This was a members DIY evening but with a twist! What a great night this turned-out to be and the large number of members and visitors present were treated to a feast of music using the Club's Clavinova and Technics GA3 organ. Pam Rea brought here Korg Pa80 along to add even more variety and lovely styles. 
Doug Farr then presented a 16 mm cine film with sound of organ music from the 1940's. It was great to watch the artists using early models of the Hammond organ and early synthesizers - I didn't even know synthesizers existed in the forties, but there you go! Not only did we get some great organ music playing but we were treated to some big band playing from the era also together with some vintage W.C. Fields car chase classics. Thanks for sharing these rare cine movies with us Doug we all thoroughly enjoyed the show.
Next up Colleen Kerr played three pieces on the Clavinova with her usual great touch.
Then, Peter Littlejohn played some great arrangements on the Technics GA3 organ. Thanks Peter we know you have been fighting a flue bug the last couple of weeks and whilst not infectious we appreciate your playing when you were still in recovery mode.
After the refreshments break, Pam Rea entertained us with five pieces on her lovely Pa80 Korg keyboard. Nice sounds, nice arrangements - thanks Pam.
Next up, Takashi Iida (Taka) played a couple of lovely ballads on the GA3 organ. Taka puts so much feeling and expression into his music and did us proud as always, especially as he set-up the sounds on-the-fly for this organ that Taka is not too familiar with. Well done Taka!
After Taka, Roy Evans treated us to some classical piano style music on the Clavinova. "On My Own" (from Les Miserables) and "Misty" were lovely arrangements and played with great touch and sensitivity - thank you Roy for sharing and see, you didn't need to be so nervous, we thoroughly enjoyed your playing!
To finish the evening, Doug Farr came back and stepped-up to the Technics GA3 organ and played some superb theatre style music and again Doug is not too familiar with the GA3 but was able to get some gorgeous theatre sounds out of the organ and all done on-the-fly. Doug had taken the trouble to set-up a disk with his arrangements but in the heat of the moment the file did not load and hence the very successful improvisation!
We had two prizes, an egg poacher and a napkin holder. Visitor Laurie Conder won the egg poacher (for a second time) and Kathleen Croft won the napkin holder. Laurie on his last visit to the Club won the raffle and received the egg poacher, but afterwards he graciously returned the prize as he already had such a poacher at home. So providence stepped-in and low and behold he won the raffle again and the self-same egg poacher. Laurie took it home this time as it obviously had to be!
So all in all, a wonderful night of music and frivolities to long remember.
Next month we are building-up to music professional, Dave Hallam, coming along to give us a second-half concert and those that were at the Club last year will know what a treat we are in for. Dave has his own band as well as offering tutoring in keyboards and piano - playing and technique. See the right-hand panel for further details and contact details for Dave.
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