FIRST PERSON: Risca Male Choir stalwart Martin Hodson MBE

“IF my parents hadn’t made me have piano lessons I wouldn’t be where I am today.

We had a piano in the front room of our house on Station Road in Risca and being born in the town I consider myself a true cuckoo. My family was very chapel-orientated and my mother played the piano for Sunday School at Moriah Baptist Church. When I went to Pontywaun Grammar School I gave up playing piano, but the seed was there and my interest in piano flared up again and I started to gravitate back to it.

My parents sent me back for lessons and that was the start of the rest of my life. I became really keen on piano and achieved Grade 8 before I was in form six. I then studied music at A-level and went to the College of SS Mark and John in Chelsea, London, and also was a part-time student at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama as an organist. After qualifying, I taught for a year in Croydon in a primary school before returning to Wales to take up teaching posts at Risca Town Primary School and the newly-opened Ty Sign Junior School, where I was appointed as a music specialist, something that was unusual in those days.

At that time I was still studying organ, now in Llandaff Cathedral, and was also becoming interested in singing. I was always singing at school, but didn’t consider myself a singer until I came back to Wales and the interest in the voice grew. I then started to have singing lessons while still learning organ and piano; this was in my early 20s. I also became interested in amateur dramatics when I joined the local drama group, firstly at Oxford House in Risca and then at the Dolman Theatre, Newport. My musical activities continued with work as an accompanist with choirs, solo singers and instrumentalists. As a singer I performed in opera, oratorio, music theatre and for BBC radio.

My teaching career continued as I went on to secondary education at Llantarnam, Pontllanfraith and Newbridge Comprehensive Schools. Finally, in 1981, I found myself at Cross Keys College where I became director of music. After establishing a large and highly successful A-level course at the college I was part of a team that founded the performing arts course there.

Eventually, I stopped lessons on piano and organ and the singing had now become quite a passion. I did quite a lot of work as an amateur singer, and am particularly proud of recitals of song cycles by Schubert and Schumann. In 1981 BBC Wales broadcast a recital I recorded, something else of which I’m proud.

Some years before joining Risca Male Choir I became accompanist to the Pendyrus Male Choir in the Rhondda. At that time the choir was conducted by the well-known character Glynne Jones. Glynne at that time was music organiser for Gwent. We became great friends and he was very encouraging to me as a young teacher.

In 1979 Risca Male Choir needed a conductor and approached me. Initially I said I would only help them out for a short while, but I ended up staying for the next 36 years. I remember the first rehearsal where the choir stood and applauded at the end. They had won me over and I soon became totally absorbed into the whole situation.

At Cross Keys College I had started a community mixed choir, Cross Keys College Choral Society. It eventually grew to a choir of around 100 singers. With the choir I was able to perform many of the great choral repertoire using orchestra and professional soloists. With the choir I conducted acclaimed performances, including Messiah, The Creation and Requiems of Mozart and Verdi.

This was a busy period for me, working with male and mixed choirs and also directing music theatre projects, mainly in Newport for local operatic societies.

With Risca Male Choir I was keen to produce concerts that were a little different and maybe just a little off the beaten track. This included our theme shows that we perform every Christmas. Sometimes we even built a set and wore costumes just like a theatrical production. It all began during my first year with Risca when I produced an Italian Opera Gala. The following year we performed a Victorian evening where the guys dressed up and sang some quite sentimental music. Other theme concerts have included sacred music, a Dixieland show and music hall. In recent years we’ve settled into four different themes: music theatre, Disney, movies and the winter season. Last year was the turn of music from the movies, which we performed in the Newbridge Memo, Blackwood ‘Stute, Congress Theatre and in Crosskeys.

I am proud of the fact that Risca Male Choir is able to move from performing difficult commissioned works through to the light-hearted, but whatever we sing we sing well. Recently, for our patrons I presented an evening looking back over the last 36 years. I called the presentation ‘I Did It My Way’. The choir sang items illustrating achievements during that time, and I was also able to play some recorded music of some very special works that the choir has performed in that time. It was a lovely occasion for me to look back on the history of the choir. At the end of the evening, much to the surprise of the audience, I actually sang “I did it my way” — with the help of two of my singers, I hasten to add.

The choir’s achievements are quite astounding. We are not a competitive choir but the competitions we’ve taken part in have been very successful. Among the awards we have won are the title of Male Choir of the Year, the National Eisteddfod, the Welsh Choral Challenge Shield and the bronze medal at the Malta Choral Festival.

In 1999 I was awarded an MBE for services to education and music in the community, having been nominated by members of the choir. It was huge thrill to receive the news of the award.

Music in the community is something I have been dedicated to ever since I started teaching and working with groups in the area.

I took my husband Tony, my brother Roger and sister-in-law Sylvia to the investiture at Buckingham Palace.

Walking out to meet the Queen in the magnificent ballroom and receiving the medal from her is something I will never forget.

After the ceremony we went to the Houses of Parliament, where MP for Islwyn, Don Touhig, treated us to lunch. The award would not have been possible if it hadn’t been for all the people I have had the pleasure and privilege of working with over the years.

I retired from the mixed choir when I was 65 and at the same time from lecturing at college. My final performance with the choir was a Verdi Requiem, bringing together the male choir, the mixed choir and a line-up of soloists that included two former singing students of mine. It was a fabulous event.

In 2010 I was asked to write a book about the history of the choir for our 40th anniversary. It was a big task which, in the end, I really enjoyed doing.

When I look back on my time with the choir the experience has been highlight after highlight. One particular highlight was being asked to record with Bryn Terfel on his We’ll Keep A Welcome CD in 1999.

Other highlights have included our foreign tours. We’ve been on tour to California —three times — and Europe many times, singing in some wonderful places from Grace Cathedral in San Francisco to St Stephen’s Cathedral in Vienna, Austria, the Mariacki Basilica in Krakow, the Thomaskirche in Leipzig and Wieliczka Salt Mines in Poland.

In Auschwitz, Poland, in 2010 we had a very moving experience singing The Prayer of the Children in the execution yard. The performance was difficult to achieve, to say the least, and as the last note faded away choristers and others in our party, heads hung low, tears welling in sad eyes, made their way silently out of the execution yard. It was one of those moments that we will always remember.

I’m enjoying preparing for my farewell concert in September, and am happy to say that it is already sold out. It will be an emotional time but I want to enjoy it until the last moment. Two of my former students, now international singers, soprano Laura Parfitt and baritone Jason Howard, are returning to perform.

I want to mention my parents during the concert because a lot of local people who follow the choir knew my parents. They died quite young and never knew of my achievements. I’ll end the concert with a Welsh hymn that was my father’s favourite as a dedication to them. I will also mention my partner and now husband of 37 years, Tony, who I met six months before I joined the choir. He has been a great support to me and has never once complained about the time I’ve given over to choir activities. He has been a fantastic support.

I was 70 in May, and I always said that I would retire from Risca Male Choir when I was 70. My time with the choir has been a wonderful journey from beginning to end and I have been left with so many great memories. I would now very much like to continue my association with the choir by joining the boys in the back row as a singer. At the same time, I hope to spend more time with Tony and our dogs at our cottage in West Wales.”