Arthur Bliss thought Bliss's music competent but unremarkable. In 1961, Bliss and Hassall collaborated on a cantata, "The Beatitudes", commissioned for the opening of the new Coventry Cathedral. Reviews were friendly, but the work has rarely been performed since, and has been eclipsed by another choral work written for Coventry at the same time, Britten's "War Requiem". Bliss followed this with two further large-scale choral works, "Mary of Magdala" (1962) and "The Golden Cantata" (1963). Throughout his life, Bliss was vigilant on the state of music in Britain, about which he had written extensively since the 1920s. In 1969 he publicly censured
Coventry Cathedral and presented to Coventry Cathedral by the ship's Captain and colleagues. The cross was subsequently presented first to the next in 1988 until she was decommissioned in 2002, and then to , which is affiliated to Coventry, during her commissioning ceremony on 6 May 2011 by Captain David Hart-Dyke, the commanding officer of "Coventry" when she was sunk. BBC broadcast a documentary in 1962 entitled "Act of Faith", narrated by Leo Genn, detailed the history of Coventry Cathedral, its destruction and rebuilding. The precentor of the new Coventry Cathedral at the opening service was Joseph Poole. The service was televised