Three Choirs Festival The event is now established in the last week of July. The 300th anniversary of the original Three Choirs Festival was celebrated during the 2015 festival, which took place from 25 July to 1 August in Hereford (the landmark 300th meeting of the Three Choirs does not fall until 2027 due to there being no Three Choirs Festivals for the duration of both WW1 and WW2). The festival is closely identified with the musical careers of British composers Edward Elgar and Ralph Vaughan Williams. The organists of the three cathedrals (who act as artistic director and festival conductor when it
Hereford Cathedral altar-piece and an oak screen, and instead of restoring the Chapter House he allowed its stones to be utilised for alterations to the Bishop's Palace. It was during this period that his brother, Thomas Bisse, was the Chancellor of the Cathedral. In 1724 Thomas Bisse organised a "Music Meeting" which subsequently became, with the Cathedrals at Worcester and Gloucester, the Three Choirs Festival. On Easter Monday, 1786, the greatest disaster in the history of the cathedral took place. The west tower fell, creating a ruin of the whole of the west front and at least one part of the nave.