcaster Alexander Armstrong and the host of the BBC reality show The Choir, Gareth Malone.

This article was amended on 28 March 2024. It had previously conflated the main college choir with St John’s Voices.