Listen here: https://www.soundclick.com/music/songInfo.cfm?songID=13771359
This Weeks “The Adrian Song of the Week” was prompted by an old friend, Stuart Trimby’s birthday. On his Facebook page somebody had posted a picture of a group of folk at the Tresaith Youth Holiday Week, back in the day. Not sure what that year was, and I don’t want to know, because it would mean I’m getting older than I thought. Lol
Every year a group would gather at that glorious Welsh Seaside location for a week of fun and fellowship. One of the champions of the week was the now retired Reverend Robert Bebb and his wife, Jackie. Robert was minister at Hoylake Presbyterian Church on the Wirral and later at Park End Presbyterian, in Cardiff. Among his other achievements he served for a while as the Moderator of the Presbyterian Church of Wales.
But, for a small group of folk, he will always remain in their hearts as one of the leaders at Tresaith,Youth Holiday Fellowship, held at a Center sadly no longer a part of the Presbyterian Church of Wales mission.
Here's a link to Rev Bebb talking about one of his favorite bible Verses: https://youtu.be/2HI_8Fzthek
Robert was known for some of his phrases, that, in keeping us all in order, had to be repeated. One was “No water in the building.” Another, “I’m only going to say this once.” A major task each morning at any youth retreat is getting kids, who have stayed up way to late, out of bed. Quite often, at Tresaith, a piece of music would be blasted out to rouse them.
A particular year came along, when…terror of terrors… the Bebbs were not going to be able to be in attendance. Sion (the guy to my right in the picture… now a minister in Melbourne, Australia) had the idea of recording Robert’s words on tape so as his presence would still be heard! One afternoon we travelled over to the manse in Hoylake and captured some of his immortal phrases.
What to do with them? At that time, I had a small recording set up in a tiny room in the house we were living. I had obtained an Akai S700 Sampler, (For gear nerds… one of Akai’s earliest… 12-bit, 6 notes polyphony and precursor to the much better known S900 and S1000 models.)
One thing it was good at doing was loading phrases that could be played, at varying pitches, across the keyboard. In went Rev Bebbs words of wisdom.
I didn’t have a reel to reel deck at that time, so everything had to stay in the MIDI or digital domain (more nerd talk) but thanks to the wonder of Atari and Roland, I came up with a little ditty that became the “Wake Up” music for the year the Bebbs could not attend Tresaith.
You would think that would be the end of the story. Just another song that became a legend in its own lunchtime. As the Internet became a place you could post music, it was a natural thing to put it out there for any who wanted to reminisce.
I was incredibly surprised when a few years later, after moving to West Virginia, I received an email from a DJ somewhere in Asia, (Indonesia I think) asking for permission to use the song as part of the set he performed at Dance events.
More recently I came across a graphic on Spotify that surely has to be related in some way!
Seems that, for a while, Rev Bebbs words went global.
One of the beautiful things about music, of any style, is how it can take us back to relive happy memories of places and people. I can’t play this one without thinking of those wonderful days at Tresaith, and the folk who shared the experience. Good to still be in touch with many of them.