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“The Party’s Over Now…”
Mike Daw, March 2006
When the great Noel Coward wrote that famous
song in 1932, he may little have guessed how
appropriate his lyrics would prove to be for
Bath more than 70 years later.
For the event that, for more than thirty
years, has opened the Bath International Musical
Festival, and which came to be known as the
country’s greatest free party, is indeed over.
What started in 1975 as a fairly small event in
the Park in front of the Crescent attracting a
few hundred people, grew into a huge affair with
a massive stage and up to 30,000 revellers
spilling over into the surrounding, candle-lit
streets. A good well-behaved time was usually
had by all and the final fireworks behind the
silhouette of the Crescent seemed to get ever
more spectacular.
But this year, the Festivals Trust’s newly
appointed Artistic Director and its Executive
Director have decided that the event has had its
day. They want to exemplify their new stamp on
the Festival by bringing the Opening Night into
the City Centre. They feel that the setting here
attracts the criticism of elitism and that the
single stage does not allow the full range of
music which the Festival offers to be promoted
sufficiently. By spreading the event across the
City, with several stages, they also hope to
diminish the mounting complaints from Bathonians
and visitors alike that during the Festival
there is virtually nothing in the City itself to
show that such a major event is happening.
Mercifully the charming childrens’ fancy
dress procession, created in 1982, will be
retained, but re-routed and a new central space
will be arranged for some of their delightful
creations to be displayed.
Those with long memories will recall the
early days of the Opening Nights here. At first
there was gentle music from the Park Bandstand,
with Madrigal singers on the steps of No.1 and
elsewhere and residents taking picnics – some
complete with candelabras – onto the Lawn. The
vast majority of residents in the Crescent and
surrounding streets put lighted candles in their
windows and, at the Society’s suggestion, the
street lamps were turned off so as to emphasise
the effect. Many visitors described the whole
scene as “magical”.
This tranquil approach soon changed as the
event became somewhat military in nature, with
marching bands, Police displays, sky-divers
trailing coloured smoke, athletic displays and a
fully rigged and sparred mast manned by Naval
cadets, complete with a “Button-Boy” climbing
slowly to the very top and coming down more
quickly by sliding on one of the guy-ropes.
There were Trumpeters on the front roof-top
corners of Nos 1 and 30 sounding the Last Post
and the whole thing was somewhat formal.
Later this approach was modified and the
Festival was opened by more relaxed luminaries
such as Anthony Andrews, Jenny Agutter, Pam
Ayres, Jilly Cooper, Jane Seymour and even Fiona
Fullerton.
Once the main stage-shell was introduced,
sometime near when the Bath Chronicle began its
sponsorship, the policy of making the event more
accessible, in the jargon of the day, showed
itself in the encouragement of concession stands
around the Park. These ranged from craft and
slightly “hippy” stalls to bangers, balloons and
Boar-Burgers! A wide variety of music was played
on the stage by a world-wide range of
performers.
Crescent Residents have always shown mixed
feelings towards the Opening Night. The majority
thoroughly enjoy them, lighting their candles,
joining the throngs on their doorsteps or using
the events as admirable excuses for giving
parties of their own – with free cabaret! A few
take a less favourable view and regard the whole
thing as inappropriate, but they remain in the
mostly silent minority.
But, as the song almost puts it “… the
melodies that charmed us so, at last are ended….
the candles gutter, the spotlight leaves the
park…. lets creep away from the day, for the
Party’s over now”.
(The author is indebted to Councillor Tim
Bullamore’s book “Fifty Festivals” for some
information for this piece).
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