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ROCHDALE LIGHT ORCHESTRA presents a Jubilee Concert in a town of music

Graham Marshall founded The Rochdale amateur Light Orchestra in 2008 with the help of some enthusiastic local musicians. They wanted to get together on a regular basis to rehearse and perform music of a generally light-hearted nature from the mediæval to the present times. This they have done, with the obvious exception of lockdown and other necessary quiet times!

WHEN THE BOAT COMES IN

It is important to keep the historical memory of the island alive, in this sense, and I believe there is a budget to set up a Fishing Museum on the island, Why hasn't it been done?

THE COST OF FREE SPEECH

My own unconstructed but long held views on the matter I usually express by saying, if you cling to freedom of speech you must afford others the same right whether or not you agree with what they say, I do know that any time I have got into a fight it has begun at exactly the moment I realised I had overstepped the line between free speech and gratuitous insult.
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BITS AND PIECES FALL INTO PLACE (vol. 1)

One member in particular had a special, reason to take part in the concert, as she is constantly worrying about her family back in Ukraine.. She was sad no doubt, but very proud, that the choir was wearing blue sashes and the brilliant yellow sunflowers that symbolise Ukraine.. She is originally from the country´s Poltova region but was living in the city of Kyiv when she met her Spanish husband before he got a job here in Lanzarote, and the couple moved over here.That city they left behind is now horribly damaged, as we have seen on our tv reports. Natalia Tunik arrived on Lanzarote over ten years ago. Since the Russian invasion of her country she has been campaigning and fundraising to aid Ukraine, whilst taking poart in concerts like tonight´s over on mainland Spain as well.
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TAPES RECORDED ALONG THE TRAIL + bits & pieces; Adsubian Art Gallery, Ribble Valley Jazz & English Folk Expo

. By writing new music influenced by the roots music many of them listened, some of these musicians, Tom Russell, in particular perhaps, themselves became music-ethno-musicologists, taking music around and in so doing strengthened its flavour rather than diluted it- My memory of those times is of how Russell, Tom Paxton, Townes, Guy Clark, Bill Staines , Butch Hancock (and his Flatlander mate Jimmie and Joe) and Nanci Griffith too created new music and took it forwarded. I also remember, though, that all these artists in performance would explain to we in the audience the geographical and ethnic roots from which their own music had grown.
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MARLENE BEWICK; meanders down Memory Lane

The voluntary sector was very strong in Rochdale and they too deserve massive credit for they work they did, of course
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How we celebrated CANARY ISLANDS DAY

The lighting was angled in to  nooks and crannies around the square and up into the trees, and as the wind gently skittered the leaves and branches it was if we were looking up into the sky in a trippy, Beatle-esque magical Mystery tour kind of way.

a stage for all the world ON LANZAROTE

This was not, to be confused with the ofte insipid fusion music that often is distilled into a homogeny until it sounds like a root alcohol that has been watered down until it tastes like tea. No, this is the real thing, a raw, new sound celebrating its nationality and its people and its origins here in a safe place.

LIVE MUSIC BOUNCING BACK !??! by Norman Warwick

LIVE MUSIC BOUNCING BACK !??! wonders Norman Warwick Just to say a big, big thank you! began a brief e mail from the organisers of Ribble Valley Jazz And Blues Festival. That´s ok, I thought, what have I done? Then I realised this…