THE rousing rendition of ‘Happy Birthday’ which ended a gala concert held to celebrate Sir David Attenborough’s 100th birthday last week was arranged by a Jersey composer.
Charles Mauleverer said he was deeply honoured to be asked by Jérôme Kuhn, who directed the BBC Concert Orchestra in the Royal Albert Hall, to arrange the birthday song, during which Sir David stood to thank the 5,000-strong audience.
Jersey-born Mr Mauleverer was one of millions watching the concert at home on Friday. It had a been a frantic week in the run-up to the event as he tailored his arrangement to the orchestra and choir on the night.
He said: “The word ‘epic’ often gets overused, but I wanted to do something that would be as epic as possible with the resources that they had. I knew the size of the orchestra and choir, so I just tried to maximise the impact of every instrument and every singer across their full range, using the percussion and particularly the trombones to good effect, and there was also a crash cymbal in there.
“The audience embraced the song so raucously and powerfully that the orchestra were rather drowned out in the end but that didn’t matter at all, and only added to the joyousness of the occasion.”
Mr Mauleverer, who has written two symphonies about Jersey, opera music in Jèrriais, music for Liberation Day and even music using types of Island rock, said he was asked to arrange the piece having worked in the past with Swiss composer Mr Kuhn.
Mr Mauleverer said: “Ten years ago, I had the première of my first symphony in Switzerland, a piece which I originally dedicated to Sir David Attenborough for his 90th birthday.
“It was called ‘One Home – An Environmental Symphony’ and was commissioned and first performed by Jérôme. He remembered an orchestral arrangement of Happy Birthday that I had done four years ago with the Slovak Radio Symphony Orchestra, and I was absolutely bowled over when he asked for permission to use a new arrangement for Sir David’s 100th.
“Commitments meant that I couldn’t attend the concert in person, but I was so proud to watch it all live on BBC1 with my family. It means so much to me that my parents, who have supported me through so many challenging years, have seen my work being performed at the Albert Hall, and I couldn’t possibly have asked for a more amazing occasion for a debut performance there.”
Mr Mauleverer is currently writing his fourth symphony, which is all about philosophy, and he hopes to collaborate with the Jersey Symphony Orchestra for the first time next year to perform it.
