Our Centenary Festival began on Saturday 13th May with Junior Vocal classes in the morning and afternoon, also the Centenary Recital Class. Choristers from Bradford Cathedral Junior Choir and the Choir itself performed in the evening, with a large group of guitar and harp entries, mostly from Lancashire.

On Sunday 14th May, we held our annual Special Service of Rededication and Centenary Celebration. 

On Monday, 15th May, the Speech and Drama classes began in two venues at once morning and afternoon, and three in the evening.  Although this year, entries in this discipline were slightly lower in some classes, in others, they were very much higher, with a record 63 Moslem primary school children in the Novice Poetry class and the Non Christian Religious Reading class.  This reflects an increased response to this area of the Festival with three inner city Bradford schools taking part, and is a source of immense pride and achievement for the Festival.

Because we had three adjudicators but only work during the daytime sessions for two of them, we arranged and sold Choral Speaking workshops in local prep and primary schools to take up the slack.  These were very well received by both staff and pupils and we hope they will become a fixture in future Festivals.

The Poetry Writing competitions enjoyed a higher number of entries, especially in the adult and 13 – 16 classes.  Since publishing a wide selection of winning and outstanding poems in our Centenary celebration poetry anthology “A Wonderland of Words”, (with enough material left over for a second volume in due course), we will have maximized our total poetry writing entries for the next few years.   We held a very high-profile launch of Volume 1 at the end of August, inviting contributors from as far afield as Halifax, Thornton Cleveleys and Altrincham to attend a reception kindly hosted by the Ilkley Gazette, where copies are currently on sale.  They are also on sale at the Grove Bookshop.

On Tuesday night, we were in four places at once as we staged Band Night with two steel bands and 8 brass and concert bands, two of which were new entries, while Speech and Drama continued in the other three venues. 

On Wednesday solo instrumental classes began, with performances from violinists, cellists, mixed recorder and instrumental groups, some chamber music, jazz improvisation piano entries and a recorder group.  Also Asian music with a variety of exponents of instrumental and vocal music.  We also had string solos, sonata, woodwind and family music-making. 

On Thursday, we had the School Choirs Workshop aimed at the LEA non-specialist primary school music teacher.  Especially gratifying was the entry of an inner-city Bradford primary school for the first time, whose children were all of Asian descent. 

Also on Thursday we had Special School groups coming together from all over Yorkshire and we have piano classes, brass, Singer-Songwriter class, Handbells, and Diploma Class.

On Friday we had junior and over sixties vocals, school choirs, senior vocal classes, the Ilkley Parish Council Evening of vocal delight, including the Country and Western class, Jazz Singer and Songs from the Shows. The Festival was privileged last year to receive sponsorship for this evening session.  We hope this is ongoing and we gratefully acknowledge the support of the Parish Council.  A sparkling evening’s entertainment closed with the Old Time Music Hall class in the capable hands of its redoubtable chairman, Mr Gerald Woollin!

In our second venue on Friday evening we had the English National Song class, folk songs, Edwardian and Victorian ballads, and songs from Gilbert and Sullivan. 

On Saturday the tempo moved up a gear as we worked through the operatic, oratorio, and other major vocal classes.  Three competitors chosen from these classes once again vied for the magnificent HSBC Rose Bowl, awarded to the most outstanding senior vocal soloist at the Gala Concert that night.

In our third venue, spectators swung to the inimitable sound of two young pop groups. Two female voice choirs, (one from Middlesbrough), and seven Male Voice Choirs, (two from Northern Ireland) we enjoyed a splendid afternoon’s entertainment.

The Gala Concert once again showcased many of the most glittering performances of the week, including the winner of last November’s Wharfedale Festival of Performing Arts Dance Championship, the Asian Dance Champion, the presentation of the BBC Radio Leeds Poetry Cup to the most outstanding poetry writer, and last year’s Festival Popstar with solo items from concert pianist Jeremy Russell, one of our Official Accompanists.. 

As part of our Centenary celebrations, the most outstanding Festival performance at the Gala Concert was rewarded with the Festival Centenary Star Award.  This was judged to be our Asian Dance champion.

Disappointing ticket sales have meant that we are re-inventing this event for next year under the title Celebration Concert and changing the venue to one both cheaper and smaller, which will take place in the middle of the following week.

Other events not held during Festival Week, were the finals of PopStar 2006.  This competition is relaunched for 2007 under the title WF X Factor, with a wider range of song styles and also a broader age group, (14 – 24).  Auditions start next month.  (Likely to be the first, third and fourth Saturdays in November, to be confirmed).

Also next month on 11th November,  our Dance Championships will be held at Guiseley Theatre.

To celebrate our Centenary, we held a Dinner at which Emma Williams provided the entertainment, which was attended by the Lord Lieutenant, Dr Ingrid Roscoe, our President Bernard Atha, and a wide range of distinguished guests.

Our Special Needs Workshop also celebrated our Centenary with funding secured from Awards for All in addition to our usual benefactor Booths Supermarkets and £1,000 from the Spooner Trust, to whom we are also supremely grateful, and we staged a Gamelan Orchestra Workshop with blind and visually impaired children from primary schools in and around Leeds, and 100 voice Choir – One Accord – comprising young people with special needs from all over Yorkshire in an afternoon free concert, Music for a Summer’s Day.

Although sadly turned down by Arts Council Yorkshire – (no surprise there, then) – we were fortunate in sourcing several thousands of pounds from a mail-shot aimed at grant-funding trusts, both charitable and commercial, and as I said before, £5,000 from Awards for All.

£3,000 of this was allocated to the Music for a Summers’ Day workshop and concert, with the rest going to the production of our poetry anthology and also our Centenary CD.  As my husband and I published the anthology entirely in-house, with only production costs to pay for, the balance of this award will be spent on the CD, which is due for release in mid November and is currently halfway through its recording schedule.  This is proving to be a very exciting project with performers from as far afield as the Isle of Man eager to return specially to record their Festival piece.  25 star Centenary Festival performers will be featured on it, ranging from harp to Popstar, choral speaking to choirs, bells to bands, Islamic naats to musical notes.

We hope to conclude our Centenary by installing a plaque inside the Kings Hall, Ilkley, commemorating this achievement, and selling copies of our CD and poetry book at a high-profile Charity Fair at the end of November.  Meanwhile, the Syllabus for 2007 is expected back from the printers within the next fortnight, and we continue with our plans for an auction to take place at the Clarke Foley Centre on Thursday 16th November under the auspices of our kindly supportive local auctioneer, Andrew Hartley.  Anyone wishing to donate good quality items, unwanted gifts, household items surplus to requirements are invited to bring them to our next and final CD recording session at Ilkley Baptist Church, Kings Road, on Saturday 21st October between 11.30 am and 3.00 pm, or to 4 Gilstead Way after 25th October.