Astra Desmond (contralto), Walter Widdop (tenor)
The City of Bristol Police Band (String section)
(By kind permission of The Watch Committee)
Relayed from The Colston Hall, Bristol

(Solo violin, Constable J. Constant; solo violoncello, Constable G. Williams)

One of those things which serious musicians number among the crimes which are, unfortunately, not punishable by law is the sacrilegious misuse of classical masterpieces. Perhaps the most heinous, but at the same time the most successful, crime of this kind ever perpetrated is this Ave Maria. The groundwork of this piece is the lovely first Prelude from Bach's Forty-eight, relegated by Gounod to the purpose of an accompaniment to a tune of his own placed on top of it. It was am impudent thing to do, nothing can excuse it, time cannot condone it-nor, indeed, can time kill it. The queer part is that had Gounod written the whole thing, accompaniment and all, it might have been accepted by everybody as a serious and, in its sentimental way, even an effective, piece of work.

Police March, Feast Song