Mass appeal: Stanford in Stamford
This article is in The Spectator’s March 2020 US edition. Subscribe here. The exterior of the basilica of St John the Evangelist in Stamford, Connecticut, looms large and gray. Built in 1875 by Irish immigrants who mined and hauled rocks from a nearby quarry, its interior bursts with greens, reds and golds. The saintly lives in its stained-glass windows are said to comprise one of the largest collections of its kind on the East Coast. I was one of 12 singers to perform here at the American premiere of the Mass in G Major by the Dublin-born composer Sir Charles Villiers Stanford (1852-1924). Stanford’s Mass was first performed at London’s Brompton Oratory in 1893, but, like The Spectator, it took its time coming to America.
