Last Tuesday, 24/3/12, I went to a concert in the Festival Hall where 800 children from Lambeth Primary Schools sang to us. When we found our places they were all on stage, sitting still and chatting, laughing and waving to us. The conductor came in and asked for silence, which she got immediately. There followed 10 songs, in various languages, sung with enthusiasm and skill and it was a beautiful experience for audience and children. There had been only one rehearsal of the entire choir, that morning, because, of course they could not be all got together more than once, but all the work had been done in the individual schools.
Afterwards the children were kept on stage for 10 minutes while the parents followed the instructions they had received as to how to find their particular school. We went to 3-GREEN for Rosendale and in no time Ava appeared and we went off to find ice creams on the South Bank.
I write this because we have an unfortunate tendency to stress our failures in this country, and never to rejoice at our achievements. This was definitely a moment for rejoicing on two counts, music teaching and organisation. Congratulations to Lambeth!
What seemed to me missing was a song at the end that everybody could sing together. God Save the Queen isn't considered appropriate any more. Could we not have something short and sweet that everybody can learn the words to and be generally uplifting to all?
This blog is a plea for common sense in public policy. Our leaders don't seem to have any. They just make daft rules for us to follow. We need to assert our right to use our own good sense instead of ticking boxes which can only say 'yes' or 'no'.
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