Bold as brass, my trombone playing mum led the way as a 1950s ‘Spice Girl’
BRITAIN is full of unsung heroes and heroines who deserve recognition. Here, in our weekly obituary column, the moving and inspiring stories of ordinary people who lived extraordinary lives, and who died recently, are told by their loved ones.
MUM’S mantra for her offspring, even when we were young, was not just to talk about it but ‘jolly well go out and do it’.
She spoke from experience because, aged just 16, she had left her job at Boots in Blackpool to join a well-known all-girl swing band — a forerunner of The Spice Girls, if you like — as a trombone player.
It was 1951 and Mum had barely been out of Lancashire. Suddenly, she was touring the country and Europe, playing in holiday camps and dance halls, and travelling to North Africa to entertain British troops.
Mum became a trombone player by accident. Her dad Cyril — my grandad — had set up a brass band for local boys. One day, when she was 14, she picked up a trombone someone had left after band practice and raised it to her lips.
And that was it: Mum was hooked — to the consternation of the nuns at her convent school, who didn’t approve of this ‘unladylike’ pastime.
Such was her talent that her trombone teacher got in touch with Ivy Benson, the glamorous driving force behind the 20-strong Ivy Benson All Girls Band.
Formed in 1939, the band was hugely popular during the war, becoming the BBC’s resident dance band in 1943, topping the bill at the London Palladium for six months in 1944, and attending the VE Day celebrations in Berlin at the personal request of Field Marshal Montgomery in 1945. Three years later, they played at the London Olympics.
Mum auditioned for Ivy and a few days later a telegram arrived, offering her a place. Ivy became a mother figure to the teenager, but was just as strict with her as with all her girls. The music came first
and she firmly believed that ‘the show must always go on’. It was a message that stuck with Mum all her life.
My mum’s musical career was interrupted when, at 19, she married fellow trombonist Frank Dixon, who played in the Stanley Black Dance Band, and started a family, having me, Laura and John. Her love of music never left her, though, and she gave singing and percussion lessons in our home.
By the late Sixties, she had set up her own 14-piece band in Bury, where she and my dad had settled. The Nora Dixon Orchestra played around the region, and had a weekly spot at the Bury Palais until 1971, when it burned down.
By then, Dad had left and Mum juggled raising us with her job managing a pharmacy as well as studying at night school so she could train as a nurse. She went on to become a ward sister at Prestwich Psychiatric Hospital in Manchester.
She never missed an opportunity to play her beloved trombone, though, and in the early Seventies joined the orchestra at the Manchester Opera House for the run of Cinderella starring Ken Dodd. As Mum was the only female musician, Dodd used to tease her, telling the audience that his ‘Auntie Nellie’ (my Mum!) was in the pit that night.
It was the first of her brushes with celebrity. In the early Eighties, she was reunited with Ivy Benson on The Russell Harty Show, and just last year she was interviewed for Radio 4 documentary The Original Girl Power, about Ivy and her band, presented by former Sporty Spice Melanie Chisholm.
Mum had another shot at romantic happiness when she met Harold Coward at a party. It was love at first sight for Harold, who recalls being captivated by the sight of her in flamingo pink tights and exotic glitter make-up. They married in 1984 and in retirement travelled the globe together. Over the years Mum developed an interest in spirituality and Buddhism that helped her retain great serenity when, 18 months ago, she was diagnosed with cancer.
She continued to ‘live in the moment’, taking delight in watching a pair of blue tits raise their little family outside her window in her final weeks.
Mum taught us all so much as well as passing on her passion for music. Today, my musician son James is the owner of her treasured trombone.
She died peacefully with Harold and her three children by her side — and I hope wherever she is that the music is playing.
nora Coward, born november 23, 1934, died June 16, 2018, aged 83.