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BOTLEY MUSIC FESTIVAL 2009 - REPORT
People of Botley and the surrounding areas – you did us proud! Thank you so much to everyone who supported the Botley Music Festival in many differing ways. Yes it was hard work arranging all the events but without the fantastic support of participants and audiences it would not have been the great success that it was. You all turned out in great numbers for all of the events for which the organisers are so grateful. The Festival Organising Committee appreciated your encouragement and was extremely pleased to hear your lovely compliments about all the happenings during the week. It was a steep learning curve for the Committee who had never organised a music festival on this scale, where do you start? The Committee is appreciative for the support of Hampshire County Council, Eastleigh Borough Council and owes an immense debt of gratitude to our own Botley Parish Council. It could not have been managed without the great help and support of the Chairman, Colin Mercer and the Parish Clerk, Janet Morgan. We are very lucky to have such dedicated people working on behalf of the community in this place.
Tribute must be paid to the Artistic Director of this festival, David Burgess, the organist and musical director at All Saints’ Church, who first mentioned the idea of a week-long festival about 18 months ago. His vision, drive and determination stirred imaginations and the first-ever Botley Music Festival was born. The committee were spurred on by good luck messages from the renowned Welsh composer, Karl Jenkins, from the composer-in residence of Classic FM, Howard Goodall and from Nigel Perrin, the conductor of Bath Camerata.
The Festival began on Sunday 5th July with a service of Choral Evensong. The Church choir sang the Magnificat and Nunc Dimittis in BЬ by Charles Villiers Stanford with Repsonses by John Sanders. The anthem sung was Jubilate Deo composed by Howard Goodall. As well as writing sacred choral music, Goodall is well-known too for his TV theme tunes for such shows as: The Vicar of Dibley, Blackadder and The Catherine Tate Show. The large congregation appreciated the Cheese and Wine reception which followed before settling down again to hear the choir sing a Festival of Anthems. David and the choir are all very fond of the music of John Rutter, so it was no surprise to find three of his anthems in the programme, Look at the world, All things bright and beautiful and Be thou my vision. Rutter is a prolific English composer and choral conductor who formed his own choir, The Cambridge Singers in 1981. The Archbishop of Canterbury conferred a Lambeth Doctorate of Music upon him, recognising his contribution to church music. Nine anthems were sung altogether with works by composers such as Archer, Carter, Purcell and Goodall. Four members of the choir, Val, Angie, Sue and Cath attended a workshop last summer with Opus Anglicanum at the Three Choirs Festival at Worcester. They put what they had learnt to good use when they sang plainsong, Praeclara Festivitas. The English translation of the Latin antiphon declared that ‘The illustrious festival which we celebrate today surrounds the entire region of Britain with joy.’
On Monday local soprano, Patricia Jenkins, gave a wonderful lunchtime recital, singing classical to show tunes. Works by Mendelssohn, Paisiello and Schubert rubbed shoulders with Rodgers and Hammerstein, Lionel Bart and Gershwin. Following this came the Owslebury Handbell Team. Handbells have a surprisingly genteel sound. It was a very enjoyable programme where the audience found out more about the handbell ringing heritage as well as listening to some great melodies. In the Owslebury Handbell Team’s handout we learn that up until the 16th century English bellringing was carried out in cold draughty towers when portable bells were produced in order for the ringers to practise in more congenial surroundings.
The organisers avidly watched weather forecasts for the Monday evening when Botley Square was closed for entertainment by Wildern Community Choir, Wyvern Community Choir, Shenanigans Band and Wickham Morris dancers. The rain certainly came down heavily but it did not manage to dampen anyone’s enthusiasm for the musical entertainment whilst partaking of the succulent hog roast from Nick the butcher. The rain eventually stopped and a beautiful rainbow could be seen arching over Botley. Over one hundred people then crammed themselves into the Market Hall for the Grand Festival Music Quiz for a brilliant evening of musical questioning from quizmaster, Tom Mills. Did you know that the A above middle C is tuned to 440Hz? Or that the largest organ in the UK is in Liverpool Anglican Cathedral? Questions covered many musical genres and great fun was had by all. Congratulations to The Jackson 4, the very worthy winners.
A veritable menagerie of puppets could be found in the church on Tuesday morning as the under 5s enjoyed a Maraca Jacks music workshop. Bubbles floated around as the little ones, sang, clapped, stamped, marched and played musical instruments.
At lunchtime James Aiken, an organ scholar at Oriel College, Oxford, gave a superb recital including works by Franck, Ireland, Boellmann and Lefébure-Wély. The audience was spellbound by his sensitive and accomplished playing.
A large appreciative audience enjoyed the Classic Classics concert on Tuesday evening. This was certainly a stunning concert given by the Kaleidoscope String Ensemble with flautist, Catherine Nicholson and harpsichordist, Sharon Gould. As it stated in the Festival Programme the concert showcased ‘great classics by J S Bach alongside the Suite Antique by John Rutter and a few classical lollipops to complete the menu.’ David Burgess played the harpsichord for several pieces with great aplomb, many of us felt very privileged to have such a gifted and consummate musician as the organist of All Saints’ Church. Two of Bach’s Brandenburg Concertos were played, No 3 in G and No 5 in D. The fifth concerto could be looked upon as one of the earliest keyboard concertos. The harpsichord has the dominant voice and has a first movement cadenza of 80 bars. Bach’s Suite No 2 in B minor was well-received by the audience. This work includes the Menuet, one of the most popular dances of the 16th and 17th centuries.
David Burgess again showed his musical prowess at a lunchtime organ recital on Wednesday. David performed a very varied programme which took the audience from the driving pounding rhythm of Mushel’s Toccata to a James Hook voluntary thence onwards to the Adagio from Bruch’s violin concerto. The operatic One fine day from Puccini was followed by Kenneth Leighton’s Paean. David had warned the audience that they might not like this piece but his superb playing counteracted any negative thoughts about the music. A more light-hearted Dance of the Watery Stave had the audience listening out for snatches of familiar music, the programme ended with the majestic War March of the Priests composed by Felix Mendelssohn.
The URO Plus! Concert was spectacular. The audience were in thrall of the wonderful sound made by an orchestra made up of Descant, Treble, Tenor and Bass recorders. During the evening two smaller recorders were played, the sopranino and the even tinier garklein. The Upham Recorder Orchestra was formed in 2007 under the direction of David Burgess. At this concert the young people came to the fore and how musically adept they were. In this age of dark news stories when we only hear negative aspects of the youth of today, what an absolute joy it was to hear these young people play so expertly and confidently. The audience was treated to recorder solos and duets, keyboard solos, flute solo and duets, an oboe solo, a piano solo and a trumpet solo. Many of the younger performers sing in Botley Church Choir. All the performers are a credit to their families and great ambassadors for their schools.
On Thursday All Saints’ Reading Group invaded Café Chat to perform an eclectic mix of literary and musical extracts. Martin recalled facets of the River Thames in readings, poetry, film theme and song whilst the feline antics of T.S. Eliot’s cats and Hairy McClary were regaled by Clare. Angela read a poignant story of The Mud Maid from the Lost Gardens of Heligan with the Bodmin Town Band playing Calling Cornwall. Val gave us a rendition of profound stories of The Little Prince with his adventures to other planets with the playing of Venus from Holst’s Planet Suite. Cath recited the unconventional rhymes of Ogden Nash interspersed with the music of Saint-Saens Carnival of the Animals. Lynne read an extract from A Wreath of Roses and Wendy Cope’s poem, Valentine. After which we heard the beautiful melody of Debussy’s The Girl with the Flaxen Hair. Sandra’s theme was appropriately More Tea, Vicar? She played the theme from the TV series, Miss Marple and read from Murder in the Vicarage. Tea was the order of the day in the Doris Day song, Tea for Two. Sandra was joined by Cath and Martin in a vignette from The importance of being earnest, then everyone was able to refill their tea and coffee cups to Jack Buchanan’s Everything stops for tea.
Everything did stop for tea in the Market Hall on Thursday afternoon. The Easy Street Dance Trio provided the music for a Tea Dance whilst the wonderfully attired waitresses from the WI served the most delicious homemade cakes that you have ever eaten. The waitresses were dressed in black uniforms with white aprons and hair bands, the very epitome of the ‘Nippies’ from the Lyons Corner House tea-rooms of the past. If you thought that tea dances were only for older folk then think again, toddler Darcey enjoyed it just as much as everyone else.
Carnival! was an opportunity for some of the young people of Botley and the surrounding area to show their musical talent of a more contemporary style. The audience was entertained for over two hours by a range of singers. Tessa Cox and Cherrie Clarke played piano and performed their own compositions. Others played acoustic guitar to accompany their singing. The youngest performers of the evening were a group from Botley Primary School Singing Squad who sang a selection of traditional folk songs and rounds, mainly unaccompanied. Particularly catching was a version of Frère Jacques and Three Blind Mice sung simultaneously. T he evening rounded off with a change in style when a band called The Pretense from Wildern School, who had recently won Battle of the Bands, rocked the hall with five songs accompanied by some sophisticated lighting.
Friday brought another wonderful lunchtime organ recital to the festival. This time the organist was Mark Dancer, the Director of Music at St. Peter’s Church, Petersfield and conductor of the Petersfield Choral Society. Mark began his programme with Fantasia and Fugue in G minor by J.S. Bach followed by the Andante cantabile from Tchaikovsky’s String Quartet Opus 11, which, the audience was informed, showed off the oboe stop on the organ. Mark then asked the audience to imagine that they were sitting in an incense-filled church in Paris. We were instantly transported there as Mark played Trois Pièces by Pierné. Mendelssohn’s Overture to ‘St. Paul’ followed and Mark’s final piece was Carillon-Sortie by the French composer, Mulet. How did Mark play all those semi-quavers?
On Friday evening a great crowd met at the Market Hall to do-si-do, promenade their partners, form intricate figures of eight and confuse right and left hands in the grand chain. You’ve guessed, it was the Festival Barn Dance. Dancers of all ages skipped along to the superb music of the Red Hot Reeds. They were hot, hot, hot! Julia played an English concertina whilst Mike and Dan played melodeons. Ian was the expert caller who kept us all in order. Dancers were refreshed with a delicious Fish and Chip supper from the Codfather. The evening was such fun and provided the festival with a different and very entertaining musical genre.
The church bells could be heard on Saturday morning as the bellringers hosted a barbeque in aid of the Church Belltower fund. Change ringing is the art of ringing a set of tuned bells in a series of mathematical patterns called ‘changes’, another fine example of musicality in the village.
Saturday evening saw the culmination of the week-long festival. The church looked wonderful, bedecked with naval flags, Union Jacks, helium balloons and the superb musically inspired flower arrangements of All Saints’ Flower Guild to enhance the atmosphere for the Last Night of the Proms. The church was packed to capacity as the audience was treated to the singing of All Saints’ Augmented Choir under the baton of David Burgess and the playing of Marchwood Orchestra under the direction of Tony Kitcherside. The choir and orchestra began with Parry’s great anthem; I was glad, so beloved of many royal occasions. Feet tapped to the orchestra’s rendition of Rossini’s William Tell Overture, particularly when it reached the Lone Ranger theme tune. Young and old alike enjoyed an arrangement of the Teddy Bear’s Picnic sung a capella by the choir. A thread of opera ran through the concert, soprano Christobel Thomas sang two Puccini arias. Then there wasn’t a dry eye in the house as the junior choir sang You raise me up. Again it was the orchestra’s turn with the memorable Intermezzo from Cavelleria Rusticana. The choir hummed and ahed their way through Breezy Bach, the tune being recognisable from the Hamlet cigar advertisements of the past. There were no words - the choir really did just hum and ah! Christobel returned to the stage to be joined by soprano, Julie Brombley, where they sang Delibes’ Flower Duet. The first half ended with the choir and the orchestra performing Chorus of the Hebrew Slaves from Verdi’s opera, Nabucco. The orchestra transported the audience to Spain at the start of the second half in the unforgettable Prelude and March from Bizet’s Carmen. The choir and orchestra joined forces again to perform three songs from the ever-popular Gilbert and Sullivan Pirates of Penzance. Tom Mills was resplendent in combat gear to be ‘the very model of a modern Major-General’. David ascended into the pulpit to sing his role as the sergeant, complete with policeman’s helmet, a tad too small, but no truncheon! A small choir group then performed Geographical Fugue written by Ernst Toch. This time there were plenty of words but no music. This fugue is the last movement of a suite Gesprochene Musik (Spoken Music) which tries to produce musical effects through speech. The choir sang another a capella piece, Evening Hymn from Humperdinck’s Hansel and Gretel. Then the bit which everyone was waiting for, flags waved enthusiastically and everyone sang those favourite tunes of the Proms, Pomp and Circumstance March 1 by Elgar, Thomas Arne’s Rule Britannia and finally Jerusalem, combining the stirring words of William Blake with Parry’s rousing music. Thanks were given to the conductors and soloists and David paid tribute to the work of the Committee.
It was a tremendous week which aimed to promote live music in Botley and I am certain that you will agree that the festival achieved that aim. Botley has seen many differing outpourings of musicality during the week which has been appreciated by a great number of people.
Catherine Tribble, Member of the Organising Committee
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