Diana is one of life’s ‘doers’, just getting on with life. Getting to know her outside the orchestra I have found there is so much more to this remarkable lady than initially meets the eye.
She is the youngest of 11 and says that her mother “ran the village” so it’s easy to see where her abundance of energy comes from. Mum was choir master and Dad organist at their Baptist church and music was part and parcel of family life, with Diana taking up the violin aged 6.
Professionally she is a fully qualified PE teacher but has always continued to keep up her music, first joining the Dartford Symphony Orchestra,
- and then moving on to the Royal Amateur Orchestra of London under the great Arthur Davison while in her first teaching post. She married John and took a few years out from orchestral playing when the children came along but by the mid 1960s she was back as a member of the St Alban’s Orchestra.
- John’s work took the family to the far East, and Diana joined the Hong Kong Philharmonic (now a professional outfit) and subsequently Diana would join a local orchestra when living in Bangkok, Australia, Hong Kong for a second time, and Jakarta. One of her highlights was performing as part of a regular Sunday afternoon concert series at the Sydney Opera House playing Stravinsky’s ‘Rite of Spring’.
On John’s retirement in 1987 they returned to this country and Diana joined the Stratford Symphony Orchestra the following year, playing in the 2nds. She gradually moved up the ranks and by the start of the orchestra’s 1997/98 season she was leading it. Chamber music also became a much bigger part of her musical life and she would often play the viola. When Andrew Swinn, the orchestra’s previous conductor, stood down, Diana decided it was the right time to ease up her own orchestral role and she has been Principal 2nd violin since Dan took over.
It is a source of delight that many of the family have followed in her musical footsteps with a very proficient instrumentalist and choir master daughter and many musical grandchildren, and she tells me what a special moment it was to be entertained by a family choir as part of the celebrations for a recent milestone birthday.
Diana has always had more than the 1 string to her bow and even though she has now stopped playing tennis and golf regularly, she plays table tennis with the U3A, runs Ma Jong and Scottish Dancing groups and still enjoys countryside walks, playing club bridge and singing tenor in the North Cotswold singers. Her spirit and passion for life is an inspiration for all!