Have a Good NEWS

Victoria Wood's new play takes its inspiration from a childrens' choir she loved. David Ward recalls the poignant reunion of the original singers

On 19 June 1929, 250 singing children - traveled from 52 local schools with the tram to the Free Trade Hall in Manchester to a happy chorus of Henry Purcell record with the Hall? Orchestra, conducted by Sir Hamilton Harty - 190 girls and 60 boys. And they made two bad attempts nervously before looking to take their form for a third, it was on the Columbia 9909, a 12in 78er disc that cost four shillings and six pence and sold 1m copies issued.

Nymphs and shepherds, sung by the Manchester School Children 's Choir, remained in print for more than 60 years and was a much-requested radio identification number, it is immediately available on a CD called Golden Years of the Gramophone.

For those who are '\ s sing bright-voiced kids about the flora' a certain age, Manchester \ s holiday immediately conjures sunny Sunday lunch times, Two-Way Family Favourites on the BBC 's Light Programme, the smell of roasting lamb in the oven and the sound of someone chopping fresh mint.

Victoria Wood with nymphs and shepherds grew, thought it was wonderful and played it on their children. Now she has it as a starting point for That Day We Sang, a new play with songs ("It 's almost a musical") used by the Manchester International Festival. The story unfolds in the two years 1929 and 1969, the year of the reunification of a choir, with the nymph Enid, a secretary, Tubby meets Shepherd, an insurance salesman. It 's the first time their paths have crossed for 40 years.

The reunion is Wood 's invention, but other meetings really happened. The last one was in Manchester Town Hall (where the choir was in 1927 for the building 's 50th birthday sung) in 1989, 60 years after admission. I know I was there.

Then a reporter from the Guardian 's Manchester office, I had Alan Rusbridger (Guardian Weekend who works and has since gone on higher things) called nymphs and shepherds suggest a function. But he had never heard of the choir or the famous record. "I 'll ask around the office and if anyone knows about it, you' re on," he said.

I hung up the receiver and then heard a ragged chorus sing Purcell 's tune in a variety of keys. So I wrote my function and then joined the singers, most of them in their 70s, on their special day in Manchester town hall. Until 1989, only 146 singers (118 nymphs, 28 Shepherd) is still alive and about 60 had come together for a final session. "This will be the last goodbye, because it is so sad farewell to our departing members 's", said Rose Stanley, the mutton-chopped shepherd who had organized the meeting. "Our reception has a life of its own and is now totally different from the people they removed was added. It could go live, but we won 't"

The singers were at the tables around the Great Hall with his Ford Madox Brown murals of great Manchester moments, including the proclamation of Weights and Measures in 1556 and the opening of the Bridgewater Canal distributed in 1761, the nymphs and shepherds event, at least for me , proved to be another great moment in Manchester. The plan was that the veterans would enjoy tea and fancies and get a gold disc from a representative of EMI, a carefully-rehearsed ensemble would then stand on a podium, singing their special number.

"Before we do that," announced someone (possibly Rose), "We 'll play the record in order to remind you of the words." The room was quiet and the Hall?, it' s long dead players on the way, through 60 years of fizz and crackle on the intro to the chorus. As the 1929 children started to sing, I was aware, a haze of sound that I initially identify couldn 't, then I realized that every nymph and shepherd in the room was looking a long time ago and very quietly singing along with his 1929 self.

Sixty years disappeared when the chorus flowed through this magnificent place for three minutes or so. It was an eerily beautiful, unforgettable, poignant musical moment, Purcell is not authentic, but the sound of people associate with the sheer joy of singing together.

I had formerly Stanley Rose, a small book describing his intensely happy four years in the choir and his memories of the days of the written record had interviewed. "[Singing] The joy for me than all my other boyish interests, whether it meant our new wireless speaker kit or the new talkies are in the cinema. Or even watch Manchester City play their brilliant football."

Rose is dead now, but it 's clear that no experience in his life, his nymphs and shepherds vying years. And that the singing of the time, and especially the day of admission, is the inspiration for Wood 's game. "I have remained faithful to the original idea that people spend a day in their life is very important and if they can back that day with the people they then again, they may suddenly her emotions," she says. "That 's what it' s -.. to the power of music to revive your love of life again and hopefully it will 's funny'

On that day we sang Enid and Tubby are together for a film by Granada TV on the 40th Anniversary of the recording was brought in 1969. "You know two people who don 't, but only by chance that day, when they are being filmed to be fair," \, Wood says. "This triggers a chain of events. You put on headphones and play him the record for Tubby, he hasn 't heard since he sang to her, and he begins to cry. That' s the beginning of his emotional journey triggered by hearing the music that he 's very funny and jokey but everything was locked, he has lived with his mother, who doesn'. t like your music has just died, now .. he is able to hear music and it is able to propel him to the next stage of his life. "And the next stage of his life is a relationship with Enid . "The play asks, what do you want to be like a child? As a man, what you feel, you owe that child? The story goes back and forth."

And back it goes to the Free Trade Hall in 1929 when 250 terrified children –"Some would have called us a scruffy lot of elementary school brats," suggested Rose – trembled, overawed by the place and the occasion; they sang with confidence only after their inspiring teacher, Gertrude Riall, told them they were braying like donkeys and were as soggy as yesterday's bread pudding, and clapped her hands to free them of the spell she said had   gripped them. For the play, the fear and the music of the original nymphs and shepherds will be recreated by two choirs of 50 (accompanied by the Hall? Youth Orchestra) from four north Manchester primary schools. They have been coached since last October by the soprano and choir trainer Anna Flannagan. The 1929 children were selected by audition; the 2011 children are almost all volunteers and Flannagan has had to take her choir, as Riall did with hers, on a long, improving journey. "They are singing a million light years away from how they were singing when I first met them," Flannagan says. "They know how to breathe and they sing beautifully in tune."

They have also learned to sing, posh, like Riall uses a blackboard and phonetic spelling to make sure that was her choral pronunciation used vowels, said "end" is "and", "darnse" for "dance "and" Mewsic "for" music ". The 2011 children have found something of this hilarious, even if it is not thrilled to Purcell and his melody. "They told me they didn 't like singing nymphs and shepherds," says Wood. "I told them this was show business, get over it. But I think that due to the time they come to do it, in their costumes in 1929 children, they 'll feel differently."

It would be nice to report that the 30 singers primary from Bowker Vale, one of the four schools involved in the production, were joyfully singing nymphs and shepherds ("Your flocks may now securely rest / While you express your happiness ' ) on the playground. But they haven 't, although acting director Gloria Hinz says her 10-year-olds have an experience that has done a tremendous amount of love for their confidence.

Leah found memorable time she spent recording four songs in a studio, says Athar working with wood was a fantastic opportunity, and Zac met many famous people on a trip to London. Aisah adds: "This event made me realize that there are many other music out there, this is a great event and - wow - I 'm in the \.!."

That's probably how many of those 250 children must feel as they rode the streetcar to Peter Street in 1929 have.