The riverside at Castlefields

The riverside at Castlefields

Monday 18 June 2012

Shrewsbury Music Hall: Past, Present and Future


STROLLING past the Music Hall the other day, I could not help but imagine what the dear old place will look like when it reopens in 2013 – while at the same time happy memories of concerts there in the 1970s came pouring back like old pals at a school reunion.
And thus the past and the future gently collide in the present.
The audacious and ambitious vision for the Music Hall project is to redevelop the 2,970 square metre site into an “integrated visitor centre” (definitions on a postcard, please) to serve the whole of Shropshire.
This will ensure a viable future for what is widely recognised as “a highly significant complex of historic buildings” in the heart of the county town.
All terribly worthy, no doubt, but why do pictures of long-haired singer-songwriters keep going off like fireworks in my head?
Faded recollections of a more youthful Phil Gillam seeing bands like Fairport Convention, Prelude, and Camel, are not terribly helpful here. Spellbinding appearances by Ralph McTell and Alan Hull of Lindisfarne (circa 1975) are not helping either.
We need to focus. And I’m not talking about Hocus-Pocus by Focus, the dutch rock band which (to the best of my knowledge) never played at the Music Hall.
According to Shropshire Council’s website: “The buildings will house the historic museum collections, reconfigured and re-presented, together with visitor services and information and a programme of contemporary visual arts, community-led events and educational activity to enable a much wider range and much greater number of people to engage with, experience and enjoy leisure, learning and the rich cultural product of Shrewsbury and Shropshire.”
It sounds good. It sounds very good.
With any luck it will be a smaller version of the superb museums we now have in many of our major cities. And that has to be great news both for we townsfolk and for the tourists.
I’m thrilled that an exciting new lease of life is being found for the Music Hall. When the notion of a brand new theatre for the town was firest put forward, there were those (and I was one of them) who feared for the future of this grade II listed beauty, an elegant Edward Haycock design of 1835, a place at which Charles Dickens appeared while at the height of his powers, and at which – a century later – The Beatles performed on their way to conquering the world.
Of course it is not just the Music Hall itself which is being rescued and renovated, but the extraordinary collection of buildings hidden behind that grand facade.
There is the Grade II* listed 13th Century Vaughan’s Mansion, one of only a handful of early medieval defensive Hall Houses in the UK remaining. And it really is a hidden gem – tucked away and for years almost forgotten.
This bizarre architectural smorgasbord also embraces a medieval shut (a passageway between buildings typical of Shrewsbury), some 18th century prison cells and a 20th century civil defence/nuclear bunker. You couldn’t make this up!
When the attraction finally opens next summer, we should all be in for quite a treat.
Another aspect af all this which fascinates me is that in 2009, architects working on this project uncovered yet more mystery and romance. They discovered a magnificent and ornate medieval roof which had been hidden by a (beautiful in its own right) Victorian celing.
Back then, the project manager, Dominic Wallis, reported: “There have been quite a few discoveries. On College Hill we have what are effectively dressing rooms, and when they took away the chipboard panelling, they uncovered a rare and beautiful very early Victorian ceiling, and behind that a medieval ceiling.”
A bricked-up Tudor window was also uncovered.
Hopefully, all of this will be on display when the new attraction opens – bringing us rich insights into the history of Shrewsbury.
I just wonder if they’ll have anything on Fairport Convention and Ralph McTell?

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