Mr. Birkett= Music and Commerce

Mr. Birkett taught Music at Tulketh and was part of  Mr. Rees’s Music department.  A middle-aged man who was involved with a local church in Eldon Street near where my family and  I lived if I remember rightly.  He resided in room 9 which was next to the main dining room. And sometimes doubled up as a extra dining room as the school’s intake got bigger. He used to teach Humanities and Commerce as well only girls at the school would take Commerce as an option in the final two years. 

Sometimes If you had a lesson before lunch you could hear meals being prepared or after lunch in the afternoon the cleaning up of the lunchtime meals in the canteen. Sometimes you could hear the distant Radio One tunes played by Tony Blackburn or Paul Burnette and the mainly female workforce singing along that was not too bad. Mr. Birkett decided to put together a choir mainly of girls like Jill Brown, Ginette Botham, Beverly Hall,  Hilary Turner and Allyson Swarbrick with a sprinkling of boys like Roderick Davies, Paul Sapsford and I, a budding Aled Jones (only joking ).. 

Mr. Birkett was busy rehearsing us for the Parents Association Meeting next get together on Thursday the 20^th of November in the main Hall with parents, teachers and dignitaries all attending according to Mr. Birkett a chance to impress. The song we were to sing was from the film Love Story which had starred Ryan O’Neill, Ray Millard, and Ali McGraw from 1971 and was a big box office success. The featured number of the film was called {Where Do I Begin?) written by Francis Lai and had been successfully covered by such stars like Shirley Bassey, Andy Williams and many more. I later watched the film which my mum and our neighbour Anne Walsh, mother of fellow schoolfriend Paul had queued up at the ABC Cinema in town to watch. Of course, it was a tearjerker. On most of the rehearsals I mimed because I was a lousy singer and a couple of times Mr. Birkett would stop his piano playing and ask were that terrible noise was coming from? But the advantages were standing next to pretty girls and biscuits with orange squash for afters.

On the night of the concert the hall was packed with parents sat in their plastic seats with teachers and other dignitaries. After what seemed like an age the Head Mr. Jones finished his opening speech and proudly introduced us to the audience. We had all assembled at the back of the stage all smartly attired in our uniforms. Mr. Rees was playing the grand piano in the main Hall with Mr. Birkett conducting us.

It seemed like the longest 5 minutes in my life, but I got through it. After all the clapping and congratulations, we headed off to our little buffet laid on for us in room 28 down the corridor from the staffroom when we got there it was all covered up under white cloths. Paul Sapsford could not resist eating a couple of sausage rolls before the covers came off this sent Mr. Birkett into a spin he went ape for some reason maybe it was artistic temperament? “How dare you touch the buffet before I get here, he lamented” Paul Sapsford did not know whether to laugh or cry.  Anyway, we certainly made up for it when all the covers come off the selection of sandwiches, fairy cakes, and lemonade were demolished in what seemed like minutes.

My mum, Paul and I were given a lift home in Paul Sapsford mum’s Rover. In the car we listened to Bay City Rollers recent album Once Upon A Star, which was playing on the fancy car cassette player, the height of sophistication for the time. I declined the invitation to re-join the choir I decided to try for the school football team instead on Thursday nights after school.

As for Mr. Birkett he left Tulketh in 1980.