This 'establishment'-trained organist, musicologist and composer's background included Salisbury Cathedral Choir School, and graduation from the R.C.M. and Cambridge before a long and distinguished career at Oxford University . B., has progressed from teaching music at Eton to posts at Canterbury, Guildford and York where, after Francis Jackson, he became Organist and Master of the Music in 1983. The rondo theme appears at the words Ave Maria, gratia plena, and is heard three times in different keys. Each appearance of this theme gives prominence to a different voice. The music of the sections that surround the rondo theme is taken from the opening, and is presented in a variety of ways, to suit the feeling of the words.
Much use is made of imitation, both between choirs and between individual voices.
Ut digni efficiamur, before subsiding rapidly to a quiet ending.