Mike Storr - 'Master of Mirth'

The speaker on 23 June was Rotarian Mike Storr and his subject was Masters of Mirth.

Mike introduced himself as a Rotarian, who had twice been President of his Club. He explained that he was asthmatic and some nine years ago had suffered a very serious asthmatic attack. He had since started fund raising for Asthma UK with his Masters of Mirth talk and had so far raised over £38,000. He was presenting to us his 622nd Masters of Mirth performance. 

The talk was about the history of the Music Hall, which really developed after the first World War and flourished until the 1950s. It started with singing in pubs and became so popular that many pubs opened up rooms or halls to house regular performances – hence Music Hall. It grew rapidly so that all the larger towns had theatres offering Music Hall entertainment and at its peak London alone had 300 venues. They had started as working class entertainment, generously lubricated with alcohol. There were attempts to set up alcohol-free Music Halls but nobody went.

Mike paid tribute to the great Music Hall comedians, picking out – for the older Rotarians – Sandy Powell, George Formby, Arthur Askey, Max Miller, Robb Wilton, George Robey and more. He then went on to deliver monologues from famous performers, which he did complete with accents and mannerisms. He had earlier been involved in amateur dramatics and his acting ability was evident. He started with Robb Wilton – “The day war broke out….” – and went on to cover Pam Ayres, Bernard Miles, Stanley Holloway’s “Albert and the Lion” and finishing with Gerard Hoffnung’s “Bricklayer’s Lament”, which he delivered to the Oxford Union.

This was a very entertaining evening and President Theresa took great pleasure in thanking Mike on behalf of the Club.