from Alan Deighton (received July 11, 2002)
I was pleased the
other day to see that the Reading Youth Orchestra has its own web presence and
read what you have so far produced with great interest. It has jogged a number
of memories from the time when I played in it between 1965 and 1968 and I
was a little surprised to see that at least one person from this time is still
associated with the orchestra - I assume that Susan Greenwood is
the former leader Susan Armitage, who was my violin teacher at
Reading School after Violet Watson's retirement.
I am impressed by the number and range of works that the orchestra has performed
in this last season. In my time the number was far more restricted: in
1965-66 I remember the programme consisted of: Brahms' Academic Festival
Overture, Grieg's Piano Concerto, Dvorak's 8th Symphony (second movement
omitted for some reason) and one other work. There were two or three concerts a
season, starting with one in Torquay after an intensive Easter course down there
and finally one i the old Reading Town Hall. I remember others, one taking place
at a public school near Reading with which the conductor Edward Underhill
(we always called him Ted, though not to his face!) had contacts and one at the
military academy in Camberley - probably more of Ted's contacts.
I am taking the liberty of attaching a couple of photographs of the orchestra
taken at this time:
The photo above was taken in Camberley in1967. Stephen Lustig was the leader (I am sitting immediately behind him on the second desk of the 1st violins), Susan Armitage is on the right (from the conductor's point of view) of the first desk of the 2nd violins;
the photo above was taken at Easter 1966 in Torquay: the soloist's was Juliet Bruce.
the photo above shows
the string section (minus cellos and basses) at one of the sectional rehearsals
in Torquay in 1967. I have forgotten the tutor's name. I won't try to
identify others on the photographs now as the names will probably not mean much
to you anyway, but if you wished to use them for the web site and thought it
appropriate I could have a stab at naming a few others. I still have the
programmes of the concerts and can let you have copies, though I suppose there
is some sort of archive you have access to already.
I wish you all the
best with the site and a successful tour in the
Netherlands.
Yours sincerely
Alan Deighton