Another jam packed concert for the Northern School of Music with a mix of thoroughly dead and still living composers.

Ref: NSM/20

Part of the #NSM2020 project "A 20/20 Legacy: the centenary of the Northern School of Music" supported by the National Lottery Heritage Fund.

3 more jam packed concerts showcasing the senior and junior musical talents at the Northern School of Music. A sprinkling of contemporary composers including Walter Carroll, staunch supporter of the Northern School of Music, local children's composer, and father of the school's secretary and future principal Ida Carroll.

All looks damned exhausting.

Ref: NSM/20

Part of the #NSM2020 project "A 20/20 Legacy: the centenary of the Northern School of Music" supported by the National Lottery Heritage Fund.

The Manchester Chamber Concerts Society organised a bunch of performances, offering cheap tickets to music school students at the time.

Ref: NSM/20

Part of the #NSM2020 project "A 20/20 Legacy: the centenary of the Northern School of Music" supported by the National Lottery Heritage Fund.

Is there any opera company that *hasn't* had a go at Figaro? This seems pretty full scale - including chorus and orchestra. That's *a lot* of people to shuffle in the Lesser Free Trade Hall.

Ref: NSM/20

Part of the #NSM2020 project "A 20/20 Legacy: the centenary of the Northern School of Music" supported by the National Lottery Heritage Fund.

This is a pretty big deal for for the Northern School of Music. Not only is the orchestra conducted by Ernest Read, a pretty bog name at the time, but they've managed to borrow the leader of the Hallé Orchestra Arthur Percival.
No pressure, everyone.

Ref: NSM/20

Part of the #NSM2020 project "A 20/20 Legacy: the centenary of the Northern School of Music" supported by the National Lottery Heritage Fund.

Still surprised by how much music they can pack into one programme.

Ref: NSM/20

Part of the #NSM2020 project "A 20/20 Legacy: the centenary of the Northern School of Music" supported by the National Lottery Heritage Fund.

The Northern School of Music opening its concert with another contemporary composer, Howard Ferguson. Sprinkling the rest of the concert with other contemporary composers amongst the standard names.

The Hirsch String Quartet was formed way back when the Northern School of Music was called the Matthay School of Music. Leonard Hirsch, a violin teacher and great friend of the school, started to gather talents for his quartet. He would only consider students from the school.

Ref: NSM/20

Part of the #NSM2020 project "A 20/20 Legacy: the centenary of the Northern School of Music" supported by the National Lottery Heritage Fund.

The Hirsch String Quartet was formed way back when the Northern School of Music was called the Matthay School of Music. Leonard Hirsch, a violin teacher and great friend of the school, started to gather talents for his quartet. He would only consider students from the school.

I like looking at the adverts on the back of programmes. They tell you about who they expected audience would have been. In this case, it's HMV customers!

Ref: NSM/20

Part of the #NSM2020 project "A 20/20 Legacy: the centenary of the Northern School of Music" supported by the National Lottery Heritage Fund.

The Hirsch String Quartet was formed way back when the Northern School of Music was called the Matthay School of Music. Leonard Hirsch, a violin teacher and great friend of the school, started to gather talents for his quartet. He would only consider students from the school.

Ref: NSM/20

Part of the #NSM2020 project "A 20/20 Legacy: the centenary of the Northern School of Music" supported by the National Lottery Heritage Fund.

The Hirsch String Quartet was formed way back when the Northern School of Music was called the Matthay School of Music. Leonard Hirsch, a violin teacher and great friend of the school, started to gather talents for his quartet. He would only consider students from the school.

Ref: NSM/20

Part of the #NSM2020 project "A 20/20 Legacy: the centenary of the Northern School of Music" supported by the National Lottery Heritage Fund.

The Hirsch String Quartet was formed way back when the Northern School of Music was called the Matthay School of Music. Leonard Hirsch, a violin teacher and great friend of the school, started to gather talents for his quartet. He would only consider students from the school.

Ref: NSM/20

Part of the #NSM2020 project "A 20/20 Legacy: the centenary of the Northern School of Music" supported by the National Lottery Heritage Fund.

In 1953 the Northern School of Music's drama students teamed up with Theological students of the Unitarian College of Manchester. They perform Clive Sansom's The Witnesses, about Jesus' last days, published just a couple years before as a series of poems.

Ref: NSM/20

Part of the #NSM2020 project "A 20/20 Legacy: the centenary of the Northern School of Music" supported by the National Lottery Heritage Fund.

Another three concerts packed with senior and junior students of the Northern School of Music. Still performing music from contemporary living composers. I wonder if any of these are the Manchester premiere of these pieces?

Ref: NSM/20

Part of the #NSM2020 project "A 20/20 Legacy: the centenary of the Northern School of Music" supported by the National Lottery Heritage Fund.

Die Fledermaus was the Northern School of Music's second opera, a chaotic comedy about mistaken identities and love scandals.
The school did pretty well. According to the Guardian review, it was “highly meritorious and not lacking in grace and sparkle,” especially since “the average professional performance of ‘Die Fledermaus‘ in this country rarely comes nearer to Vienna than Surbiton or Salford.” (Alright that's pretty rude.) The production’s direction ”did much to overcome the disadvantages of the small stage.”

Ref: NSM/20

Part of the #NSM2020 project "A 20/20 Legacy: the centenary of the Northern School of Music" supported by the National Lottery Heritage Fund.

A heads up by the Northern School of Music advertising their first ever opera performance, The Bartered Bride.

Ref: NSM/20

Part of the #NSM2020 project "A 20/20 Legacy: the centenary of the Northern School of Music" supported by the National Lottery Heritage Fund.

The Junior School of the Northern School of Music was the parent of the RNCM Junior School. With this legacy, Hilda Collens ensured the musical training and enrichment of thousands of young people and children for nearly a century. Big up Hilda Collens!

Ref: NSM/20

Part of the #NSM2020 project "A 20/20 Legacy: the centenary of the Northern School of Music" supported by the National Lottery Heritage Fund.

A programme for the Manchester String Orchestra in the Northern School of Music's archive. I'm not sure what the connection with the school is apart from the fact that they did have a string orchestra themselves. Perhaps students performed with it?

The orchestra was conducted by a woman, Clarice Dunington, and was led by a woman, Eva Martin. Fantastic!

If anyone has info about these two women or the orchestra itself, I would be fascinated to learn it.

Ref: NSM/20

Part of the #NSM2020 project "A 20/20 Legacy: the centenary of the Northern School of Music" supported by the National Lottery Heritage Fund.

It's Christmas! Again! I think this is my favourite Christmas concert by the Northern School of Music yet: it has a female composer listed!

Margaret Hubicki (1915-2006), was one of Annie Lennox's music teachers and also developed the "colour staff" to help people with dyslexia to read music. She was pretty awesome and the NSM performed two of her pieces in 1952.

Ref: NSM/20

Part of the #NSM2020 project "A 20/20 Legacy: the centenary of the Northern School of Music" supported by the National Lottery Heritage Fund.

A concert in true Northern School of Music style with well known composers such as Mozart and Bach and then a handful of contemporary English composers of the 20th century thrown in as well. I wonder if that was the students' decision or the school's own encouragement.

Ref: NSM/20

Part of the #NSM2020 project "A 20/20 Legacy: the centenary of the Northern School of Music" supported by the National Lottery Heritage Fund.

Another pretty epic oratorio (a large choral piece with solo singers accompanied by an orchestra, so pretty beefy) tackled by the Northern School of Music.
I like the typos here - its rare that you see these programmes annotated in the archive so this is lovely.

Ref: NSM/20

Part of the #NSM2020 project "A 20/20 Legacy: the centenary of the Northern School of Music" supported by the National Lottery Heritage Fund.

The Bartered Bride! This was the first opera that the school over produced. It's a comedy about true love triumphing over ambition and money. So there used to be things called "marriage brokers" who were people that did for your daughter what accountants now do for your mortgage deals?

Anyway, the school was really proud of its efforts. A Guardian article at the time claimed that it was “gay and competent... “bringing off an ambitious performance so well... No opportunity was missed in the production which was complete with circus and ballet. There seemed to be no limit to the number ingenuity could place without crowding on the stage, but by the look of things even Vasek was a prize to be sought after, for girls vastly outnumbered boys. Are there more girl music students than men, or had all the village menfolk gone for soldiers?”

Ref: NSM/20

Part of the #NSM2020 project "A 20/20 Legacy: the centenary of the Northern School of Music" supported by the National Lottery Heritage Fund.

The Northern School of Music often liked to start with a good old fashioned "God Save the Queen". I hope it wasn't the whole thing, I only know the first couple of lines. It would be like back in church when you just know a bit to a hymn and the whole of the song gets carried by the life timers, while you just join in with the clappy bits.

Ref: NSM/20

Part of the #NSM2020 project "A 20/20 Legacy: the centenary of the Northern School of Music" supported by the National Lottery Heritage Fund.

This weird mashup of ye olde performances is from the Northern School of Music's musical students as well as their Speech and Drama students. Including Eileen Darbyshire! That's right, Emily Bishop from Corrie studied at the NSM!

A mystery remains however... who or what is The Unnamed Society?? According to the Guardian at the time, they seem to be well connected to the Whitworth Theatre venue but I can't find information about what they actually *were*.

The Whitworth Theatre was at the Whitworth Art Gallery, according to ads at the time.

Ref: NSM/20

Part of the #NSM2020 project "A 20/20 Legacy: the centenary of the Northern School of Music" supported by the National Lottery Heritage Fund.

The Northern School of Music were super keen on giving their students as much performance practice as possible, even the Junior School. They would organise these big recitals every summer. Despite being primarily a music teacher training school, they produced some pretty impressive musicians who took a career in performance all the way!

Ref: NSM/20

Part of the #NSM2020 project "A 20/20 Legacy: the centenary of the Northern School of Music" supported by the National Lottery Heritage Fund.