Bizarre moment bishop tells choir to stop its 'terrible racket' and 'get out of my house' as church concert cut short
This is the moment an angry bishop told a choir at a church concert performing in front of hundreds of people to stop its "terrible racket" and get out of his house.
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The City Academy Voices choir was wrapping up its performance at St Andrew's church in Holborn, central London, on Friday night when all of the lights suddenly came on.
Jonathan Baker, the Bishop of Fulham, could be seen grabbing the microphone as he stood on stage with no shoes and a blue dressing gown to demand that the 360-strong audience get out of his abode.
In a clip that has gone viral online, Bishop Jonathan, 58, could be heard shouting at the crowd: "You are in my house.
"It's gone past 10pm and this is a terrible racket."
He added: "Goodnight. You are in my house – can you leave it now please. Thank you, it's over."
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A church worker then told the crowd to exit quietly and the musicians to leave the stage, telling them "this is a residential home".
The audience could be heard booing before the choir performed a final song - an a cappella version of Abba's Dancing Queen - turning the boos from the audience into cheers.
Leigh Stanford Thompson, the choir's director, called the incident "bizarre", saying the singers at first thought it was some kind of "comedy act".
“I’ve never experienced anything like it,” he said.
"A lot of people thought it was some weird thing that I had organised, like a parting thing, but I knew exactly what was happening,” he added.
Another choir member said: “There were boos and everything, it’s just really disappointing. At the end of these concerts, we always end on a real high and everyone goes home full of joy, but this dampened things.”
Benedict Collins, who was attending the concert with his 10-year-old daughter, said he thought the interruption was a staged joke.
"The church willingly rents out the premises for performances, for money.
"They can hardly be surprised if they take bookings for concerts and there is music in the hall," he told Sky News.