JANUARY 2008 MEETING
VISIT OUR ACCORDION LINKS PAGE TO FIND A HOST OF INTERESTING AND EXCITING ACCORDION SITES
SAD NEWS
JOHN TAYLOR, WHAC member since our early days, passed away in December. Although ill health had prevented John from playing in recent years, he was always a keen supporter of the Club and also went to many of the national accordion festivals. We will miss him, and send our sincere sympathies to his wife and friends.
This meting was an extremely successful DIY concert plus mini AGM. An excellent selection of music was provided by Linda Knowles on guitar, plus Club in fine voice in Happy Birthday dear Adrienne, also, (on accordion) Harry Haigh, Adrienne Griffiths, Doug Ellis, Suzanne Webber, Ralph Cornish, Ken Owen and Ben MaGee, Jenny Powley, Carol Hanwell, Sue Coppard, Marshal Sturgeon, Aileen Hood, Brian Young, Suzanne Webber (on a different accordion), and finally Adrienne Grifiths.
Bob Head our Vice President who sadly can rarely manage to get to meetings these days, would greatly appreciate visits from members travelling near Sturminster Newton. Ring him on 01258 817439 if you are able.
The meeting opened with a PlayAlong where we were entertained by John Baker, Adrienne Griffiths and Doug Ellis. This was followed by a concert by Pearl Fawcett-Adriano. Pearl is a superb artist and we were treated to some truly great accordion playing. The varied programm contained something for everyone including classical, musette, Frosini and Deiro, Italian and generally popular tunes all enhanced by Pearl's subtle use of MIDI. Question time proved interesting as well. We learned that she does all her own arrangements, and how and when she started playing the accordion.
We were also entertained in the PlayRound with items from Ralph Cornish, Ken Owen & Ben McGee, Ben's accordion has a pure, rich tone which suited his item 'The Dark Isle' perfectly. We also heard from Carol Hanwell, Gillian James, Adrienne Griffiths & Valerie Antell who played their duet for the forthcoming NAO contest Doug Ellis and Sue Coppard. An additional treat was provided by the Stour Valley Accordion Group, who played the overture to Orpheus in the Underworld by Offenbach, their entry in the NAO Festival.
There is a new web site to check out www.metamusic.org.uk which aims to provide better links between the many existing networks of music organisations across the UK, and help other organisations plug into the bigger picture. To visit the site just click on the link above.
The Weaver Valley Accordion band were our guests, and they gave us a really entertaining afternoon. We had a wide variety of music including Alpine, Bavarian, Italian, Spanish, Russian, tango, songs from the 30's, Lawrence of Arabia, medieval and classical.
It was good to meet them and to chat during the coffee break.
Club members who played were Carol Hanwell, Adrienne Griffiths, Brian Green, Ralph Cornish, Gillian James, Jenny Powley, and Sue Coppard. Harry Haigh was our Chairman for the first time, and was most successful.
We are happy to have two new committee members: Adrienne Griffiths has agreed to become membership secretary in 2008 and Harry Haigh has consented to chair some of our meetings.
WHAC Donation We have received a very appreciative letter from betty Pollard who runs the Tameside Junior Accordion Band which has been doing so well recently. We sent them a donation of £50, part of the proceeds of the WHAC Library which has now been wound up.
This was a super meeting! Our guest artiste was Lisa Lee Leslie who played a wonderful selection of music including Fantasia by Handel, Piazzolla tangos, French musette, a Bach invention and music from the shows. Particularly enjoyable were her duets with her father John Leslie who also contributed some jazz, as well as an extremely well stocked table selling accordions and other goodies. Both Lisa and John certainly know how to communicate with an audience, introducing and sharing their music in a very friendly and relaxed manner. Other players were members of the club and included Harry Haigh with Adrienne Griffiths, Carol Hanwell, Ben McGee, Ken Owen with Jenny Clinch, Sue Coppard, Doug Ellis, Ralph Cornish, Jenny Powley, and Francis Kelly who hasn't played at one of our meetings before and gave us an excellent Valse Lyrique. We hope to here more from Francis!
Our next meeting is on 20th. January 2008 and will be a 'home grown meeting' including our AGM (which takes up very little time). So please come along and bring your accordion as there will be ample time for you to play your party piece for the other members. There will be a PlayAlong between 1.30 and 2.00pm for anyone who wants to play with no sheet music in the safety of a group.
Les Pyrenees en Live broadcasts two hours of accordion music Sunday morning 9-11am (French time). This can be found at www.picfm.com Click on this link to find it. And then follow the Real Player or Windows media Player link in the top right hand corner.
News for Tango lovers. If you visit www.malando.com you will be treated to a feast of music, all with accordion lead, and superb arrangements, mostly tango, but also some standards. Well worth a visit.
An Invitation If you have any feedback that you could contribute to the WHAC Newsletter or website, music you heard, a concert you went to, a new instrument, whatever, it would be nice to hesr from you. Please apply pen to paper or digit to keyboad (computer not accordion) and let us know letters to Sue e-mail to me.
And now for some Good News! In future all Under 16's will be admitted to WHAC meetings completely FREE! Now for the Not so good news. Hardly any under 16's come to WHAC meetings. Do you know any you
could bring?
North Staffs Accordion Club now have a web site click on the link below. For UKAO Web site click here
Stockport Accordion Club News Letter
Additional Meetings. You may (or may not) be surprised to learn that no one put their hand up and volunteered to organize the requested additional meetings. So it is suggested that if any members wish to meet up informally between times they can put their details on the notice board, or give their names to Sue Coppard for inclusion in the newsletter. Over to you.....
ADVERTISEMENTS
For sale: Roland RA90 Midi expander £200. Jack Beecroft 0117 9658507
A New Magazine: M@H (Music at Home)- a quarterly 01242 01844 for more info.
DID YOU KNOW?
That famous Wessex novelist and poet Thomas Hardy, who played the violin in his father's folk music band at village dances, cut his musical teeth at the age of 4 - on the accordion!
Also.......The accordion was first patented on 23 May 1829 by piano and organ maker Zyrill Demian in Viena. The first accordions had foot operated bellows until somebody realised it would be easier to have small hand bellows to drive the reeds.
If you're in Westbury........
If you're in or around Westbury and you want to visit an interesting shop, visit Cool Beans Music, but give
your self plenty of time as you will spend a long time browsing. You can also find them on line at www.coolbeansmusic.co.uk
And finally.........Whilst researching something recently I was sent the following newspaper article. I thought you might find it interesting. JB.
Pugwash theme tune man dies The man who provided the theme tune for the classic children's television programme Captain Pugwash, has died nearly 50 years after being paid £1.50 (30s) for his work.
The sea shanty, which Tommy Edmondson learned from Sir Jimmy Shand, heralded the start of each episode of Captain Pugwash, the long-running BBC cartoon about a group of cowardly pirates.
Mr. Edmondson, who was 67, recorded his version of the Trumpet Hornpipe in the front room of his home in Harbottle, Northumberland, in 1954 when he offered to play traditional tunes to a BBC sound archivist who recorded them.
He accepted payment, so forfeiting his rights to royalties.
An animator discovered Mr. Edmondson's identity in 1992 and, as a gesture of goodwill, gave him a cheque for £100 and some of the original cut-out characters from Captain Pugwash, which ran for 60 episodes.
In October 2004, WHAC moved to a new home at Westbury Leigh Hall. The building, which is a old church that has been converted to a community centre half of which is still used for Sunday worship, is well suited to WHAC's needs. Apart from the main hall where the meeting takes place, there is a committee room, and a green room for the visiting artistes. There is ample parking close by, and we hope to see many of you there in the future. 
For news from Tameside Junior Accordion Band click here.
www.northstaffsaccordionclub.co.uk
By Nicola Woolcock