John Weitzel
It is quite interesting reading the very first document I produced in relation to the Quincentenary, some seven years before it happened. That detailed some initial thoughts and I can reflect now, 30 years on, as to what happened and what didn’t!
The original plan was for the year to run January to December - in the end we opted for the School Year 1994-95 - starting with a ‘New Year’s Dinner Dance’ to see 1995 in and a similar event a year later to see the year out! Neither happened!!! I wrote ‘We need to ‘take the school’ to the Country and the world’ and we certainly achieved that with a World Rugby Tour, the Gondoro Peak Expedition, taking the whole School to London for the Burton Service and seeing Les Miserables, the Choir toured the USA the following year, we had two locomotives named after us etc.
Certain things did not happen. I wanted to host Mastermind, Songs of Praise and the Radio 1 road show! My idea for a sponsored event was:- ’ Something big and different - one thought I had was to have the whole school in Loughborough at 9.00 a.m. and have 4 boys in every Youth Hostel in Britain by 9.00 p.m. Involving national bodies would gain maximum publicity - firms could sponsor the more exciting venues - helicopters and fighter aircraft!!’ I still regret not doing this!!!!
Then I had this thought:-
Fortunately the Monarch (note I wasn’t certain the Queen would still be on the throne!) was delayed by 12 months, which was fortunate given the events that did happen in those last few days of the Summer Term. The concert, however, did happen...but not with the CBSO - and this is the story over seven years between writing this and the performance on 2 July 1995.
In fact it was four years before I started to seriously consider how I could deliver such a concert. I contacted Kellaway down at Holland Park, London who describe themselves today as ‘We create demand. We are an award willing full service PR, sponsorship media buying and planning agency that helps brands excite and inspire their audiences into action through intelligent, creative and measurable campaigns.’ Do look at their website www.kallaway.com ...they have come along way in 30 years!
Initially I did not get a reply...so tried again and in May 1992 received the following letter.
On 18 May I met with Performing Arts Management at the School and suggested holding an outdoor concert in the Quad with the 1852 Building as a background, especially for lasers. However Nicholas Smith said this was too small an area but the 1st XI field would be ideal and two days later received confirmation of my discussions.
The following week I met with Incentive Services at a far more local Leicester but they were not able to help. At the committee meeting on Monday 1 June 1992 I reported to the 1995 Committee.
The question related to two major concerns. Where would we park all the cars but more importantly was it safe to launch fireworks in such a built up area - both in terms of where they would be fired from and also the effect on the main A6. Most big concerts with fireworks took place in the grounds of Stately Homes where such problems did not exist. I discussed the matters over the phone with Nicholas Smith and in July 1992 received assurances on the matter as well as agreeing to move the concert to the Sunday night...we were ‘pencilled into our schedule’ three years in advance.
Early in 1994 I met with the Local Authority’s licencing officer, the police and the fire and rescue services who assured me that they would be able to give a licence for the event and it was with great excitement that Dave Evans and I headed up to Macclesfield to hopefully confirm everything.
The meeting started with Nicholas Smith explaining that whilst they had a marvellous year in 1993 with the concerts at Stately Homes being sold out, their two ‘in town’ concerts had been financial disasters. Listening to him we thought they were about to pull out - but they didn’t and ideas to minimise any loss took place, one of which - us providing a choir (free of charge!) to sing Carmina Burana - seemed quite attractive. Indeed I was quite excited by this proposition as I had sung it as an 11 year old!
At the 1995 Committee meeting on 21 February I was able to report on that meeting.
At the meeting a month later the choir was confirmed.
In the end a Choir of 110 was formed.
In the meantime confirmation from Performing Arts Management of our meeting had arrived.
You will see that there were two matters I immediately had to deal with. Firstly the closure of the public footpath. In May 1994 I was delighted to receive the following letter, which was far more encouraging than the second matter of using Southfields Park for Car Parking.
However I was delighted, when at the end of September, I received the following letter.
So by November 1994 I was able to sign the contract regarding the sale of tickets
At the end of October I received the following letter regarding the footpath.
It amused me that we would be closing the footpath under an act that was written before Burton Walks had actually been planted! In January 1995 I was reassured ‘the Chief Constable has no objection to your proposal’!
This was confirmed in a letter received in May 1995 .
...and this is the order. It is the only time that the footpath has ever been closed. A year later I wanted to close it when the Queen came - but the ‘Palace’ insisted it remain open.
Whilst dealing with the local authority the ‘big meeting’ we had with all involved was in February 1995 and these are the notes of that meeting.
And this is the site plan that Lisa Charlwood provided a week later. You can see that floodlights were to be installed in the car parks - as well as in the extra car parking in Southfields Park which is not on this map. The big shaded area of The Walks in front of the School was where there was to be no parking at the request of Standard Fireworks. Their ‘firing zones’ were to be the Quad and the asphalt outside the library - marked 2 on the plan with the aim of landing the shells in the car park.
There were two other matters to sort out from the School’s point of view. The first was the need to ‘shield off’ the main A6 so people (and cars!) could not look into the site. For me a bigger problem was what to do with the cricket square. After consultation with William Davis to solve both they were unable to help as they didn’t have enough stock.
Consultation with Owen Brown revealed costs of £2,640 for interlocking plywood floor sections to cover the square and a cost of £1050 for 156m of 7ft high white screening for the A6.
But in their letter they suggested a cheaper solution.
For covering the square I approached Kingsmead Marquee Hire Services who suggested that rather than putting down plywood the square should be sufficiently hard in July at the end of the season that matting would be a cheaper. This would also have the advantage that it would be quicker to lay and pick up we were playing the Old Boys until 7.30 the night before and playing again at 11 on the Tuesday!
With every thing in place there was just the matter of finding sponsors, primarily for the publicity of the event as if the School was to sell over 1000 tickets, with it keeping 10%, that would cover the £1500 for the matting, screening and Southfields Park.
I had worked closely with The Leicester Mercury, at the time the largest ’local’ paper in the world, over a double page feature covering the Quincentenary funded by advertising from local firms congratulating us on 500 years. They were an obvious source to approach.
The Leicester Mercury would cover the cost of printing the 100,000 ‘flyers’ whilst David Wilson Homes would cover the cost of other advertising.
Thus the ‘flyers’ had both logos on.
As you can see from the brochure for the Summer Series the Carmina Burana concert was to be performed three times out of their 30 concerts across England and Wales. They were the only three concerts which had a Choir to perform with the Performing Arts Symphony Orchestra.
Whist Peter Underwood was well into rehearsals with his specially formed Quincentenary Choir, which at 110 consisted of much larger numbers than we anticipated, there was only one thing left to do - let the local residents know what was to happen.
As the day of the concert approached I seemed to spend my life with Standard fireworks. They were going to fire 5,000 shells at a cost of £2,500 in the 8 minute finale in a built up area. They took endless measurements as to possible launching and landing sites, with the complication of different wind speeds and directions, and the height we could go to was determined by East Midlands Airport! The vast majority of these were to be fired from the middle of the Quad and they had never set off so many fireworks surrounded by so much glass! The plan was then to land them in the main car park, which was kept clear of cars.
Peter Underwood’s biggest concern was trying to work out what speed we would take the piece and he was traumatised when 10 days before performance Nicholas Smith arrived and wanted everything twice as fast as we had been rehearsing it!
The 1st XI finished playing the OLA at 7.20 p.m. and we all then moved to join the 500 OL’s enjoying their Quincentennial Reunion in the halls. At 10 p.m. we all moved to the Quad for the Toasts, concluding with the singing of the School Hymn at around 10.30.
At 4 .00 a.m. the first access to the site was made and at about 8.30 the stage, which had spent most of the night in the car park, was slowly moved through the Walks. It looked an impossible task to actually get it into the site but the skill of the driver meant he drove it straight in.
You can see from these pictures that, fortunately, the ground was rock hard so driving it across the field to get it into position was easy.
As the stage unfolded lorries, and cars seemed to be all over the site as toilets arrived, the sponsors’ tents were erected, the first aid caravan arrived and the sound system was installed.
By 1.00 p.m. he site was virtually finished and sound testing took place. Down at Quorn the Old Boys were holding a picnic surrounded by vintage cars and in the Burton Hall over 100 former staff were being entertained by Headmaster, Neville Ireland.
Standard Fireworks started setting up in the Quad and at 4.00 I met with the stewards, programme sellers, the doctor, St John’s Ambulance, the police, the fire officers and the Licencing officer.
At 5 p.m. the gates opened.
The Choir and Orchestra arrived at 2.00 p.m. and as the first notes of O Fortuna were sung I knew that everything would be all right...not least because of a great weather forecast!
The field filled and for the next 3 hours a carnival atmosphere developed as 3,500 people filled the site.
Champagne Corks popped and food was consumed!
Note the sponsor’s hoardings on the sight screen and the first aid caravan. The audience consisted of all ages!
Things were definitely more civilised in the sponsor’s tent!
At 8 p.m. the Orchestra began the programme with Shostakovich’s Festive Overture, followed by Honegger’s Pacific 231.
Conducted by Nicholas Smith, the final piece of the first half was Gershwin’s Rhapsody in Blue with John Gough on the piano.
At the interval the choir gathered adults and boys!
At 9.00 p.m. we knew it was raining in Market Harborough and we took the decision to start the second half 10 minutes early.
As darkness fell the lanterns flickered, the sound was magnificent and the stage majestic as Carl Orff’s ‘Carmina Burana’ filled the air.
Fortunately the boys had no idea what they were singing about I encouraged the little trebles to get a translation from Dr Underwood but he was not forthcoming!
The soloists were Jayne Carpenter (Soprano), David Johnson (Tenor) and Robert Carpenter Turner (Baritone).
At 10.10 as the last two movements began the fireworks took to the air. The noise as they went airborne was terrific as it echoed round the Quad. Choreographed by Sally Smith to the music they were magnificent as they cascaded over the School. 8 minutes, 5,000 shells, £2,500 and it was all over - much to the relief of Standard Fireworks!
My immediate concern was the state of the windows in the Quad. I quickly checked every building, and much to my relief there was not one even cracked! The site started to be cleared and just after midnight the stage left the site. One major problem remained. Having got the stage by the kitchens it then had to be reversed down to the sports hall to get it to exit via the Walks - this took 10’s of attempts, considerable skill, and 30 minutes. By 12.40 it trundled down the Walks and three years of planning were over.
However, this was not the end of the Quincentenary celebrations. At 11.00 on the Tuesday morning the 1st XI played Solihull and that evening 300 youngsters from across the three Schools held a Victorian Evening , recreating the celebrations held in 1895 when the School celebrated its 400th anniversary, and at the end of the week, and term, a Ball for 500 guests was held. Also on Tuesday I received the following letter from Lisa Charlwood.
...whilst later in the week, Neville Ireland received this from Nicholas Smith. I am afraid I won’t be around in 470 years time to do it all again!
In the end we sold £14,576 worth of tickets so received 10% - £1,457 - which more than covered the costs that we incurredthus the concert came in with a slight profit!
It will come as no surprise that the event attracted great press coverage. This is the Loughborough Echo.
This is the image of the Goddess ‘Fortuna’ - the Roman goddess of fortune, luck and chance - that comes from the cover of the score of Carmina Burana on the stained glass window that adorns the Queen’s Building. This was my gift to the School when I retired - with grateful thanks for 38 wonderful years at the School. Seven of those years were dominated by planning and delivering the School’s Quincentenary in 1995. Carmina Burana was the climax of that year.
The reason for ending the year like this was explained in my letter to the local residents (The full letter is in this document) ‘It was our intention to hold an event for the people of Loughborough and surrounding district during the year in recognition of the support we have received from them over the past 500 years. This seemed the best way to do so - we have received support from all quarters - as Loughborough itself has never paid host to such an event.’
Indeed it was to be the biggest event the School or Loughborough has ever hosted, with around 3,500 attendees, and this is the story as to how it was all achieved.
O Fortuna!
John Weitzel
May 2025