SCHOOLS PROMS PERSONALITIES
Richard Stilgoe, Presenter, lives
Antony Hopkins CBE,
in Surrey (where he was born) and has five children. He writes musicals, runs The Orpheus Trust, builds houses, plays cricket and sails his boat. He was brought up in Liverpool, and progressed from St Agnes' Church Choir through the Cavern Club to the Cambridge Footlights. Several spells singing his songs in London nightclubs led to appearances on the Today programme in the 60s and thence to BBC 1's Nationwide and That's Life, as well as several series of his own. Andrew Lloyd-Webber then invited him to write lyrics.
Guest Conductor, thinks he deserves a place in the Guinness Book of ReC01"ds for having conducted Land of Hope and Glory in the Royal Albert H all more times than anybody else; he has done it at every single Schools Prom which means 94'htimes (counting encores as half!) Even a stroke in 1996 failed to halt the sequence and although still a little wobbly on his feet he is proud to be with you all yet again this year.
He continues to make radio programmes and his New York Gold Award, three Monte Carlo Prizes and Prix Italia are unmatched in broadcasting. He has performed for Her Majesty the Queen and the Rothschild family, played cricket on Goodwin Sands, conducted children's choirs at the Barbican, the Royal Festival Hall and the Royal Albert Hall and passed his 100th appearance on Countdown . Next year he and Peter Skellern will tour throughout the UK and Ireland, and the Orpheus Centre, his new arts centre for disabled people, will be fully operational. Schools continue to perform his musical BI'illiant the Dinosam路.
Cats, Stadight &pl"eSS and Pbanto11l of tbe Opem, all of which contain his lyrics, keep playing all over the world. Cats and Stadigbt Express are now the longest and secondlongest running shows in British theatre history.
Lin Marsh, Presenter, smdied piano
ABOVE FROM TOP: RICHARD STILGOE, LIN MARSH, ANTONY HOPKINS, LARRY WESTLAND
and voice at Trinity College of Music and London University, later gaining an MAin Performance Arts at Middlesex University. She has worked extensively in music education and is currently an advisory teacher of music in Oxfordshire where she directs two choirs and the Oxfordshire Youth Music Theatre. She is also a composer of vocal music and has written for BBC children's programmes, both television and radio, and has directed her own work at the Namral History Museum, the Royal Albert Hall, the South Bank and Bermuda! Lin has worked as a musical director for the National Youth Music Theatre, frequently co-directing workshops as well as productions of Cbadie at the Buxton Festival and BI'illiant tbe Dinosaur at the Edinburgh Festival. She has worked many times for Music for Youth both as an adjudicator and presenter of children's concerts.
Many of you will be too young to remember his broadcast series Talking about Music but it continued over a period of thirty-six years and has been sold to forty-four countries by the BBC. Composer, conductor, author and broadcaster he may be, but he still regards the Schools Prom as the highlight of his year.
Larry Westland CBE, Founder and Executive Director of Music for Youth, was born in London in the year that Lorenz Hart wrote Tbe Lady and tbe Tramp and J oe Louis beat England's Jim Braddock in the eighth to win the World H eavyweight Championship. He failed his 11-plus examination and has been in his time a teacher, soldier, actor, journalist, poet, publisher, off-spin bowler, rock group manager and concert promoter. He has four main interests in life - music, cricket and his two granddaughters. He is widely respected for his work with young people and was awarded the CBE in 1991 for his services to music and education. He founded Music for Youth in 1971 and over the past twenty-eight years has fostered the work of countless thousands of young musicians, singers and dancers. He has been responsible for the inception of many arts activities for young performers, including dance, music tlleatre, marching bands and choirs. He is a Director of Brixton Musicworks, an executive committee member of the Music Education Council, Honorary Vice President of the National Youth Music Theatre and a Governor of the National Children's Orchestra .