Soundtrack

Today

Wherever you go, these days, there is recorded music as a backdrop to our lives. In cafes, bars, shops and shopping malls. I have my Walkman plugged into my ears as I walk the treadmill and read a trashy mag, we listen to it in the car and while we're making the tea.

Sometimes it does intrude; I've become bolder about asking for music in pubs to be turned down, and I heard of one orchestral player who was horrified to hear the Bach B Minor Mass as background music in a restaurant. When the club next door started up with its hip-hop, the waiter's response was to turn the Bach up to full volume!

"The trouble is," I said to Paul "we often don't really listen to our music. Why don't we take it in turns to devise a proper programme of music and really listen, not talk?" "Good idea," said my spouse.

So, on Friday, arranged around a very nice meal, I played V William's "The Lark Ascending", Elgar's Cello Concerto and V William's "A Sea Symphony". I even found a website which provided programme notes so downloaded some and made a little programme. V enjoyable - and I found that I listened much more closely, especially to the symphony. And it kind of made Friday evening special

In My Day

In 1941 bombs destroyed The Queen's Hall in London. This was a major concert venue and a fund, under the auspices of Sir Henry Wood, was set up to rebuild. He died in 1944 but the funds still continued.

My parents contribution was to create the Henry Wood Gramophone Circle. Gramophone societies were quite common at that time. Not everyone had their own record-player and it was costly to amass a collection of discs.

The Circle met at 4 Beulah every third Sunday. Mamma and Daddy were very proud that they had the space to do this; many others had to meet in church halls and the like which gave a colder air to the proceedings. At 4 BH members were able to sit in armchairs and enjoy a family atmosphere. Normally, I suppose, about fifteen-twenty members would gather; sometimes we had bumper nights of about thirty or more which was quite a strain on the seating.

Initially, of course, the records were 78rpm which gave you four minutes of listening per disc. The record deck had two turntables and the records were double sided in alternate numbering 1,3 2,4 etc. This meant that you could go fairly smoothly from disc one to two, with time to get number three ready. This way, the Beethoven symphony you were listening to wasn't too lumpy.

Later, Daddy transferred to long play. I remember the cabinet of discs - hundreds, it seemed - carefully catalogued.

The programmes weren't just slung together, either. They were carefully themed, mostly along symphony concert lines. There were exceptions. Daddy would play "Scheherazade" and read aloud from Lane's translation of "The Arabian Nights" carefully slotting his words to the meaning and fluctuations of the music.

As we got older we were occasionally allowed to devise our own programmes and present them to the circle.

The circle was affiliated to a larger group and the members formed the large part of Mamma and Daddy's social circle for many years. We had patrons: Margaret Ritchie whom I remember as having a sweet round face and delightful voice singing "My Heart Ever Faithful" and Peter Katin, pianist who several times visited with his wife and little boy Nicholas. Apparently Beatrice met him a few years ago and he had no recollection of these events.

The Circle kept going for over twenty years and was eventually disbanded when it finally became obvious that The Queens' Hall would never be rebuilt. The money my parents had so carefully gathered went towards a Sir Henry Wood memorial.

Programme preparation is quite tricky, as we've discovered, so I don't really blame Paul for switching from all four Bach orchestral suites to Santana.