I've read all of the comments on the evening and come to the same conclusion as most of you. I can well understand all the difficulties the organizers were under but despite all the hard work the result was that the school is not a suitable venue. Because of security and the placement of the venue to many young musicians spent to many hour ferrying us around, I know that they did it with the utmost courtesy and with a smile on their faces but it wasn't fair. As many have written, we, the people it's run for need to get involved. We can't expect working service people to do all the work, we would want their help but I think it's got to be a two way organization.

I think:

1. We've got to get the school onboard and form a working committee.

2. It's got to be in Portsmouth or the surrounding area because of the Sunday service.

3. We need a new venue, somewhere like the RMA in Eastney.

4. We have to decide what we want from the evening and what we are prepared to pay for it. (I don't think we need a hot meal, a good buffet would I think satisfy most people)

These are just a few thoughts and without any doubt there are many of you who could add to them but the first thing that must be done is to arrange a meeting with the PDM to find out what his thoughts and response would be to our ideas.

Richard Valentine - 1996 - 2019© - All rights reserved