Keith Vinerd Interview: Beginnings of Boys' Brigade Shows at the Theatre Royal
Title
Keith Vinerd Interview: Beginnings of Boys' Brigade Shows at the Theatre Royal
Date
6 November 2017
Description
Oral history interview with Keith Vinerd about the history of the Boys' Brigade shows at the Theatre Royal.
What's the story?
The Theatre Royal has a long history and involvement with local community-based organisations that have used the venue and its resources to stage their shows. These include Nottingham Operatic Society, Nottinghamshire Scouts and Guides (The Gang Show) and Carlton Operatic Society.
From the late 1950s another regular user was the Nottingham Boys’ Brigade.
Established in Glasgow in 1883 by Sir William Alexander Smith, the Boys’ Brigade was the first voluntary uniformed youth movement in the world and today engages with over 50,000 children and young people, providing opportunities to meet together in their communities and engage in a range of fun and developmental activities.
Keith Vinerd was a member of the Boys’ Brigade as a boy and continued to be involved in the organisation.
In this interview Keith talks about the beginnings of the Boy’s Brigade shows at the Theatre Royal.
And the Empire was where I first came into it, really, because I’d just managed to do about - I think we used to do a Saturday afternoon show in those days. That’s what we were doing when I joined. And I did one of the last shows, I think, on a Saturday afternoon at the Empire, as a boy, and then by the time we came to the Theatre Royal, which was 1957, I think I was a Staff Sergeant or something, so I was more or less on the staff by then. So I didn’t perform.
It was always just the boys. We never had officers, maybe perhaps in the band we might have had one or two officers, but it was always boys, so I was too old after that, by the time we came to the theatre. But I used to help backstage. That was 1957. The reason it was 1957 was that the Boys’ Brigade in Nottingham hosted the Boys’ Brigade National or International Council and so they all converged from all over the United Kingdom and elsewhere, hosted at the Nottingham University, and we put on a full week at the Theatre Royal, with most of the Council coming to the final performance on the Saturday night. That was the point, really. And so we did a full week’s show and I think even we were surprised with how successful it was. We managed to fill the theatre every night - a lot, of course, parents – but also a lot of other interested people.
And so it was very successful and after that we did it every two years. There were one or two hiccups. One year, I think, somebody double-booked the theatre, so we had to get out of the sequence, and then another year I don’t know the reason but we didn’t do it, but otherwise it was biannual and I think we did it until our centenary year, 1983. And we did a full week’s show and then we found that it was getting too expensive and we weren’t able to fill the theatre quite as easily.
So we continued to do the show. In those days it was called Nottingham Rock. A little bit misleading because I think the general public thought it was a rock show, so maybe that’s why we didn’t get the support we could have done. But it was called Nottingham Rock because we always started the first item, there was always a backcloth of the Nottingham Castle mounted on Nottingham Rock. And it was the foundation, if you like. I mean our emblem is an anchor in a rock and that was the connection. So it was called Nottingham Rock until we moved away after 1983. We moved to the George Street Theatre and we’ve used one or two other local theatres since.
From the late 1950s another regular user was the Nottingham Boys’ Brigade.
Established in Glasgow in 1883 by Sir William Alexander Smith, the Boys’ Brigade was the first voluntary uniformed youth movement in the world and today engages with over 50,000 children and young people, providing opportunities to meet together in their communities and engage in a range of fun and developmental activities.
Keith Vinerd was a member of the Boys’ Brigade as a boy and continued to be involved in the organisation.
In this interview Keith talks about the beginnings of the Boy’s Brigade shows at the Theatre Royal.
And the Empire was where I first came into it, really, because I’d just managed to do about - I think we used to do a Saturday afternoon show in those days. That’s what we were doing when I joined. And I did one of the last shows, I think, on a Saturday afternoon at the Empire, as a boy, and then by the time we came to the Theatre Royal, which was 1957, I think I was a Staff Sergeant or something, so I was more or less on the staff by then. So I didn’t perform.
It was always just the boys. We never had officers, maybe perhaps in the band we might have had one or two officers, but it was always boys, so I was too old after that, by the time we came to the theatre. But I used to help backstage. That was 1957. The reason it was 1957 was that the Boys’ Brigade in Nottingham hosted the Boys’ Brigade National or International Council and so they all converged from all over the United Kingdom and elsewhere, hosted at the Nottingham University, and we put on a full week at the Theatre Royal, with most of the Council coming to the final performance on the Saturday night. That was the point, really. And so we did a full week’s show and I think even we were surprised with how successful it was. We managed to fill the theatre every night - a lot, of course, parents – but also a lot of other interested people.
And so it was very successful and after that we did it every two years. There were one or two hiccups. One year, I think, somebody double-booked the theatre, so we had to get out of the sequence, and then another year I don’t know the reason but we didn’t do it, but otherwise it was biannual and I think we did it until our centenary year, 1983. And we did a full week’s show and then we found that it was getting too expensive and we weren’t able to fill the theatre quite as easily.
So we continued to do the show. In those days it was called Nottingham Rock. A little bit misleading because I think the general public thought it was a rock show, so maybe that’s why we didn’t get the support we could have done. But it was called Nottingham Rock because we always started the first item, there was always a backcloth of the Nottingham Castle mounted on Nottingham Rock. And it was the foundation, if you like. I mean our emblem is an anchor in a rock and that was the connection. So it was called Nottingham Rock until we moved away after 1983. We moved to the George Street Theatre and we’ve used one or two other local theatres since.
Type
Oral interview
Location of item
Theatre Royal & Royal Concert Hall
Rights
Theatre Royal & Royal Concert Hall
Contributor
Interviewers: Liz Mackenzie & Stephen Bray
Transcriber: David Chilton
Transcriber: David Chilton
