RAMSBOTTOM RECORDED MUSIC SOCIETY

GUEST speaker Sue Parker gave her programme ‘Boy with the violin’ which featured music inspired by the poems and novels of Thomas Hardy, as well as folk songs and tunes that Hardy knew and played on his violin.

Sue’s presentation was audio-visual so we were able to follow the words of Hardy’s poems which enhanced our enjoyment throughout the evening.

After the Mellstock Band’s rendition of two folk songs we heard Richard Rodney Bennett’s score for Far From the Madding Crowd played by the BBC Philharmonic under Rumon Gamba.

Gerald Finzi was one of many composers who set Hardy’s poems to music and we greatly enjoyed, amongst others, To Lizbie Browne sung by the baritone Stephen Varcoe accompanied by Clifford Benson.

We arrived at the interval with Holst’s Egdon Heath inspired by Hardy’s Wessex and premiered in 1928 at a memorial concert a month after the author’s death.

The London Philharmonic conducted by Sir Adrian Boult did the honours.

We started the second half with The Banks of Allan Water sung by Sally Dexter with the Mellstock Band, which preceded Benjamin Britten’s setting of At the Railway Station, Upway, sung by tenor Richard Edgar-Wilson with pianist Eugene Asti.

After John Ireland’s setting of Her Song and Robin Milford’s orchestral suite The Darkling Thrush, written in memory of Hardy, we concluded with a final offering from the Dorset folk group The Yetties, who had interspersed the programme throughout with the spoken word and tunes played on Hardy’s and his father’s violins.

Their final offering was The New Rigged Ship.

The next meeting of the Society will take place on Thursday, May 31.

For further details visit Facebook or contact Richard W Hall on 01706 823490 or via email: r.w.hall45@hotmail.co.uk