The Radio Big Band was taking a long tea break in between recordings. Young Gerry Hawthorne, a promising young percussionist, had only just joined the band and sat at a table with Giles Herbert. Giles was one of the older members, the lead saxophonist well known for his solo pieces.
Giles had been with the outfit when it was the BBC Dance Orchestra back in the 1950s under Cyril Stapleton in the heyday of the big dance bands led by the likes of Joe Loss and Ted Heath. He had played with the great singers like Matt Munro, Frank Sinatra and Nat King Cole. By the 1960s it had become the Radio Big Band and was part of the larger BBC Radio Orchestra under Barry Forgie.
Now in the early eighties Giles had become something of a legend himself and could relate many anecdotes of the stars he had worked with in the music world. Young Gerry had been told that the strangest story of all was the one Giles related about his beginnings in the music industry and now seemed an opportune time to ask him about it. “Giles, how did you get started in all this?” Gerry queried.
Because he knew it always intrigued the listeners Giles agreed to relate his life from the beginning. He explained how he had been brought up by a great aunt in London who he always knew as Mabel and when he was small it was explained that his mother had died in childbirth, which later turned out to be true, but nothing was ever forthcoming about his father. They lived in a small terraced house in the East End of London, survived the blitz during the war when Mabel made ends meet by doing tailoring alterations and clothing repairs at home, with her sewing machine. When clothing was rationed women were often happy to have old dresses refashioned when new ones just weren’t available.
At the end of the war Giles left school just before he was fifteen and started work at a local grocer’s, often doing deliveries by bicycle with a large carrier on the front. It was at this time he had found the old violin on top of a wardrobe and Aunt Mabel had said he could have it if he wanted. He had a bit of a flair for music and gradually learnt to play the violin. They couldn't afford lessons and his efforts were certainly not very polished, but it was a spare time amusement.
Over the next five years Aunt Mabel’s health declined and she could no longer take in work and Giles' earnings were barely enough to pay for rent and groceries. Christmas 1947 looked like being a bleak one for them and Giles decided to take his violin up to the West End and try busking. He found an open square busy with Christmas shoppers and setting his cap on the pavement in front of him started to scratch and scrape on the strings, ignored by everyone except a café proprietor who was coming out to tell him to move on as he was driving his customers away.
It was just before the café proprietor reached him that it happened. The old gentleman appeared. He was dressed in rather an old-fashioned style – frock coat, spats, a top hat and a muffler round his lower face. He took the violin from Giles and with a twinkle in his dark eyes, adjusted the pegs, took the bow, played a note or two and adjusted the pegs again. Then he started to play Dvorak’s Humoresque followed by Bach’s Ave Maria. Pavement walkers were stopping to listen and soon a crowd was gathering quite transfixed by his playing. He almost danced round the square playing the Flight of the Bumble Bee. He paused briefly to tell Giles to take his cap round and while the cap filled with the listeners generosity the old man launched into a medley of popular songs and Christmas carols.
Then suddenly it was all over. The old man had disappeared, the shopping crowds moved on and Giles was sitting on his own on the pavement with his violin. Had it really happened or had he dreamt it, but his cap was full of money, silver and even some notes.
He went home and told Aunt Mabel what had happened. She smiled and said little other than “Take care with the money; we might need it soon.” And it was to be a Godsend to them over the coming two years. They had a better Christmas than they had expected but Aunt Mabel was not going to see many more. She died two years later.
When Giles went to see the solicitor, it became clear that Aunt Mabel had left a small sum, but little was left over after the simple funeral expenses were paid. However, the solicitor had other news for him. He explained that although his Aunt Mabel did not know, his mother had not confided in her who his father was; many years ago he had been approached by an old man who was his grandfather who wanted to make provision for him when he grew up. His eldest son Bartek had been something of a playboy and after a wild fling with Giles’ mother had been killed in a road accident in Paris. Bartek had told his father before the accident that he intended to do the honourable thing and marry her. The solicitor continued “Your grandfather was Cezary Kaminski.”
“Not the Cezary Kaminski, the Polish violinist” exclaimed Giles.
“The very same” responded the solicitor “and as you may know he left Poland to make London his home. He was a widely acclaimed concert violinist and with the considerable wealth he earned established a Music College here. He left a £1000 pounds for me to pass on to you when I thought you had reached an age of responsibility and in addition a free place at the Music College should you wish to take it.”
Listening to Giles' account of his early life Gerry gasped in surprise “So you are the great Cezary Kaminski’s grandson. I expect you took the place offered at the Music College then.”
“Yes, I did after I got over the surprise and shock of it all. Aunt Mabel never knew all this and as I had been brought up with the surname Herbert, I kept it.” Giles went on to explain that although he had musical talent, he never was a success with the violin, but at the college he experimented with the wind section and soon found he was natural with the saxophone and from then on it had been plain sailing.”
“However, there was one other great surprise” continued Giles. “The first day I entered the college hanging at the end of the imposing entrance hall was a full- length portrait of the founder, my grand-father, the great Cezary Kaminski in frock coat and top hat with those dark twinkling eyes. The very same man who had unexpectantly taken my violin and played to the crowd in the street that Christmas many years ago.”
“So now all the questions about your past had been answered and no mystery remained” responded Gerry.
“Not quite” replied Giles “That Christmas was in 1947. Cezary Kaminski had died in 1938.”
About the author
Guy Pratt is a retired octogenarian second hand bookseller who enjoys gardening, long walks with his dog and travel. He gravitated into the book trade after earlier years in farming, the army Intelligence Corps and the civil service.
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