This past Saturday Rob and I were accorded the honour by the International Brigade Memorial Trust (IBMT) of opening their fund raising event to remember the 75th Anniversary of the Spanish Civil War, held in conjunction with Philosophy Football at the New Red Lion Theatre pub in Islington in London.
This was an evening’s worth of remembrance, education and entertainment which took place on an exceptionally hot October evening, in an atmospheric and tightly packed pub.
In addition to ourselves, there was further music from Grace Petrie, there was a homage to Paul Robeson taken from the one-man show Call Mr. Robeson, by actor Tayo Aluko , a poetry recital by the Scottish poet Jackie Kay, and there was a panel session discussing the meaning and legacy of the Spanish Civil War to the world today. This involved celebrities and academics including Andy Croft, Robert Elms, Victoria Hislop, Helen Graham and Billy Bragg.
We arrived early for the sound check and watched Tayo rehearse some of his performance. To see such acting power close up was very impressive. We also watched the histrionics on a Norwich City fan who was watching a live stream of his team going down 2-0 to Manchester United. I like football as much as the next man and supporting my small home town team have more than my fair share of disappointments – but I haven’t yet resorted to throwing things around and beating objects on the floor. Most amusing.
We and Grace did our sound-checks and then we were interviewed by young film maker, Sanum Ghafoor, who was making a film of the event for a You Tube release. We then waited for the theatre to fill up.
The show was well marshalled and professional, starting prompt at 7.15pm. Following a brief visual exhibition on stage, we started the evening with Rob playing his usual excellent and powerful instrumental opening to The Bite, which immediately halted the chat and captured people’s attention. The Bite started the evening well.
Then, we moved off into the audience and waited to watch the panel session. The very pleasant Billy Bragg introduced himself to us and said some kind words about The Bite. There was the possibility that he would be prevailed upon to play something at the end of the panel session and, since he didn’t have his guitar, enquired whether he might use mine – which, of course, was fine. In the event, the panel session overran (as these can do) and I didn’t get the chance to boast that my guitar had been played by Billy Bragg. Rather, it was us called back onto stage to finish this first part of the evening - which we did with a rendition of English Penny, in honour of nurse Penny Feiwel who served in Spain and who, sadly, passed away recently. The song is rather hymnal in nature, with a chorus, and the audience soon picked the chorus up and we did have some singing along, which was great.
As we left the stage for a second time, the IBMT Chair, Marlene Sidaway said some very kind things about our support for the Trust. Various audience members, including senior trade unionists also congratulated us on our music. We were deeply honoured. Philosophy Football also gifted us some commemorative tee-shirts which are excellent and we shall wear them with pride.
We were able to stay to watch the poignant and funny Jackie Kay perform, and Rob had a nice conversation with Billy Bragg swapping stories from their personal links to the Spanish Civil War. Then, we needed to make for home. So, sadly we missed both Tayo and Grace’s performance – apologies to both of them.
It was also a huge honour to see the standing ovation deservedly given to International Brigader David Lomon, the living connection between today and the dark days of the Spanish Civil War.