It was the second of our Forget Me Not Cafes of the month and once again we had the ever engaging Angela Bishop who has visited us numerous times in the past.
This time Angela was talking about memories of the 1960s. She mentioned loads of films, musicals and songs. And at one point she posed a question.
What links the musical The Sound of Music and Norwich? The answer wasn't apparent but as soon as Angela mentioned the song Do Re Mi from The Sound of Music, I cottoned on.
Do Re Mi is the notation known as the Tonic Solfa which as you all know is a technique aid for teaching singing and the Tonic Solfa was invented by Sarah Ann Glover in Norwich.
So who exactly was Sarah Ann Glover?
She was born in Norwich Cathedral Close in 1786 and received music lessons from the organist of Norwich Cathedral at the age of six. While teaching a Sunday school with her sister, she began creating her own simplified notation system which became known as the Norwich Sol-Fa system and then the Tonic Solfa when it was developed by somebody else.
There is a blue plaque to her on the wall of St Benedict's Church in Norwich. I include a photograph of the plaque.
She later lived in Cromer and then Reading and Hereford. One of Norwich's relatively unknown gems such as Pablo Fanque, whom I may have mentioned a few times in the past.
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One day I'm going to write a book on ridiculous quiz answers. I put them on here a lot. Today's comes from Who Wants To Be a Millionaire? To which the answer from most is "Me but I don't have the necessary knowledge."
This is not so puch a silly answer as somebody who couldn't think logical. The question was something along the lines of: "Which book by Charles Dickens has the main character Phillip Pip Pirrip. The alternatives were Oliver Twist, Great Expectations, David Copperfield and Nicholas Nickleby.
The person answering didn't seem to have a clue and asked the audience who were also very split with their answers. She eventually did get it right but only after I had shouted at the TV:
It's Pirrip you stupid woman. The others all have Dickens' books named after them so wouldn't be the main character in Great Expectations.
A slightly shorter blog today as I'm building up to one of my more serious ones on identity and insignificance which will take some working on. Bet you can't wait.