Ron Drew's Music Page - Activities
Singing - South Shields Amateur Operatic Society
Chapter 5.13 - Snippets of Chorus Lines
From Issue No. 13 (December 1999)
SUNDERLAND ECHO, MONDAY 18th 1999
"When it comes to choosing Sunderland Football Club's greatest fan we should perhaps be looking across the North Sea rather than in Pennywell or Pallion."
The above refers to Bengt Bilge, who travels 1000 miles from his home in Sweden to indulge his passion for football and in particular B. He is a season ticket holder and travels each month from Stockholm to the Stadium of Light. Although it was mentioned, the article did not stress his great support of SSAOS.
As well as football, Bengt's other great love is musical theatre and he always fits in shows while he is across here for matches. He has visited all 92 league grounds and is familiar with the theatres in most of those towns and cities .
The following is a piece he has written for us concerning his love of theatre and to explain the Swede-SSAOS-Sunderland connection.
A TALE OF CHOICE
BY
BENGT BILGE
Life gives us many opportunities of choosing.
In my teens, my brother, 15years my senior, presented me with three records; "Waltzes From the Rosencavalier" "Fat Mummy Brown" and "La cumpasita". His intention was for me to select 'my' way into the world of music.
But I had already made my choice. Eight years old and with my ear close to my parent's old Radiola, when the FA Cup-Final in 1937 was transmitted over to Sweden for the first time ever, and when Sunderland turned around a deficit to a 3-1 victory, a little boy in Gothenberg was happy - ever so happy!
Later a child's dream became reality. From 1952 I spent 25 years as editor of a Stockholm Weekly, concerned mostly with British football. In a closed world of sport ther was not much time for anything else.
But in connection with me changing from one field of writing to another - humorous columns on a freelance basis - I remembered those old, velvet progammes from operettas like "NIGHT IN BABYLON"and "THE THREE MUSKETEERS"in the thirties, and I decided to start collecting again. Statistics were always in my blood and I can now look back on 144 different theatre-salons since 1979 from the Town Hall in Hong-Kong, via Malan in Capetown to Teatro Copacabana in Rio. Nine times have I visited the Empire in Sunderland, and "Gigi" was number 253. A certain Miss Shelley Lamb appears three times in my book ("GIGI", "FOLLIES"and "SINGIN' IN THE RAIN"). Congratulations!
My most memorable visit? Perhaps "Bob Hope in Person" at the magnificent Chicago Theatre in 1987. Hope, then 84 years old, entertained non stop for nearly two hours with jokes and song and dance (well ... some steps). Fabulous!
Today, if I should be asked to choose a record, I would select music from Musicals. My favourite show? "GRAND HOTEL", directed and choreographed by Tommy Tune. Among opera composers I favour Verdi. Two months ago I went to Bologne only to see "ATTILA", very seldom played in Scandinavia.
"WEST SIDE STORY" I have not seen since 1984, when a touring American company visited Stockholm, and of course, I now look forward to be entertained at the Empire for the tenth time in October.
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Last revised: October 14, 2002.