Michael Anderson (G 58-63) has sent the following recollections:

"I read with great interest the article written by Peter Royds in the July 2013 issue of the Bulletin. I am very grateful that he did so, because I was also a long-standing member of the choir under Donald Leggat. He was indeed a demanding, at times difficult, man; but above all a great champion of choral music and of all who were members of his choir. I joined first Meadow House under Philip Lever then on to Grindal with Sam Parkinson in 1959 and remained a member of the choir until I left for RMA Sandhurst in 1964. My parents were stationed abroad in Malaya (as my father was serving in the British Army on secondment to the Malaysian Armed Forces). I had my voice test and ended up as a treble for a short time before my voice broke. There was an area reserved in the choir hall, so well described by Peter, for those who sat there during rehearsals until they either made the next stage safely for singing or sadly had to leave. I was lucky and made it in a very short time to second bass. Mr Cotterell, who was also a master associated with Grindal, was a second bass as well. Mr Dearle, mentioned by Peter, was a highly energetic tenor. Donald Leggat was also a very accomplished organist for not only did he play in the school chapel, but also in the Priory where there was, to a schoolboy, a most gorgeous organ with towering pipes and a pretty demanding array of keyboards and organ stops to bring into play. The organ had a hand-pumped bellow at the rear and one day, I remember, having volunteered to assist with page-changing the music sheet in the organ loft, we had a failure and I was dispatched to pump away and hear the odd cry of encouragement floating down from above! For this action I was rewarded with a tea in the then Abbots Court Hotel. Here I have to recall that both Mr Dearle and Donald Leggat used to have choir members round for tea after rehearsals in their Lonsdale Terrace homes, which, when compared with the House offerings, was brilliant - especially with the odd Waggon Wheel on the plate.

I have no photographs of those days, but I did write some thoughts down as we travelled from event to event. Highlights were coaching to and singing in Carlisle Cathedral, and the Rosehill Theatre, where we sang before the Amadeus Quartet arrived. It was their programme of music that was recorded by Border television - sadly not ours!  This was the event that truly fired me up to learn the cello and play it for the remainder of my time at St Bees. Peter wrote about the St Bees Festival of Music. Mr James Wykes, the Headmaster, was instrumental in getting this off the ground with Donald, and the Halley Orchestra came for the first year. In this Festival we sang a new piece for us called 'Festival in Rio'. This was a pretty difficult piece that had many chord changes and clashes in it. A recording was made of this and I have a copy of this which I will send to the school for safekeeping. This too took place in the Memorial Hall and we had to rehearse endlessly to get everything right before we were let anywhere near singing with the orchestra! The same was true of rehearsing for church services, and on my last visit I tried to sit in the choir stalls near the organ where I had my place for three years! Gosh, they (or the wood) must have shrunk over the years!

Donald Leggat was also a visiting conductor of an orchestra in Canada, and he would on occasion place a recording made by that orchestra on the gramophone located in the top of the choir room near to the piano. I have since been back only once, on the fortieth anniversary of my leaving in 1964. I have to say all was very different.

The choir room was closed and barred and even worse, the school tuck shop on the little roadway towards Meadow House was gone! There was the usual St Beghian Day rugby match, but no numbers were sitting on their rugs beside the field, indeed we Old Boys outnumbered the resident school members watching the game! I too remember the fagging, the regular echoing thwacks with the cane by 'Parky' in the Grindal changing rooms and the pretty gruesome food served by the House kitchen! And where have the steam trains gone that brought us from London to St Bees via Crewe and Lancaster?
I also played the bugle in the school CCF drum and bugle band, and I do have a copy of an old photograph from 1963 of this accomplished musical grouping!

With Morton I played the Last Post from the top of the fire-escape steps of Grindal. This was sometimes a touch farcical, especially when it was wet or cold and one often got the timing wrong - but not so often as we were harangued by Parky if we were late! For a bet, Morton played from the top of the wall running round Grindal; he won the bet, but got strenuously thwacked by Parky for doing so! 

My last bit is sheer coincidence. Some twenty years ago my parents moved from Andover to Aldeburgh in order to downsize house and be nearer to my sister. To our amazement, living almost beside them was Cecile Wykes, the widow of James Wykes. I visited her on a number of occasions until her death a couple of years ago and used to enjoy looking through her old photograph albums of the school and to talk of their joint love of music. She spoke of the choir and her husband's true friendship and long lasting respect for Donald Leggat, which did indeed set the tone for the manner in which the choir was run and trained through all my time at St Bees. Music still is in the blood and I have taken part in many musical events throughout my military career. The highlight must be winning the Inter-service Operatic competition with 'Oh What a Lovely War', which we put on when I was based in Lisburn, Northern Ireland."

 

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