Donations hit £7,000 as competition to name most popular hymn hots up

Image: St Michael & All Angels junior choir, The Choristers

Donations to St Michaels’ Heritage Fund reach £7,000

The competition to nominate the most popular hymn in next weekend’s Hymnathon at St Michael & All Angels Church in Chiswick is hotting up. Donations to St Michael’s Heritage Fund have now reached £7,000.

The idea is that you pay to vote for your favourite hymn, and then you go along to the chuch on Saturday 1 March to sing your way through 150 hymns to commemorate 150 years of Bedford Park.

As the bidding speeds up, there are several hymns jostling for the top slot. The top place has changed three times in two days says organiser Torin Douglas. On Monday night, (24 February) Thine Be The Glory took the lead.

To influence the selection, go to the JustGiving page and make your bid: justgiving.com

Image: Hymnathon Top 20 at time of writing

John Betjeman and local celebrities remembered in hymn choices

St Michael & All Angels has now revealed  the Top 100 hymns to be sung on Saturday, as chosen by the public’s donations to its Heritage Fund. See the full list here:  smaaa.org.uk/hymnathon150

The positions of most of the Top 100 are now fixed (so that the programme can be printed) but people will be able to change the order of the Top 20 with their donations right up to Saturday afternoon.

There is a dedicated ‘John Betjeman hour’, from noon until 10m, which will be followed by a ‘Bedford Park hour’, from 1 until 2pm, celebrating people and places in Bedford Park, including Gillian Lynne, ArtsEd and Richard Briers amongst others.

READ ALSO: Hymns & Heritage – John Betjeman’s Bedford Park legacy

Photographs above: Richard Briers; More Than Just a Good Life cover; The Good Life BBC photo

Richard Briers was one of Britain’s most recognised faces as Tom in the 1975 BBC series The Good Life, with Felicity Kendal, Penelope Keith and Paul Eddington.

READ ALSO: Richard Briers CBE actor

Dame Gillian Lynne was the award-winning choreographer of Cats, who was a pupil and patron of the performing arts school. The former Bedford Park resident, who died in 2018, chose four hymns to be sung by ArtsEd pupils and filmed in St Michael’s for a 1988 BBC TV programme, Home on Sunday.

As a dancer, Dame Gillian performed at Sadler’s Wells Ballet, the Royal Opera House, the Royal Shakespeare Company and in the West End before changing the face of musical theatre as choreographer of Cats and Phantom of the Opera. See tributes and photograph on the ArtsEd website. artsed.co.uk

Father Kevin Morris, the vicar of St Michael & All Angels Church, said:

“We’re delighted with the support we’re receiving for our Hymnathon, both in the generous donations to our Heritage Fund and the many local people and choirs who have signed up to sing.  It will be a joyful occasion and we look forward to remembering Gillian Lynne, John Betjeman, Richard Briers and others from Bedford Park who have made a real difference to people lives.”

People who love singing are invited to join in for as long as they like. Refreshments will be on sale throughout the day, including a choice of hot dishes at lunchtime and an Afternoon Tea box.

See latest updates on the Hymnathon 150 page: smaaa.org.uk/hymnathon150

‘Hymnathon 150’ will start at 11am on March 1st 2025, and will last until well into the evening, involving several local choirs, including West London Chorus, Hogarth Singers and singers from several Chiswick churches – St Michael & All Angels, St Paul’s Grove Park. It will begin with an hour of the best-known Christmas and Easter hymns and end with a countdown of the top 100 hymns.

After the Betjeman hour and the Bedford Park hour, at 2pm, the singers will begin a five-hour Countdown of the Top 100 hymns, chosen by the public through donations for their favourite hymns. The church is listed Grade II* and donations will go to its Heritage Conservation Fund.

St Michael & All Angels held its first Hymnathon in 1987, singing all 542 hymns in the New English Hymnal which had just been published. That lasted over 30 hours and attracted national publicity, including a front-page picture in the Independent, showing ArtsEd pupils singing. The church did the same in 2012 and 2017 to raise money for its new pipe organ.

Read more stories on The Chiswick Calendar