THE
P RTAL
September 2017
Page 7
“If music be the
food of love, play on”
Jackie Ottaway and Ronald Crane have been to visit Keith Brown
T he opening
line of Shakespeare’s ‘Twelfth Night’ is usually taken to refer to romantic love. But for
Keith Brown, it is the love of music itself, the love of the Church, and love for Our Lord himself.
Keith was born in Sunderland, although he never
lived there. The family lived in Washington, which in
the late seventies was the new town in the North East
of England. There are two children; his sister is four
years his junior. His grandmother used to play the
piano for the WI and in chapel. She became his first
piano teacher. There was a piano in the house and he
could never walk past it without banging on it.
He tells us with a smile, “Even when she took me, as
a toddler, to play for the WI, I would stand waving my
arms like windmills in front of these old ladies singing
Jerusalem!”
We had come to Keith’s comfortable apartment in St
Albans. He had thoughtfully provided refreshments.
He continued, “From then on I used to stay with
Grandma. Mum and Dad would go and stay with
friends at the weekend. I used to stay with a different
set of grandparents each weekend. When I stayed with
my Mum’s parents I went to chapel. When I stayed
with my Dad’s parents I went to church.
“Some people might remember St Margaret’s,
Castletown where Fr Peter Spargo was the vicar. My
dad had been his boat boy. He played for the church
football team all those years ago. So, I went to an
Anglo Catholic church with one set of grandparents
“I got my graded Organ distinction, and then went
and chapel with the other. It was the nice people at to university with first study pianist, second study
chapel who allowed me to play the organ. The chapel organist. But in my first few weeks I actually changed
really encouraged me.
to be a first study organist and second study pianist
and I got the organ scholarship at Wakefield cathedral
“Then I moved and became a chorister with some at the time under Jonathan Bielby. I was there for a few
of my friends, when I was in my mid-teens, in the years. I combined that with being organist at Mirfield
parish church. Then went to City of Sunderland parish church - that was in 1998.
College to do my A levels. I was a 1st study pianist
at this stage and met a chap called Derek Shute.
“I did my music degree at Huddersfield and then
my PGCE. I wasn’t sure whether I wanted to continue
“I then had masters such as David Sanger, David playing or go into teaching. I came for an interview
Titterington, Graham Cummings and Gordon Stewart here at St Albans to do a second organ scholarship
as later organ teachers. Derick Shute was organist at and at the same time I went for a job interview as an
St Ignatius Hendon, Sunderland, which was another assistant director of music and organist at Barnard
big Anglo Catholic parish. I went and had my organ Castle School. I was offered the job so I could teach
lessons there and Derick really inspired me.
and play and that’s how my teaching career and playing