“.. you blink as your lifetime passes
In the morning glare of the sun;
Then suddenly it is evening,
And your life has scarcely begun.
You may search for lost time, but not find it,
However close it may seem;
For the past is a vanished country
And the present will soon be a dream.”
From ‘Time’ by Alison Evans (15.7.47 – 13.12.24)
Alison was a founder member of the choir. Her open smile is an abiding memory.
On the 17th of January, her family held a celebration of her life in Hemel Methodist Church. It was an uplifting and joyous occasion, with musical and spoken contributions from family and friends and a combination of the different faiths of Alison and Martin, Quakerism and Buddhism.
She and Martin, her husband of forty-six years, met at a folk dancing class in Cecil Sharpe House, in 1977, and married the next year. Children, Thomas and Susi, born in 1979 and 1980 completed the family.
The poem above was discovered after her death and read by Martin. The family were searching through some of her papers looking for a piece of her music they might use for the memorial and found ‘Time’ which she had printed out only a couple of months before in October. Susi told me that if it hadn’t been printed, they probably would have missed it, and it might have been lost forever.
I only knew Alison though DCC so I was overwhelmed when I learnt of the breadth of her talents. She sang, of course, she composed music, she wrote poetry, and she painted delicate watercolour landscapes. She played the violin and recorder but her passion was for the Northumbrian pipes, a passion which she passed on to Susi.
It is impossible in such a short piece to do more than touch on Alison’s full and fulfilled life. Someone said of her, ‘She really was the most beautiful soul.’
She will be much missed by all those whose lives she touched.
It is often said that our choir is like a family. People come to us for many reasons. Some after retirement, some after a bereavement, many because our daytime rehearsals suit their lifestyles.
We take our music seriously, but that doesn’t stop our meetings from being fun. Rufus, our Musical Director, has a fund of anecdotes which often result in gales of laughter ringing round the room.
We give three concerts over the course of a year -the next on May 10th. We give short performances for local groups – the last at Our Lady Queen of All Creation on January 19th.
The choir meets at the Church of the Resurrection in Grovehill, on Tuesdays from 9.45am in term time. There are no auditions, all are welcome. We number over a hundred so you will find there’s plenty of support.
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See www.dacorumcommunitychoir.org for more details.
