A Chapel Royal is, technically and historically, not a building but a group of people - priests and singers - who accompany the Monarch and tend to his or her spiritual needs. Today, in practice, they're more firmly based in a specific location. Hampton Court's is one of three Chapels Royal - the other two being at St James’s Palace and the Tower of London.

The palace has a special place in the history of Anglican worship, as it was from the Hampton Court Conference of 1604, called to bring peace to liturgical disagreements, that the King James Bible emerged. A few decades on, it was here that Parliament imprisoned the Anglican Church’s great defender Charles I.

Musically, however, the contribution of the Chapel Royal (in its non-site specific guise) is immense: Tallis and Byrd were both Gentlemen of the Chapel Royal, the former serving four monarchs, while Purcell was an organist. Today, the choir sing Eucharist or Mattins, and Evensong, every Sunday, to which all are welcome.

Grandeur, heritage, Gibbons and Wren - but not as much money as the surroundings might imply, and Choral foundations are expensive things: the maintenance of a choral director, organist, organ (currently being restored by Harrison & Harrison), the gentleman singers (they can currently only afford nine, rather than the desired ten), and the support of the musical education (including weekly lessons) of the choristers themselves, drawn from local schools both independent and state. Just as there's a misconception that the palace itself is Royal-funded (it isn't - Historic Royal Palaces, an independent charity, maintains it, along with Kensington Palace, the Tower of London, Banqueting House and Kew Palace), so too the choir needs money. The Privy Purse offers some support, but not enough, and the foundation is seeking to raise £1.5m, half of which has already been achieved. It's a lot of money, but anyone who has had any contact at all with one of our country's great cathedral or chapel choirs knows what a remarkable musical education the tradition offers, and what a musical legacy it safeguards. I wish them well.

A fundraising concert held there last Friday got them a little further along that long road. For a decade, James Bowman, a countertenor with an international stage and recording career, sang in the ranks of the Chapel Royal (the one at St James's). And here he now was, almost breaking his self-imposed retirement from central-London to fundraise out in zone six. As communicative as always, he began with Tallis, music familiar to these walls, before exploring anniversary composers Dowland and - of course - Britten, the latter's music having played an important a role in Bowman's life (and, one might argue, he in it’s, through his portrayal of Oberon). A beautiful tapestry of Britten's music sat at the heart of the programme, which drew on church music, theatre music and folk music. The boys, under their director Carl Jackson, also offered Britten: his Missa Brevis.

Bowman was generous in giving of his time, and the Foundation was £5000 richer by the evening's end. But another element of his contribution to the evening might not be realised for years to come. Behind him as he sang sat the choristers, the youngest aged seven, perhaps not born when Bowman made his last disc. But when their musical curiosity leads them to flick through a record collection, or iTunes, or whatever means by which we listen to music in the future, they will surely find his name - it does appear on 180 recordings after all. And perhaps then they'll remember sharing a concert programme with him, and be inspired by the example of his committed advocacy of the countertenor voice and repertoire over so many decades, his dedication to church music in serving the Chapel Royal for a decade - and that here he still was, aged 71, singing on their behalf, to help safeguard their future. James Bowman's name is among those on the nomination list this year for the Gramophone Hall of Fame, in which we celebrate the contribution made by individuals to the history of recorded music. Surely he's worthy of your consideration.