RHS Garden Wisley

[roger]

denis said:

How about the weather!!

Denis.

Oh, that is a certainty - we're definitely going to have some!

As it is an outdoor concert, I guess it would be as well to know. The forcasr for Woking (the nearest town) is sunny all day, maximum temperature 25°C / 77°F falling to a minimum of 13°C / 55°F at night. South-easterly winds of 3mph. Sounds good to me!

Where's me wellies?

Roger

[Richard]

Thanks for your good wishes, Denis!

I'm really looking forward to this evening, because I haven't seen Hayley since Tuesday! i.postimg.cc/9fYxy370/smilie-big-grin.gif

I hope you and Brid have a good time in Huddersfield on Saturday.

Best Wishes from London,

Richard

[Stuart H]

Hi Richard

Looks like a scorcher!

Cant wait to "cop a squat" as Richard Gear would say!

See you there.

Stuart

[Richard]

Hello again everybody!

I'm still on a high after the wonderful concert at Cadogan Hall, but last night at Wisley RHS Gardens was even better! I was there quite early as usual, and said a quick hello to Hayley when she arrived for the rehearsal at about 3:30pm. The weather was warm and sunny, and Peter and Lothar joined me while I was sitting in the shade in the picnic area. We listened to the rehearsal for a while, but when more people started to arrive we thought it best to start an orderly queue, with us at the front!

When the gates opened, we took up a position at the front and central to the stage, and we were soon joined by Steve and Stuart Hayter, Tony and Anne, George and his family, Roger and Dave. There were still two hours to go before the concert started, but the time passed very quickly. The arena soon filled up, and the audience was probably approaching 3,000.

The concert started just after 7:45pm, when the National Symphony Orchestra took the stage with their conductor, David Arnold, to play one of my favourite overtures, 'The Marriage Of Figaro' by Mozart. Then Hayley was introduced, and she came on stage wearing a beautiful long blue dress. She opened with Enya's 'May It Be' from 'Lord Of The Rings', and followed with the vocalise version of 'Pokarekare Ana'. It was clear from the start that Hayley was in good form, as always.

The orchestra then played Ron Goodwin's theme to '633 Squadron', before Tenors Unlimited appeared to sing Rossini's 'La Danza', followed by Bizet's 'Pearl Fishers Duet'. As at Codogan Hall, they harmonised perfectly and certainly pleased the crowd.

Then young violinist Ben Baker took centre stage to play 'Schindler's List' by John Williams and 'Rondo Capricioso' by Saint-Saens. He was excellent, and his performance was well-received by the crowd.

The orchestra then played a medley from 'West Side Story', then Hayley returned and gave a beautiful rendition of 'The Water Is Wide'. Tenors Unlimited then joined her in a lovely version of Schubert's 'Ave Maria' before the orchestra closed the first half with Eric Coates's 'Dambusters March'.

After a twenty minute interval, the orchestra returned to play 'Hungarian Dance No.5' by Brahms. Tenors Unlimited then sang 'O Sole Mio', 'Nessan Dorma' and 'Largo Al Factotum' from 'The Barber Of Seville'. The orchestra then played 'Montagues and Capulets' from 'Romeo and Juliet' by Prokofiev, not Tchaikovsky as stated in the programme!

Hayley then returned to the stage wearing a stunning red dress. She sang 'Prayer' and 'O Mio Babbino Caro', both delivered to perfection. Then she left the stage while the orchestra played a medley from Gershwin's 'Strike Up The Band'. Hayley returned and sang 'River of Dreams' followed by 'Amazing Grace' with full orchestral accompaniment.

The orchestra then played the 'Sailor's Hornpipe' while the audience clapped along. Hayley and Tenors Unlimited reappeared carrying huge Union Flags, and they sang 'Jerusalem' and 'Rule Britannia' together. The orchestra then played Elgar's 'Pomp & Circumstance March No.1', and Hayley and Tenors Unlimited returned for the final chorus of 'Land Of Hope And Glory'.

The orchestra played Offenbach's 'Can-Can' while there was a fireworks display behind the stage, which couldn't really be seen from the front. Finally Hayley and Tenors Unlimited returned for an encore of 'Land Of Hope And Glory'.

Most of the crowd dispersed quite quickly, but most of us waited for a short while, when Hayley appeared to the right of the stage to sign autographs. It was very dark, but luckily I had a small torch with me so I was able to throw some light on the proceedings! After mingling with Hayley for several minutes we all headed for home, tired but happy.

Hayley, many thanks for all your hard work. You were absolutely magnificent, and it's been a wonderful week for all of us! i.postimg.cc/9fYxy370/smilie-big-grin.gif

Best Wishes,

Richard

[denis]

Hi Richard,
What a great time you are having. We can now set out for Huddersfield just had to wait for your review. Thank you.

Best wishes all.

Brid and Denis

[postscript]

Superb coverage, Richard.

I'll be adding too, once I've got myself sorted out and got to grips with what has already been posted, so I don't unnecessarily duplicate.

Sorry to have missed Hayley (TWICE!) on the same day! That, surely, must be plain DUMB carelessness!

The first time was when she arrived with Ian and Fiona. I had already met Richard--after he had been gesticulating at me wildly from his park bench whilst I looked everywhere but there for him. He finally planted himself slap bang in front of me.
'Hi, Peter, I'm Richard!'
'Yes, Richard, I know, oh, there you are!'
I chose that moment to get my gear from my car so I was 'all together' for when she might arrive and able to run on to starting the queue for access. That was the moment she arrived!

The second time, at the end, i chose to return to the car as quickly as possible to catch the 'before show' interview she gave to BBC Southern Counties Radio (104.6), which was why she was in a hurry when she first arrived.

It had surprised Richard and I that she was in a hurry when in fact we did not hear her crystal voice wafting upon the lazy summer air in rehearsal until much later.

It brought me back to my days of being an amateur actor as a youthful, strolling player amongst peacock littered lawns on just such a summer's night as this, hearing scene rehearsals in different areas of the grounds from one or other of the two Shakespeare plays we were performing that year.

I had a new toy to play with. An MP3 player, twice the length but otherwise about the size of a cigarette lighter and the concert seemed a good opportunity to find out just what sort of quality this thing could produce on simple 'automatic'. I also wanted to record the interview as there was some doubt, when chatting with Roger, that we could obtain a recording.

'You don't need to read the instructions, just use it!' Said Lothar, who apparently has a similar but earlier model.

That may be fine for a chap who teaches Mathematics and Physics in possibly two languages but I'm the sort of guy who likes to open the box first, assess its contents and then start reading at page 1, where it tells me who owns the copyright and what trade marks are registered!

Whether I've got anything I have yet to find out, so if someone did manage to record the whole interview, please go ahead and put it up--don't wait for me.

If we are in dire straights I think I have Part 2 of a two-part interview but that is interrupted with a need to start the car as the queue I was in suddenly turned tail, literally and dived up the 'no entry' route where we were supposed to come in!

What I can say is this interview is worth pursuing. it is in the mould of the glorious Welsh radio interview (I'll leave the mods to edit in a link to that (please?!) with Hayley at her most relaxed bubbling effervescent!

Peter

[graemek]

Many Thanks Richard & Peter
for your very thorough coverage.

It is really lovely to read of Hayley's very significant
contribution to both Cadogan & Wisley.

Am I jealous? YES I AM!!!!

Graemek

[Dave]

Hello everyone, here is my - long winded(!) Wisley report. You can read it in bits (or ignore it!) if you like, I've put in some headings.

Before the concert

Arriving with Roger shortly after the gates opened at 5:30, we were soon inside on the large concert field with the usual outdoors large covered stage at one end and high trees at the other. The field was already well over half full and there were still nearly two hours to go! We soon noticed some frantic waving right at the front and recognised a group of HWI'ers including Richard Steve and Stuart, George and his wife were there and others too. We headed towards them, hoping they'd saved some space for us... and they had! Roger squeezed his foldup chair in but I was delighted to find out that an area in front of the chairs had been reserved for people like me with only ground sheets... and I sat down right in front of the others, next to Lothar and another long-distance visitor from Germany, very near the stage. Soon we were tucking into our picnics and generally chatting in the pleasant, sunny and warm early evening air. It really was a perfect day for a concert and we soon discovered that in practice, there were going to be no restrictions on photography

Minutes before the concert started we had a surprise visitor... Ian Tilley (Hayley's musical director) found us and asked Roger if he'd seen a request for a birthday dedication on the forums recently as they knew there was one - somewhere - but Hayley didn't have the details. None of us had seen this but we promised to try and find out by the interval. But I decided to make some text message enquiries anyway and spent part of the first half in contact with my daughter Emma who luckily was home by her computer at the time. She searched the recent messages in both forums (100 each I think)... but sadly, there was nothing to be found - but we tried (thanks Emma!) and it's nice to know that Hayley's team spotted us and thought we might be able to help. Ian came over again in the interval for the result of our search.

First Half

So the concert started, with the National Symphony Orchestra conducted by David Arnold... with the Overture from Marriage of Figaro. This set us up nicely and straight away after that,Hayley was announced and strode onto stage in a nice blue dress (photos later) to sing "May it Be". Hayley was delighted with the weather too and said so - she was quite chatty! She must have been delighted with the crowd too, Richard I think mentioned that a steward said they'd sold 2,500 tickets and looking round the crowded field, I could well believe it! Then, Hayley sang Pokarekare Ana to complete her first appearance and the orchestra played 633 Squadron. Tenors UnLimited were next on stage and included a very nice performance of The Pearl Fishers duet before the first surprise of the evening... the excellence of 16 years old Ben Baker, violinist. He played Schlinders List followed by an excellent performance of Rondo Capricioso by Rossini and ended it to loud and appreciative applause - which the conductor stopped in mid-stream! He then announced that due to a misunderstanding, Ben had completely missed his rehearsals that afternoon and this was the first time they'd ever played together. Needless to say, he got an even bigger ovation after that.

And then it was Hayley again... with lovely renditions of The Water is Wide - and Ave Maria (Schubert) in quartet with Tenors Un Limited! This was followed by Dambusters March, taking us to the interval. Stirring stuff indeed... and I'm sure they added a couple of extra orchestral pieces but I can't remember what they were! And we had little idea of what was to come after the interval...

Second Half

The second half started with orchestral Hungarian Dance no. 5 (Brahms) and Hayley was scheduled to appear next... but Tenors UnLimited came on instead! Oh dear, I thought, what's happened? Well the "boys" revealed all during their 3 song performance... "Hayley is having trouble with her sequins" joked one of them... which I took to mean "dress problems". We would find out a bit more about that later on The Tenors sung Nessun Dorma, O Sole Mio and a third song which escapes me and they were very good - not quite up to the Three Tenors standard though, obviously!

After an orchestral piece that was not listed in the programme, Hayley finally appeared! She was dressed in a nice wraparound dress in bright red of a very particular shade - the reason for which would become apparent later on! Although it took a few seconds for the sound guys to bring up Hayley's microphone, I heard her say something like "it's OK for you men, you don't have to worry about these kind of things!" (looking down at her dress) and it was clear to me she really had had dress trouble! (this was, you see, a very special dress...). Hayley sang Prayer and O Mio Babbino Caro and was followed by the orchestra (Strike up the Band?) before Hayley returned again... she had lost time to make up in the programme! Then Hayley sang beautiful orchestral versions of River of Dreams and Amazing Grace before she again left it to the orchestra.

Finale

And now, it suddenly turned into... The Last night of The Proms! David Arnold having briefly left the stage looking like a normal conductor black suited with tails, soon reappeared dressed in a bright red jacket - exactly the same shade as Hayley's red dress had been... as he turned away he revealed a large Union Jack (Union Flag for any pedants ) designed into the back of his jacket, to shouts of approval from the crowd. Quickly, he started Sailor's Hornpipe and also gave us instructions about how and when we should join in with clapping hands - and just like the real Last Night, he beckoned when it was time for us to start... and stop... and start again. Great fun was had by all and as it finished, onto the stage strode Hayley - followed by Tenors Unlimited. But this time, Hayley was carrying a HUGE Union Jack and so were the Tenors!

Hayley spent the next three songs, Jerusalem, Rule Britannia and Land of Hope and Glory waving the flag around (photos later) and joini4ng in all the choruses, leaving the Tenors mostly to take the lead - but Hayley was having a ball... and so were we! Hayley took time out to explain that she would be at The World Cup in Germany, singing Rule Britannia for England at the official concerts for England's matches and it was obvious that she loved her involvement - she also gained roars of approval when she wished England well in the World Cup. After a short reprise, Hayley received a huge bouquet of flowers and they left the stage to a standing ovation... this was stirring stuff!!!

Finally (we thought) the orchestra played The Can Can and the conductor tried to get some of us dancing (but with a few takers, LOL) while fireworks burst behind the stage. But I had to run down the aisle, well back into the field to get any photos of them. And we wouldn't let 'em stop, the party mood was in full swing as we demanded an encore - which we got, with Land of Hope and Glory again - to more fireworks as Hayley and the Tenors waved their flags enthusiastically. The crowd by this time had surged up to the stage and was highly animated... the performers were clearly enjoying it too!

So what was the exact colour of Hayley's troublesome dress that I mentioned earier? It was... the exact colour and shade of the red St George's Cross in the Union Jack that Hayley was carrying... a St George's dress!

After the concert

After the concert, Hayley came out and we were beckoned by Steve her Manager into a dark corner by the side of the stage and with a few others from the crowd who noticed this, we were able to chat and have a few photos in the darkness, illuminated only by the occasional torch and flashbulb. As Steve wondered away to take phone calls on his mobile, I noted two large security guards standing right behind Hayley.... better safe than sorry - especially in the darkness like that! After a while, Hayley asked where Steve was - she had to go (don't ask!) and I quickly pointed out to her that Roger was already scurrying across the field to bring him back (nice one Roger )

Wow, what an action packed evening, I am still out of breath! Photos later... but we won't even mention the lost car, eh, Roger? At least I managed not to get lost this time, on the long drive home! Many thanks to Hayley, the other performers and all intrepid HWI'ers who were there to help make it such an enjoyable evening.

Cheers, Dave

[roger]

No, we definitely won't mention the lost car, Dave. Actually, I knew where it was all along. I was just interested to see how long it would take you to work it out!

Roger

[Dave]

Photos!

Crowd scene near the start - wide view

Crowd scene close up with the HWI crowd at the front. Roger's hiding behind his hand,
Steve and Stuart are looking down into their camera bags and I'm hiding behind the camera!
You can also see Richard (stage left!), Tony, Lothar (stage front right), Peter (stage right) and more I'm sure!

[postscript]

Ah Dave, you've pipped me in my technique for the Cadogan Hall report. But I will post anyway before I leave for Huddersfield.

Oh dear, In that one sentence I've crossed three threads!
Peter

[Dave]

Hayley, first half

Hayley, waving to me (well that's what I say!)

[Dave]

Hayley, second half - that troublesome 'special' dress!

Hayley, flying the flag!
Well it's included in the NZ flag too, ain't it?

[Dave]

The finale - part one

Finale part 2 - Must be a GOAAALLLL!!!!

Awww, flowers... thanks Hayley!

Dave

[george]

Hi

We too, had a great night last night at Wisley. The reports above are so thorough there is nothing more to add!
It was lovely to meet with Hayley afterwards. There were just a few of us who were aware, so it seemed Hayley had so much more time to chat with us all.

It was great to meet and sit with all our HWI friends.

Dave your photos are fantastic! I cannot compete with them at all.

So I will just post the following ones:-













The strange look was because I was waiting for Denise and was not expecting my sister in law to click!
(Hayley, the professional was still ready)