My four years at Wakefield Art School, in the earlier part of the 1960s, was a time of adventure and discovery. Later, in 1968, I staged Wakefield's first ever free rock concert with my band 'Global Village' on the park's bandstand. (I remember seeing my father play there in his band when I was a very young boy.) Also Thornes Park is referenced where, in my infancy, my parents took me to hear brass bands perform. The piece combines electric guitar and orchestra, moving through a panorama of changing moods, each portraying aspects of the city, the Cathedral, the old 1950s bus station with its clock tower where members of 'The Teenagers', (a band I was in,) would meet to be picked up by the band's van to travel to that evening's gig. It was a rather different place back then, in some ways more pleasant if rather less modern that today's city. This one references my birthplace of Wakefield, where I also grew up. This is the first of four 'Memory Time' pieces spread throughout the album. 1950s.ģ: ‘Memory Time No 1: A Wakefield Adventure.’ Ian Nelson with Lantern Hill in the background. The track features moments of happy, skipping lightness and other moments where the swell of the sea rises dramatically as the old steamship sails proudly from the harbour trailing clouds of smoke from its funnels. This piece of music is a richly textured orchestral piece, a sort of tone poem, which conjures up that holiday. Ilfracombe is also where the photograph on the cover of my 'Diary Of A Hyperdreamer Volume One' book was taken, (with Ian and myself and a steamship in the background.) Lantern Hill itself is surmounted by St Nicholas' Chapel, (built in the 1300's,) which doubles as a small and quaint lighthouse, hence the name 'Lantern Hill.' I have an old photograph of my brother Ian standing with Lantern Hill in the background which evokes sweet memories coupled with a degree of melancholy. My father had a Bolex wind-up cine camera and I can vividly remember him filming a large sailing boat tossing about on the waves from the ocean side window. We stayed in a rented upstairs flat right on the harbour where on one side of the living room there were windows looking out onto the harbour itself, and on the other side were windows looking out to sea. It was quite a long drive to get there from Yorkshire. Lantern Hill is situated in the coastal town of Ilfracombe in Devon where, in the 1950s, my parents, my brother Ian and myself spent a memorable holiday.
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