Chopin

We had a concert in our church to celebrate the birth of Frédéric Chopin.  Why?  Probably mainly because we have a concert-standard piano.  Although on occasion it has been lowered to the indignity of having me play it, on this night it was played by a master musician, Warren Mailley-Smith.

The concert was put on by one of our local Music Societies, one of whose members kindly invited me.  I turned up as that most general of all human expressions, 'a member of the public'.  One armed, though, with inside information that the seats near the back are warmer and more padded than most and there I parked myself.

People arrived, music officianados one and all I imagine, and took their places in the gloom observing the spotlit stage.  Very few seemed at all familiar to me.  Three well-dressed people slid into the row in front of me.

"It's a nice church", said an older man in a refined voice.  His younger companion muttered his agreement at this architectural observation.

"How many manuals do you think the organ has?"  It was not a question that I guessed was usually asked by the church's visitors, but whatever.  The younger man muttered again without giving an answer.  Knowing the answer I was about to venture it but then felt this conversation would be more interesting without me introducing myself.  (If the number of manuals on any British organ alive or dead bothers you this link is the one to consult.  Our organ is IIIP . . .)

The older man continued his expansive observations, "They use Mission Praise".   I braced myself.  I suspected Mission Praise was unlikely to be the hymnbook of choice of my involuntary companions.  But without more ado the conversation moved on . . .

"I wonder how many people they get?".  The younger man muttered in his refined manner - he only ever muttered it seemed to me - again without apparantly offering an answer.  This fly-on-the-wall experience was turning out disappointingly boring.  But then the older man added casually,

"Mostly West Indian, I should think."  The younger man nodded knowledgeably his assent.  I stared.

I stared at the familiar wooden gallery.  I stared at the grand piano on the stage.  I stared at the back of the heads of the Anglo-Saxon with a dash of Oriental audience.  I stared at the dark red ceiling, the shiny organ casing, the lecturn made locally, the wall, the windows, the Bibles in the pews.  If you'd been there I would have stared at you.

I stared because no matter where I stared I could not come up with the remotest spark of a reason why this gentleman and his muttering ally could possibly speculate, let alone conclude, the racial make-up of the congregation that meets on a Sunday.

Chopin will, for me, be forever linked with the vain search for evidences of the Caribbean in an Edwardian English non-Conformist chapel interior.