Rye College Sunday 22 April   Donald Mackenzie

Exchanging the Metropolitan aura of the organ of the Odeon Leicester Square for the blossoming spring of the Rye countryside, Donald Mackenzie opened his programme on Rye’s Wurlitzer with a selection from Broadway musicals, Cabaret, Hello Dolly, Everything’s Coming up Roses from Gipsy. Then came a whistle-stop tour of Western Europe with Tulips from Amsterdam,  Sous les Toits de Paris, Funicule Funicula, Anton Karas’s Harry Lime Theme,  Falling in love Again, ever associated with Marlene Dietrich, That’s Amore, and a foot-tapping selection of Strauss Waltzes ending topically with Voices of Spring.

Jack Strachey, famous for These Foolish Things, wrote other hits as well.  Donald chose In Party Time, remembered as the introduction to BBC’s Housewives’ Choice.   A selection of Gracie Fields’ favourites began with Sing as We Go, Sally, the comedy number I Took My Harp to a Party, Now is the Hour, The Isle of Capri, Wish Me Luck as You Wave Me Goodbye, and ended with Everything Stops for Tea appropriately announcing the interval.

The second half opened from Eric Coates’s suite The Three Elizabeths,  the topical Springtime in Angus, and the third movement now termed Youth of Britain.  Jerome Kern contributed numbers from the scores of Showboat and the Astaire-Rogers  Swingtime,  Look for the Silver Lining,  Smoke gets in Your Eyes, Why Do I Love You,  Can’t Help Lovin’ that Man, Let Yourself Go, All the Things You Are and Ole Man River.

A request item was Highland Cathedral (not penned by a Scot but two German tunesmiths).  Donald ended with a reminder of the music of  Noel Gay, the public persona of Reginald Armitage, organist of Wakefield Cathedral, The Sun Has Got His Hat On (a Thirties film number for comedian Jack Hulbert but with renewed popularity in the West End revival of Me and My Girl,)  The Fleet’s in Port Again, Hey Little Hen, and most of all The Lambeth Walk.     MW