The Friends of Shakepeare’s Church have set themselves the formidable task of raising substantial capital sums to repair and restore a famous building that has stood at the centre of Stratford’s religious and civic life for seven or eight centuries. They have made good progress: a cheque for £30,000 has been handed over, stonework grotesques have been replaced, parapets repaired, and dry rot and wet rot are about to be tackled by expert builders and craftsmen. A vigorous programme is in very good hands and, with the support of the town trust and individual donations, looks sure to arrest the decay of ages.

What the Friends may not initially have envisaged is the contribution the organisation is making to the cultural life and enjoyment of the town. Yet this is indeed the case, not least with the concert, or more appropriately the entertainment provided last Thursday by the touring company the Oxford Waits under the title Hey for Christmas. A robust, jocular programme of music, featuring period instruments such as the baroque violin, lute, hurdy-gurdy, nakers (sic), bagpipes and pipe and tabor was offered. This was interspersed with readings from authors such as the Oxford chronicler Anthony à Wood, and diarists John Evelyn and Samuel Pepys. The words and music, spoken and sung by performers in traditional costume, focused on Christmas, and was throughout taken from 17th (or occasionally 16th or 18th century sources.

The five-strong company bases its activities on the real-life band of musicians known as the Oxford Waits which, in the tradition on other cities, provided entertainment for the people of Oxford in the period of the civil war and the restoration, as well as before and after. Led by the ebullient Tim Healey, humorous, crowd-pleasing and garrulous in keeping with his material, the Waits featured in addition the sweet-voiced Caroline Butler, the accomplished lutanist (and lute-maker) Edward Fitzgibbon, the lugubrious-looking but multiply-accomplished Jon Boden and the remarkable Ian Giles, a renowned folk singer of astonishingly deep voice and engaging personality.

The virtuosity of the group across a whole range of popular song and light-hearted reading beguiled even the traditionally resistant Stratford audience into participating in communal singing of the rounds Banbury Ale and Great Tom is Cast – a sure sign of success – one in each half of of what proved a thoroughly delightful evening’s entertainment and good fellowship.

We may wish the Friends well in their fundraising activities, and encourage them to promote yet more occasions in Stratford of both a serious and popular cast.

Ronnie Mulryne
Stratford Herald 18/12/03