You wait a long time for a big wedding anniversary but once you’ve reached the magical silver 25, they feel just like buses following each other down the road and seemingly travelling very fast.
 
So as March 2019 approached - five years after the silver one - there we were incredulously approaching our 30th (pearl) anniversary. 30 years – surely only old people celebrate pearl wedding anniversaries– can’t possibly be that many for us already?!
 
Suppose we had better make an effort to do something special (we thought!) – not party people, tied to a weekend, weather forecast not good; what were we to do?
 
Well, as you will know if you follow our ramblings (thank you all -it’s so lovely when it’s not just your Mum reading them!) our favourite activities always involve our walking boots and the cameras, but where could we go which would be a little special?

One of the greatest things we share is a love and passion for music. All sorts of music. Neither of us follow any genre and (hip) hop around between classical and rock, rap and pop, we even dabbled with jazz last year and thanks to the fantastic Hackney Colliery Band found it maybe wasn’t so bad after all.

​That’s not to say we don’t have favourites and certain groups/singers who we would put some effort into seeing. Dave Grohl and the Foo Fighters hold the record for the group we have seen the most - taking our kids to see them at a very early age and continuing that through the last 20 years! 

We actively seek out new musical experiences from attending the world premiere  of the Hacienda Classical when no one knew what on earth would happen (Happy Monday’s Bez was there – always unpredictable), to the combined skills of McBusted! We even enjoy the occasional ‘fake’ band – ticket prices are much cheaper to watch Fake That or the Tom Jones impersonator who morphed into Neil Sedaka during the interval (maybe one we won’t be revisiting!). 
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So when we heard on the grapevine that a brand new group – Manchester Baroque – would be holding their inaugural performance in Manchester – tickets just £10 and a night when we were already going to be in the city. Hardly difficult to make that decision!

​Manchester Baroque have a catchy slogan ‘Old Instruments, New Ideas’. They are led by Dr Pauline Nobes, who specialises in historical performance and they aim to recreate some of the famous baroque concerts held in Manchester in the 18th century. (That meant nothing to us either!) One of us was quite familiar with baroque music and the other was secretly hoping it was actually some new style of rock music ‘ba-rock’! (time to get the black studded ankle boots out?!)
 
The debut concert took place in St Ann’s Church in the city centre to a sell out audience. The church was obviously picked for its historical connections and beauty, but maybe not for the view from the seats! Luckily, before the  second half someone left early due to a fidgety toddler, so we quickly shuffled into their centre stage view (don’t think anyone noticed!) and it was time to get the cameras out (you should know by now we go nowhere without them!).

​The concert consisted of 6 concertos and an introduction to the group and their aims. Not noticed by us until Dr Nobes pointed it out, was that the instruments were definitely ‘old’ (even older than us!), either genuine 18thcentury instruments or recreations. The Violins had pigs gut strings and the cello had no stand and was held by the musician between her knees– can’t imagine how uncomfortable that was! Most surprising was the flute which looked just like the recorder I used to play (very poorly!) at primary school. 

​We both really enjoyed the evening – the concertos were short and lively and played with great passion. Learning about the history of Baroque and the aim of the group's project was fascinating. This music would have been the ‘rock’ music of the 18th century I have no doubt! Don’t you imagine Mozart to be the Bowie of his day? The Aladdin Sane of the 18th century?

Whilst queuing for the interval toilet break (second issue with a church just 3 toilets!) several members of the very knowledgeable audience stated that Manchester has had a huge gap with a lack of Baroque musicians (not noticed that either!). Maybe Manchester Baroque have just filled that.
 
Visit their website to sign up for updates on their upcoming projects.

 Emmeline Pankhurst is a very famous woman – have you heard of her?
Born in Moss Side, Manchester in 1858 she was named in 1999 as one of Time Magazines ‘100 Most Important People of the 20th Century’ and made the shortlist for the BBC’s 28 Most Important and Influential figures of the 20th century.
It’s hard to imagine a time when, if you were a woman, you were not allowed to vote and if it wasn’t for women like Emmeline Pankhurst there is every possibility that in 2019 it would still be the same. Described as a militant, she was introduced to the women’s suffrage movement from a very early age and went on to take a leading role in the fight for women’s votes.
On Friday 14th December 2018, exactly 100 years since the first women in the UK voted in a general election, a brand new bronze statue of Emmeline Pankhurst, created by sculptor Hazel Reeves, was unveiled in St Peter’s Square, Manchester. Chosen in a public vote (we have a lot of these now don’t we!) she now stands, forever immortalised, addressing the crowds from her chair.