St Mary In The Castle

Come early and stay late!

On Saturday, 21 September, St Mary in the Castle are celebrating their newly acquired status as a Charitable Trust with a day of FREE entertainment. Performers from all over the South Coast are giving their time free to promote this wonderful and iconic arts venue. The show will be a real Hullabaloo, writes HOT’s Chris Cormack.

Liane singing from the heart!

See Hastings’ own carnival queen and her court open the Hullabaloo at midday – Come early to catch Hastings’ beloved jazz singer, Liane Carroll, at about 12.20pm before she pops off for her date at Ronnie Scott’s in London’s Soho.  Following Liane at around 1pm will be Poppy Prescott, a second generation Hastings musician, and then Jonathan Martin.

At about 2pm Duncan Reid will accompany singers Lucy Ashton (often to be heard at the Holy Trinity lunchtime concerts), Margaret Lawrence and Bernard Perkins, who became well known at Hastings’ Music Festival, and from singing with several local music groups: Opera South East, Battle Light Opera and Waites & Measures to name but a few. Then Josie Body leading the audience in some Old Time Music Hall songs.

At about 3pm comes Tony May, the ‘music nut’ ex DJ, who also likes to make music of his own and has recorded a series of original albums with producer, Harvey Summers as both a singer/songwriter and as a poet and then Alba Torriset followed at about 4pm by Keith Foster.

Mike Hatchard

Michael Short, the multi-faceted musician and composer in jazz, classical and purveyor of whimsy performs for us at about 4.30pm followed by Victoria Howarthaccompanied by Mike Hatchard.Mike Hatchard at 5.30pm  has played with Barbara Thompson’s Paraphernalia, Tina May, the National Youth Jazz Orchestra and the London Chamber Ensemble. At the Royal College of Music he studied piano with Peter Wallfisch and composition with Philip Cannon. He later became Matt Monro‘s youngest ever musical director, and toured America with the Dankworth quintet accompanying the legendary Cleo Laine. He has been described as ‘like Victor Borge on Acid’!

Sugar Loaf Band in front of folly

And STAY LATE!!  In the evening, starting at 8pm, there is a free ceilidh with popular local performers The Sugar Loaf Band, many of whom have played at the major folk festivals. The Sugar Loaf Band play in a traditional English style but draw from many sources which are both traditional and recently penned. Formed in 2007 from within Mad Jack’s Morris for a ceolidh at Battle, they proceeded to include other local musicians and have decades of experience between them in various bands including Banjax and the Catsfield Steamers.

There will also be tours of the building, and well known story teller, Ben Fairlight, will be in the baptistry storytelling to delight the children. Ben Fairlight is perhaps best known as a Storyteller and Herbsman but he is also a great singer/songwriter as his performances at the Meet of the Tongue show.

There is also a ‘Poets Corner’ near the crypt where performance poets will do their thing at intervals. These poets include Tom Harvey, Respond  and Active Arts rappers, Copperplate, Yvonne Rees, and Jan and Nigel Wilkins, roughly in that order between 1.30pm and 5pm Five popular local charities, the RNLI. The Carers Association, Active Arts, The Friends of the Conquest Hospital and Bluebell Ridge, will be displaying material in the crypt and talking about their work.

Hastings Hullabaloo 21 September 2013 starting at midday at St Mary in the Castle, 7 Pelham Crescent TN34 3AF – entrance and all events are FREE! All times are necessarily approximate!

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