“You are going to hear the story of a day in the life of a church, a very special day..
This amazing document was recorded FIFTY YEARS AGO on 3rd August 1955 and it is fascinating to hear how we were then, how we sang, how we spoke, how we expressed our faith and how a complete vestry could be built for less than a thousand pounds! Southerly, Folly Gate, Bratton Clovelly and Southcott Methodist Chapels were still on the plan and television had only recently become available in Okehampton, often speaking in Welsh! The recorded voices are generally very vivid and somehow have much more life than a photograph. These were the days of heady excitement when sound recordings could be made on magnetic tape and played back immediately and such a programme as this would have been almost revolutionary outside of the BBC. East St Church, of course, is just a memory (it was demolished in 1964/5) as are most of the people here recorded. But the spirit of it all still burns brightly today within the united fellowship at Fairplace…
Live recordings made on the day at East St. Church and on location around the town. Recorded by Leslie Bailey, lan Cann and John Holland and narrated by Derek Allin.
Edited and produced by Leslie Bailey.
I was fifteen years old when the events on this CD took place and I can well remember humping around the heavy equipment from one location to another on the day. Luckily we had two Ferrograph tape machines and Leslie Bailey had managed to borrow a unit called a mains converter for locations away from a suitable mains supply so that the equipment could be run from a 12 volt car battery.
The technique of tape splicing was not yet in general use so that the editing of many hours of recording was done by copying selected excerpts from one machine to another to form a master. The result is essentially what you hear on this CD. I have taken out some clicks and plops inevitable with copy editing and generally used modern computer editing to equalise sound levels etc. The original tape is clearly beginning to decay slightly (only really noticeable in music) but I feel that Mr Bailey’s achievement is very considerable and certainly deserves to be heard, as the commentary puts it, in 50 years time….
John Holland 7/05
