The Coventry Carol

Olly plays in our Salvation Army band in Bellshill under the expert guidance of our good friend Ian Dickie. The band runs a website: www.bsab.co.uk and before Christmas a visitor to the website gave the band a tremendous gift - a new arrangement of the Coventry Carol. Until recently, we didn't know much about the person who gave this special gift, but Ian passed on an email from him that gives a bit of background to the gift:

Hello Ian,

Thanks very much for your message. It was so good to hear from you. I'm glad you and your band - and your listeners - enjoyed my Coventry Carol arrangement.

I've received many similar e-mails from bands all from over the world who downloaded and played it this Christmas. 62 bands downloaded it and I sent 20 more sets to friends in the band world. Although not all of them have contacted me I do know it has been played from Adelaide to Vancouver including bands from all over Europe, North America, New Zealand and Cape Town. And now the list includes Scotland!

I haven't made any money with it - that wasn't the point - but it has created a tremendous amount of goodwill - which was. It was for Christmas above all. My hope is it was "for the right reasons".../

/...I had a serious illness in 2001 that required several operations but thankfully I'm now almost completely recovered. I had to give up both conducting and playing. A blessing that came from that was that I had lots of time to devote to composing and arranging, and now teaching as well.../

/...So, as you can see, I've been blessed with a wonderful life in music and now I feel I should put something back. The Coventry Carol was part of that.../

Kind regards,

Ian Bartram

Well Ian, your kindness was appreciated. The piece is beautiful and really works with the Band. Thank you!