January 30th  For the majority of his career MICHAEL PORTILLO has been involved in politics.  Since leaving politics in 2005 he has devoted himself to writing and broadcasting.  He writes for the Sunday Times and is a regular on both BBC 1’s “This Week” programme and Radio 4’s “Moral Maze”, and has made documentaries on subjects as diverse as Richard Wagner and the death penalty.  In 2008 he chaired the judges of the Man Booker prize. Sponsored by THOMPSON, SMITH & PUXON (Solicitors), Clacton-on-Sea.

The Princes Theatre, Town Hall, Clacton on Sea, Monday nights 7.30pm

The resultant show of slides and anecdotes made for a very interesting evening indeed.   Some slides were accompanied by a soundtrack of the noises of the birds and animals and at Christmas of the carol singing by village children, still interspersed with the mullahs calling!

The evening was sponsored by Fred Olsen Travel, Worldwide Holiday/Cruise Specialists of Colchester
                                                            Audrey Owens
                                                             Press Officer

The final presentation in the Society’s 2008/2009 Season was a return visit from the superb vocal group – Cantabile – The London Quartet. This a cappella singing group have achieved proficiency in producing different styles of music. The result was an eclectic programme which transported the audience from Sixteenth Century Part-Songs to a medley from that classic Disney cartoon ‘Snow White & the Seven Dwarfs’.

Cantabile comprise Richard Bryan (Counter-Tenor), Steven Brooks (Tenor), Mark Fleming (Tenor) and Michael Steffan (Baritone), who first sang as an a cappella singing group during their student days at Cambridge. They began with Perpetuum Mobile Opus 25 by Johann Strauss (The Younger).This musical joke served as a showcase for the vocal dexterity that the group possess. The mood changed for their rendition of Weep O Mine Eyes, a plaintive 16th Century Part Song and which produced a rich choral sound belying their quartet composition. My personal highlight of the first half was the performance of Summertime from Gershwin’s Porgy & Bess This moving aria written by Gershwin, in his own style of Afro-American spiritual, was faultless. Richard Bryan’s singing evoked the feeling of the southern American cotton plantations.

The second half opened with a ‘Homage to Harmony Groups’. The group’s arrangement of Dry Bones was a brilliant amalgam of music and comedy which exemplified their versatility and was immensely appreciated by the audience. The piece de resistance of this half was without doubt ‘The History of Western Music’- a whistle stop tour of one thousand years of Western Music. Their inclusion of Richard Strauss’ Also sprach Zarathustra, Op. 30 was innovative and they achieved a chilling rendition of this tone poem which has been so engrained in recent popular culture by Stanley Kubrick’s use of it as the main theme in 2001: A Space Odyssey.

Once again Cantabile brought to the Society an evening of innovative musical entertainment underlining their virtuosity and creativity. An enormously enjoyable performance from this talented and personable quartet.

The evening was sponsored by Boydons Estate Agents of Colchester & Frinton-On-Sea.

Robert Pearce

Locum Press Officer

During the second half of his show, he took us to Siberia and his attempt to cross the vast icy plains to Alaska.   This was a truly remarkable story and we were shown so many photographs of his husky team of 10 very individual dogs, so hard working and so very endearing.  He got lost in a snow storm and lost his dogs, but they went in search of him and he of them – they found each other – and Benedict abandoned his attempt to reach Alaska so that he and his dogs might survive.    This was a very exciting and memorable evening with a charming and articulate raconteur.

The sponsors for this evening were Fred Olsen Travel Ltd.
 

                                                           Audrey Owens
                                                                Press Officer

This is perhaps the most famous picture of Gilbert – it is to be found in the National Portrait Gallery 

The portrait of Sullivan in the National Portrait Gallery

Added: March 13, 2008
Kate Humble is interviewed on BBC Breakfast about the sexy new show about the wet parts of our world.