The choir's primary role is to sing daily services in the Cathedral, but the choir also undertakes a busy annual schedule of concerts, broadcasts, tours, and recordings.

The Foundation

The Choir

Music in worship lifts us above the ordinary and takes us to the extraordinary, giving us a vision of heaven. It is central to services in this Cathedral church.

The Cathedral Choir sings every day except Monday in term-time. In one week, they may well sing thirty separate pieces of music, composed as long ago as 1500 and as recently as 2023. 

Choristers at Christ Church
Choristers

Centuries of choral tradition

King Henry VIII established the Collegiate Foundation in 1546, including one Organist and eight Lay Clerks, plus provision for a schoolmaster to educate the choristers. In the last five hundred years, the choir has always been a central part of Christ Church; and many significant church musicians have been associated with it, from the first director of music John Taverner, to twentieth-century choristers and composers William Walton, Simon Preston and Howard Goodall.

Now the choral foundation consists of approximately sixteen Choristers (boys), educated at the Cathedral School; plus six Lay Clerks (professional adult singers) and six Academical Clerks (undergraduate choral scholars), in addition to the Director of Music (who bears the official historic title of ‘Organist’), the Sub-Organist, and one or two Organ Scholars. 

Find out more about joining the Cathedral Choir

Services with the choir

The normal weekly pattern of services for the Cathedral Choir is as follows:

Sunday 
11am: Sung Eucharist 
6pm: Evensong (rehearsal 5pm)

Tuesday–Friday 
6pm: Evensong (rehearsal 5pm) 
6pm: Sung Eucharist (on Thursdays)

Saturday 
6pm: Evensong (rehearsal 4.45pm)

The 6pm service on Monday does not usually involve the Cathedral Choir.

Stephen Gahl
Organist

Director of Music

The current Director of Music is Steven Grahl

Steven took up the post of Organist (Director of Music) and Tutor in Music at Christ Church, Oxford in 2018. He is also an Associate Professor of Music at Oxford University, Conductor of Schola Cantorum of Oxford, and Musical Director of Benson Choral Society. 

Watch

Evensong

Recordings of Choral Evensong at the Cathedral are often recorded and available to watch via YouTube.  

Christ Church Cathedral YouTube channel
The choirs and orchestra performing Bach in the Cathedral

Repertoire

The Cathedral Choir repertoire ranges from Renaissance polyphony to new commissions, embracing European baroque and Romantic, English Victorian, and contemporary music. In recent years, music has been commissioned from Cheryl Frances-Hoad, Piers Connor Kennedy and Ghislaine Rees-Trapp. Annual high points include Gabriel Fauré’s Requiem, performed on All Souls’ Day, and the JS Bach St John Passion, performed in Holy Week.