The Folk Passion Years

John Lockley, composer, piano and occasional bass 1968-72, recalls:

In Cambridge there was a Cambridge University 20th Century Church Light Music Group; instrumental (sic!) in this were Michael Lehr, Peter Casey, Alan Thomas and Trevor Jones. Michael was and is a prolific music writer; Peter wrote lyrics and Alan Thomas wrote tunes. There are a large number of Casey/Thomas songs from this era.

1968: Folk Passion? We do Them

I'd joined in September 1968. I was in the process of writing A Folk Passion for some of the young people at Bramhall Methodist Church where I was then a member. When I went to the student societies' fair at the beginning of the Michaelmas term in 1968, it was held in the Cambridge Corn Exchange (now completely revamped as a theatre and music venue). There, I met various members of the church light music group for the first time. I remember talking with Trevor Jones and saying that I was writing the music for A Folk Passion (my friend Mike Colley was the lyricist). Trevor's memorable instant reply was: "We put Folk Passions on". We had an instant rapport!

One of the earlier members of the group, Michael Lehr, returned in 1968 to give the group a talk on his experiences in running a music recording and publishing partnership, Reflection. They had mostly been recording LPs featuring collections of songs and modern hymns, performed and sung by a regular troupe of musicians and players, many of whom had started their musical careers with 20th Century. This planted the seed of an idea in our minds.

1969: Eeyore and the Easter Tour

The first performance of A Folk Passion by 20th Century was in Holy Trinity, Cambridge (opposite Eaden Lilley's) in February, 1969 (the première was by the church youth at Bramhall Methodist Church, on 12 January, 1969). At this time, the group also offered its help to various churches for special events and services. Over Easter 1969, the Cambridge University Twentieth Century Church Light Music Group went on tour to various places, including, if I remember correctly, Macclesfield. At the end of the academic year in 1969 I left Cambridge, but just after finals I spent quite a time collating the group's music library, collecting together the many songs and poems that the society used. I became a medical student at The London Hospital (now The Royal London Hospital), but continued to stay involved with 20th Century over performances of A Folk Passion.

Most of the old guard left at the end of the summer term 1969, and at the beginning of the next academic year the only thing that stopped the group collapsing was the prior existence of A Folk Passion; some of the players that had been recruited for the Easter tour stayed on. Notable among these were David Woodward and Pete Dobbs (Gonville and Caius). With the new influx of people the group effectively reformed itself and took off in a slightly different direction. This was the time when the name was changed simply to 20th Century. It was also the time when the emphasis of the group became a little more evangelical. In the middle and late 1960s there had been a very definite "social gospel" influence. The new group was a more overtly Bible-based in orientation, although there was no strict code of beliefs for members, and on at least one occasion we worked with a drummer who quite openly told us that he had no particular Christian beliefs at all! I was never quite sure why he wanted to be part of the band, but we needed a drummer and he was very good at it!

David Woodward, organ and guitar, 1969-72, recalls:

For touring purposes, 20th Century acquired a van to carry all the equipment. It was a second-hand diesel box van of some antiquity, which I collected from a garage in Acre Lane, Brixton, the purchase having been arranged through Pete Eustace's father in 1969. As the van had no seats, we fitted two old church pews longitudinally in the back. The van was affectionately known as Eeyore, inspired by the registration plate, which contained the letters EYU (I cannot remember the numbers). I think it previously belonged to a paint company, and the name "Waller" seems to stick in my mind in this connection (the very faded company name that had been removed could still be read on the side).

Peter Eustace, flute, 1969-72, recalls:

The garage in Acre Lane Brixton was called Escott and Co. and in fact belonged to my father; and it was he who had arranged the purchase for us, as he had taken the vehicle in part exchange for a new one. Eeyore was a Commer B-Type 1-ton van, previously owned by E and W Waller of Balham, a company who made and installed exhibition stands. The name was still on the side for several months after we took it over, and I remember my Dad being rather cross that we hadn't kept our promise to paint it out. The side panels were promptly covered with Folk Passion posters and then, while the van was being stored at Polly Taylor's parents' place in Burgess Hill during a vacation, it was repainted in a rather lurid blue and green scheme, apparently the choice of Michael "Clem" Clements who had that kind of taste in colours! The van's registration plate was in fact 258 EYU, which gave rise to the name Eeyore.

1970: Recording at Orange Studios

John Lockley, composer, piano and occasional bass 1968-72, recalls:

20th Century had made a homegrown recording of A Folk Passion at a special session at Dogsthorpe Methodist Church, Peterborough, but it wasn't of any professional quality. Eventually it was agreed that Reflection Records would record the work. In preparation for this, we gave a performance in one of the churches in Cambridge the week before we were due to go into the studio. Michael Lehr came up to hear us and we promptly gave the worst performance we'd ever done! I remember going back that evening to my digs in Cambridge and deciding that it wasn't worth going back to the London Hospital, because I was needed all week in Cambridge to rehearse everybody. We had intensive sessions all week, especially with the drummer, Pete Taylor, for whom I had not written a drum part that was subtle or complex enough. I remember him nearly falling off his stool with exhaustion.

Apparently it was touch-and-go as to whether Michael cancelled the recording session or not, but eventually it went ahead in October/November 1970 and we all trouped across to the Orange Studios in New Compton Street, off Charing Cross Road (opposite Old Compton Street). At that time, New Compton Street was a run-down road, with a rough parking area opposite, but the whole area has now been obliterated (including the road) and a new building covers the whole site. Orange Studios was downstairs from where they sold all the Orange amplifiers and speakers; and I remember that we frequently had to stop because of the rumble from the underground trains coming through beneath us. At that time Orange Studios was quite impressive - many studios were still working the old four-track system but Orange had 16 tracks: it also cost £16 an hour to hire, which was an absolute fortune at the time, considering that the average wage was about £30 a week.

The recording of A Folk Passion went ahead but there were all sorts of problems - the sustain pedal of the piano squeaked, the studio organ sounded nothing like a proper Church pipe organ; and Michael deemed 20th Century's soprano soloist (Polly Munroe) not to have quite enough vocal impact to allow her to sing everything, so he brought in two Reflection singers. The recording over-ran horribly, but we eventually finished it off, getting round the problem of not having a decent organ by going to St John's Ealing, and recording the pipe organ part there.

Pete "Bill" Fletcher, road crew, percussion and drums 1970-73, recalls:

I followed my elder brother to Cambridge, where I came across 20th Century. The group had been invited by Andy Knight to my home church, where I first heard them. It was through hearing the group that I decided to join them at Cambridge, where I found a personal faith in Jesus Christ. I was associated with the group from 1970-73, a contemporary of Polly Monroe, "Bong" and "Flute" (all of us born Peter had to choose new distinctive names). I was variously a roadie, percussionist and drummer, understudy to "Bong". I remember the band playing in support of the IVF (now UCCF) mission in Tunbridge Wells in autumn, 1971. This picture reminded me of Margaret O'Malley, sadly no longer with us. She also played rhythm guitar with "Clem" on lead and Andy Mackintosh on bass. But occasionally they wanted to do double lead and Margaret would take up the bass. Her rather classical style did not have the string bending approach of "Clem"and Andy but she gave them the backing they needed.

1971: Icthyan Singers and Riding Lights

Vince Cross, vocals and keyboards, 1970-72 recalls:

When I arrived there was a mix of folk and some rock music. We covered a lot of Sydney Carter and Joni Mitchell, wrote some of our own songs - now long forgotten and unrecorded - and of course we performed A Folk Passion. There were maybe 25 people loosely involved in 20th Century at the time, and different teams were assigned to different projects. So, while our musical style was centred in what you might nowadays call plugged-in folk music, we had a growing interest in rock music too. When I joined in 1970, I started out as the "singer in the rock band", covering numbers by Cream, but eventually I graduated to singing A Folk Passion after Richard Bradshaw left Trinity.

My time was divided between 20th Century and the other Cambridge Christian Music Group, the Ichthyan Singers, who were a quite separate outfit taking services on a similar basis to C20th, but singing traditional choral church music (rather well, we thought). We were good enough to get the occasional radio broadcast, or or cathedral gig. The standard of C20th gigs ranged from inspired to appalling, depending on the mix of people at the time. But I think we were a valid and interesting model of DIY evangelism (is there any other kind?) What I mean is that our hearts were in the right place, we prayed and thought about what we were doing very hard, and we usually kept our feet on the ground. What the effects were on the listeners, I don't know - a longitudinal study would be fascinating!

At the same time, Riding Lights Theatre Company, who made a tremendous contribution to Christian drama for the next twenty years, were flexing their muscles in Cambridge under Murray Watts (I would think he arrived in Cambridge in 1971). Geoffrey Stevenson, who was his partner in that project, now teaches at St. John's College Durham, and continues to reflect deeply and seriously about the interplay of Christianity and the media. Murray Watts and Paul Burbridge eventually took Riding Lights on tour round the UK, where they have become nationally famous for their cutting edge, high-energy ensemble drama, both Christian and secular. They set up a permanent base in Friargate, York in around 2000. They have many published plays and collections of sketches. Murray wrote the screenplay for the stop-motion animated film The Miracle Maker (Icon, S4C and Bible Society, 2000), which was a huge hit.

David Woodward, organ and guitar, 1969-72, recalls how June went decimal in February:

Mavis Watt decided to change her given forename from Mavis to June (her middle name) on 15th February, 1971 - the date that decimal currency was officially introduced in the UK. Later, she changed her surname by marrying John Lockley.

John Lockley, composer, piano and occasional bass 1968-72, recalls:

By this time 20th Century had a van to carry the equipment, which had the registration plate EYU, and so had been promptly christened Eeyore. We toured that year in the Eastbourne and London areas; in particular we gave memorable performances at St John's Ealing, on a number of occasions; also St Leonards' Shoreditch. I remember being there the day Stravinski died (6 April, 1971).

1972: A Folk Passion is Released

Michael Lehr, guitar and composer 1963-65, and founder of Reflection, recalls:

Over the previous few years, Reflection had accumulated a number of ex-members from 20th Century, until we got to the stage of recording the group's famous folk-rock oratorio A Folk Passion (by Lockley and Colley). We used the current 20th Century musicians, but supplemented the vocal line-up with personnel from Reflection. The full line-up for A Folk Passion required solo male and female vocal, a backing chorus, a full rock-band, jazz piano and church pipe organ! It was quite a daunting task doing the bulk of the recording in a studio and then going out on location to add the pipe organ seamlessly, but it worked. The LP was eventually released on Reflection Records (RL305) in 1972.

John Lockley, composer, piano and occasional bass 1968-72, recalls:

We did a week-long tour in Liverpool in Easter 1972. In Cambridge, I remember the group playing at: Great St Mary's (individual songs), the main Methodist Church, Holy Trinity, Peterhouse Chapel (we took the communion service there), St John's chapel (A Folk Passion); we also performed A Folk Passion at Bramhall Methodist church (where the work had originally premièred). We went on tour in Norwich; and also played A Folk Passion at Bunyan Meeting Church in Bedford. By 1971 I had written another musical, called Credo; this received two or three performances, but it never really caught on - certainly nothing like as well as A Folk Passion. I'd also written a communion service, which the group performed a couple of times.

20th Century continued performing long after I had to leave it because of medical commitments. I qualified in 1972, and from then on, being on-call meant that it was almost impossible to play regularly. I was fortunate to be able to be involved in the prestigeous performance of A Folk Passion, held in the following year at the Westminster Central Hall. But that's another story... Since then I've continued song writing, including a complete folk-rock/classical musical Luther!, based on the life of Martin Luther; and I have branched out into writing Christian fiction and Christian approaches to handling medical depression. For more help, please visit my website, which has details of these.

Editor's note: David Woodward passed into glory on 18 August 2012, after a long battle with cancer. He wil be greatly missed.