On 26th February the Band was asked to perform a special concert in memory of Mary Spraggon, who died just before Christmas. Mary and her husband Bill have been regular members of our audience since the earliest days of the band over 15 years ago, indeed Bill recalled the very first concert of the reconstituted band at the Hazell’s club in Aylesbury, now long demolished and replaced by housing. So we were honoured when Bill asked us to perform in her memory for their many friends.
The concert took place at Aylesbury Methodist church, conducted by Claire Lawrence and Robert Wicks. Before each half Bill spoke movingly about his wife, how they met when he came to work in Watford as a pharmacist in 1960, when Mary sang with the Langley Singers; how they moved to Aylesbury and made many friends through the Aylesbury Round Table and the Ladies’ Circle, but most of all about Mary’s deep love of music. Mary had very wide musical tastes, which he illustrated through the choice of music for the concert. Though she came originally from Woburn she loved Yorkshire, so the opening work was appropriately A Yorkshire Overture by Philip Sparke. She loved musicals and light opera, so the programme included selections from Les Misérables, My Fair Lady and the music of Andrew Lloyd Webber. Gilbert and Sullivan was represented by three movements from the ballet Pineapple Poll arranged from Sullivan’s music by Charles Mackerras.
Bill had a selection of programmes they had kept as souvenirs of the many shows they had seen, including a concert by the modern Glenn Miller Band, so naturally the Band played In the Miller Mood, arranged by Warren Barker. This year Bill and Mary would have been married 50 years, so the programme included the Woody Herman version of Golden Wedding. Among other favourites were the Florentiner March by Julius Fučík, the Radetzky March by Johann Strauss, The Dambusters by Eric Coates, The Mazurka and Waltz from Coppélia by Delibes, and Nimrod from the Enigma Variations by Edward Elgar.
Director of Music Claire Lawrence spoke for the Band when she said how honoured we were to have been asked to celebrate Mary’s life in this way. Finally Bill sent his friends on their way with this poem by Joyce Grenfell:–
If I should go before the rest of you
Break not a flower nor inscribe a stone
Nor when I’m gone speak in a Sunday voice
But be the usual selves that I have known
Weep if you must
Parting is hell
But life goes on
So sing as well.
after which the audience joining in singing Jerusalem by Hubert Parry.