16/03/2019
By kind permission of Canon Myles Davies, Vice Dean and Precentor, we are pleased to be able to publish the sermon which he preached at the Memorial Service for Dr. Noel Rawsthorne recently.
‘Immaculate in console technique, in musicianship, in dress; eloquent in speech and a true polymath in every sense of the word; organist, teacher, composer, arranger, organ designer, harpsichord maker, cook, angler, gardener, French polisher, water colour artist and IT boffin.’ This is just the beginning of how Ian Tracey has paid tribute to Noel Rawsthorne, his teacher, mentor and illustrious predecessor as organist of this great Cathedral Church.
Noel’s relationship with Liverpool Cathedral began when he was just 8 years old with a visit here with his father. Three years later he became a chorister and with that, a lifetime’s association came into being. Organ lessons followed, and when I visited Noel just a few days before he died, he was keen to tell me of the day, when aged16, Henry Goss Custard, his own illustrious predecessor, took the risk of allowing Noel to play the organ for Evensong for the first time. Dean Dwelly was suitably impressed, and three years later, Noel was appointed Assistant Organist. In 1955 he succeeded his great teacher, and he was Cathedral Organist for the next 25 years.
Whilst he was always supremely at home, presiding effortlessly, as it seemed, at the upstairs console which he proudly described as his Boeing 747, his music-making was by no means confined to the Cathedral. Noel Rawsthorne was a musician of world renown. He was proud of his association with Royal Manchester College of Music, now the Royal Northern, and of having studied with Fernando Germani in Italy and Marcel Dupre in France. With EMI he recorded the first LP entitled Great Cathedral Organs which sold over 20,000 copies. This was unprecedented at the time. What began as an experiment by EMI went on to become a series of 17 LP’s, all due to initial success of Noel’s recording here at Liverpool. Many of his recordings became the standard benchmark for other organists, and are still so regarded today.
Noel’s international career took him across Europe and to the United States. He was also the first organist to tour the USSR, visiting there three times, and on one occasion being arrested by the KGB! He also had the distinction to be the first Cathedral Organist to be invited to take part in Desert Island Disks. (There has only been one other since!)
He was delighted to receive an Honorary Doctorate from Liverpool University, and following his retirement from the Cathedral in 1980, he was appointed City Organist and Artistic Director of St George’s Hall.
Ian describes Noel as an inspirational teacher. They would often joke that if Noel could not teach someone, then perhaps they could not be taught! He taught organ and keyboard skills at St. Katharine's College, now Liverpool Hope University, and so many teachers, both serving and retired, have need to be grateful for all the keyboard skills they acquired and honed.
He maintained a keen interest in organ design and for 25 years was Liverpool Diocesan Organ Advisor, overseeing the restoration and renewal of many organs in the Diocese and the re-building of both the Lady Chapel and Cathedral organs and that in Philharmonic Hall. In addition, he also built his own harpsichord and played a mean continuo.
For nearly 40 years, he regularly examined for the Royal College of Organists, writing tests and often chairing the panel, and, in that capacity taking great pleasure from spotting emerging talented organists.
At the same time Ian recalls that he would not suffer wrong notes. On one occasion in Ian’s youth, after playing a Bach prelude and fugue in the Lady Chapel, where just one or two notes had gone awry, Noel came to the loft and said, ‘I have just been down in the Lady Chapel with a brush and pan, and with all the wrong notes I have swept up off the Lady Chapel floor, I could write a new Fugue.’ Then with a wry smile he added: "and so they collected them and filled twelve baskets with the fragments thereof!" He could quote scripture to great effect.
Joe has reminded us of his life with the family at Ashbourne Avenue. There are cherished memories too of the years of marriage and companionship which Noel and Liz have shared at South Drive during which Noel’s many gifts and talents have continued to flourish, not least in his much loved garden and as he has continued to compose and publish so many memorable pieces, both choral and for the organ. These too are part of Noel’s lasting legacy. We also remember with thankfulness the loving and constant care which Liz has given to Noel, not least in recent times when age and increasing frailty have taken their toll.
My first memory of Noel goes back 54 years to a dark November evening, when I attended a Communion Service to mark the retirement of Bishop Clifford Martin, the 4th Bishop of Liverpool, who had confirmed me earlier that year. The Cathedral was packed to the doors, and I sat in in the presbytery facing west. From there I could see clearly the Choir and Ronald Woan, the Choral Conductor, and Noel Rawsthorne, the organist in his red cassock, high above. The sound of the organ as the choir entered in procession for the service to begin was like nothing I had ever heard before. It can only be described as thrilling with Noel’s consummate skill, and which has been inherited by those who preside at the console today. After all these years, it still never fails to thrill today, as it prepares us for the majestic and mysterious encounter with God at the heart of our worship. Noel’s skill and imagination offered to our ears what the building itself places before our eyes.
We spoke about this too on that final visit. ‘It has all been a gift’, Noel told me, ‘the most wonderful gift.’ What did he mean by that? He was looking back to the days when he first began, to the opportunities which were given to him as a chorister, as a young organist, to the trust placed in him by the Dean and Chapter to cherish the most wonderful tradition of music in this place, a tradition he insisted should be passed on to a new generation – the musical apostolic succession of Liverpool Cathedral. ‘It has all been a gift, the most wonderful gift.’ As he prepared for his own Nunc Dimittis, Noel was simply thankful for all that he had received, as we today are thankful to God for him, for the memories, for his human love, for the legacy of his music, all passed on for us to treasure. For Noel himself, God now makes all things new. God speaks to him to say ‘I will be your God, and you shall be my son.’ May light perpetual shine upon him. May he rest in the peace of Christ.
