Christmas magic

10th December 2023

For more than twenty five years there’s been - for me - an official starting gun to Christmas. It was the evening in early December when, as I liked to say on air, I ‘got up on my hind legs’ to host the BBC Radio Leeds Christmas carol service. Each year we’d be in a different cathedral or big church, rotating round the five council areas of West Yorkshire. It might be Wakefield one year, Huddersfield the next, then Bradford Cathedral perhaps, Halifax and finally Leeds Minster. In fact that’s where we were in December 2022 for what proved to be the final event of its kind. I always loved meeting listeners who began to understand just what a face for radio really means! There was the added pleasure of then listening to the broadcast of the service on Christmas Eve and Christmas Day. Sadly the reorganisation of BBC local radio, and the departure of long serving staff like me and my friend and colleague David Crickmore (who produced the service), meant that this annual highlight came to an end.

However, much to my delight, I was asked by Colne Valley Male Voice Choir to host their annual Christmas Concert at one of the most famous venues for music of this kind, Huddersfield Town Hall. This year’s guests were the world famous, and utterly brilliant, Brighouse and Rastrick Band. So it was I found myself back on my hind legs again with a microphone in front of me. The acoustics are wonderful, the history of the building legendary and the music was an absolute joy. I just had to talk a bit, guide the audience through the programme and crack a few of the Dad jokes I’ve been getting away with on the radio for years. What a joy! The concert was very well attended, the band and choir - joined by their own Colne Valley Boys - were on fabulous form and I had a ball (and my own dressing room).

There’s nothing to compare with the way brass and voices combine to bring the hairs up on the back of the neck, from gentle, moving emotion to 'rip the roof off’ magnificence. And nothing quite says Yorkshire like a male voice choir and brass band performing together. Happy Christmas!