Wilton's Music Hall – Ian Louis Harris

Wilton’s Music Hall Door in 2010 by James Perry, CC BY-SA 3.0

Just back from our extraordinary trip to India & Sri Lanka –

India and Sri Lanka, 29 January to 26 February 2011, placeholder and links

…my first working day back in fact – we had a Z/Yen team symposium that afternoon followed by an evening of entertainment courtesy of the Gresham Society at Wilton’s Music Hall.

Very convenient for Michael and Elisabeth Mainelli, this, as Wilton’s is next door to them. It is a fabulous venue, steeped in history but, at that time anyway, in a very dilapidated state.

I think this was a proto Gresham Society event, probably connected to the AGM but before the latterly traditional AGM & Dinner. I also think this might have been a prototype of the thing that became the Gresham Society Biennial Soiree, as the first of those recorded in my diary was later that same year.

Anyway, this event, as I recall, was primarily a Gilbert & Sullivan evening, hosted by Professor Robin Wilson (who is an expert on Savoy Operas as well as mathematics) and mostly comprising performers from his associated choirs and musical troupes.

I seem to remember being required to sing along a fair bit and I think this might have been the first time (but certainly not the last time) I heard the Gresham Professor version of “A Policeman’s Lot”, both in English and, naturally, also in Latin.

I don’t remember how many of us retired to Café Spice Namasté after the Gresham Society do – quite a lot of us I think. In those days Café Spice was quite near Wilton’s – in Leman Street I think or at least very near there. I felt very at home in there having just spent a month eating Southern Asian food.

A very good evening – for me a rather jolly way to return to the world of work.

We weren’t expecting to see a show that day. Michael and Elisabeth invited us over “for the day” being a bit unspecific about the meal time, but suggesting that we might all take a swim in the pool of their newcapartment block. But, unbeknown to us, their plan was to serve an early meal and then pop out to see Fiona Shaw perform The Waste Land under Deborah Warner’s direction in Wilton’s Music Hall – within spitting distance of Michael and Elisabeth’s new place.

Good plan.

I recorded in my log that the piece was short and OK. I’ve never been over keen on The Waste Land as a piece of poetry. Fiona Shaw is of course marvellous and would probably hold one’s attention if reciting from the telephone directory.

Janie was intrigued by the T S Eliot aspect, as she had treated and continued to treat Valerie Eliot for many years.

Most interesting about the evening was seeing Wilton’s Music Hall, which had not been used for a performance for over 100 years and looked suitably distressed. I’m not sure that the health and safety brigade would today allow a performance in a place quite so distressed, but it was great to see it at that time. It has since been somewhat more revived.

Lyn Gardner warmed to the whole idea in The Guardian: