On Thursday, August 9 the choir performed at Sardis Congregational Chapel. Family and friends of Tony and Christine Hesselgrave gathered to celebrate their Golden Wedding Anniversary.

Many new friendships were struck up and I met a lovely lady who started teaching at Greenhill School when our MC Dave Blackmore was in the sixth form.

We were warmly welcomed to the chapel by Stewart Treharne, organist at the chapel, who told us that last time the choir performed at the chapel one of the choristers burnt his shirt on one of the lit candles.

David Blackmore promptly replied that they had asked for forks for the buffet afterwards not four candles. Tony is a member of the choir and performed the first set with them. There were recitations from Christine and Audrey Hilling as well as solos from John Butland, Eric Mullins and Kevin Morgan.

Friends and relatives had travelled from as far away as Belgium for this happy event and they were not disappointed.

Once again the choir proved that they can quickly change the tempo and the mood of their performance and delighted the audience with their polished repertoire. Audience participation for two of the numbers was outstanding and was described as ‘very tidy ‘ by Dave Blackmore who was on top form amusing(?) the audience with his banter and quickly provided quips to other people’s comments.

Our lesser spotted accompanist Jill Williams together with our MD Ian Williams kept the choir and audience in good order.

During the first interval Christine had written a monologue ‘Being There’ in which she recalled her memories of the preparation for their wedding day and the people who shared that day with them.

It was a cleverly composed piece which planted images in my mind of this special day though I couldn’t picture a clean-shaven Tony as I have only known him with a beard.

The Queen was in Milford Haven opening what was then The Gulf Refinery so there was plenty of bunting on display in the town. Tony was from Middlesex and met Christine at the coal office in Saundersfoot when it was The Barbecue.

After Christine’s monologue John Butland sang Country Road, a favourite of Tony’s and followed with Eric Clapton’s Wonderful Tonight.

During the second interval Audrey Hilling narrated The Pilots Psalm.

Ever the professional Audrey’s performance was flawless.

The Pilots Psalm is based on the 23 psalm and was written in 1874 by Capt. J H Roberts. Eric Mullins then sang If I Was A Rich Man before young Kevin Morgan joined him with The Bold Gendarmes.

In the final set the choir sang the hauntingly sad Irish song The Fields Of Athenry in which Duncan Hilling sings a solo spot. The song tells the story of Michael, who is deported to Botany Bay for stealing corn from Trevelyan for his children during the Great Famine in Ireland in the 1840s.

This is a big favourite of mine so it was a real treat to hear Duncan and the choir perform this. This beautiful song was written by Peter St John in the 1970s.

When it was time for the finale fellow choristers in the audience were invited to join them. As a surprise for Christine, her two sons had learnt An American Trilogy and joined Tony to sing with the choir.

Tony then surprised us by issuing golden raffle prizes to some of the guests who had winning numbers on their invitations after the audience were asked to call out numbers.

To quote Dave Blackmore it was a “Golden evening, golden sunshine and a golden performance.”

The choir will perform at the Giltar Hotel on Tuesday, August 21 at 9 pm.

Our full programme for this season is on our website tenbymalechoir.org.

Di Mumford