Trevor writes:

The Rotary Year that is now drawing to a close has indeed been a strange one with meetings almost exclusively having been conducted remotely.

In the early part of this year I encouraged all members to download the Zoom application to their computers and, thankfully, most members readily embraced the idea with the result our remote meetings these days are, on average, better attended than used to be the case with previous face-to-face meetings. I think that just to maintain such a level of interest has been a noteworthy achievement.

We have enjoyed many successful projects this year, some local and some international. One of our principal international actions has been relief to the people of Beirut following the blast in the dock area there last year. This has been achieved by our liaising with the Beirut-based Metn Club. George Saddington undertook a London Bridges Walk in order to make a very significant contribution to this project. We have also supported the Polio and Children in Need Charity in their efforts to change the lives of orphans in Bunyoni, Uganda via a connection with the Charity’s founding member Arun Patel who, I’m delighted to say, has now joined our club together with several other members of the now-defunct Dagenham Rotary Club. Hence our small club has managed to actually expand its membership numbers at this particularly difficult time.

Local projects have included supporting Hope 4 Havering, Street Sleeper Support (Romford) and many other initiatives all of which I consider to have reflected very well upon the generous nature of our Romford Rotary Club membership.

Trevor Brown

President 2020/21

Romford Rotary Club

About Trevor – a passion for music and Rotary

Trevor’s music career started at the early age of eight playing accordion in summer season variety shows in the Thanet area.   In 1966 he moved to London to study chemistry at University College but at weekends was regularly playing in dance bands and writing music arrangements for various cabaret artistes.

On leaving college in 1971 he entered the music profession on a full time basis and has since worked extensively in many areas. He joined the Victor Silvester Orchestra in 1972 and was subsequently part of Bob Miller’s band “The Millermen”, and spent twenty years as pianist with the Joe Loss Orchestra. Music arranging has always been of great interest to Trevor: “I was fortunate enough to work closely with TV musical director Alyn Ainsworth from 1978 during which time I contributed to many television shows including several Royal Variety Performances, many Nights of 100 Stars and BAFTA award shows. I had a hand in shaping and arranging music for many TV series such as Wednesday at Eight, Live from the Palladium, Summertime Special, Surprise Surprise, Russ Abbot’s Madhouse, Cannon and Ball, Paul Daniels’ Magic Show and many more. My work in television continued and I have been privileged to be the musical director of five Royal Variety Performances for ITV and also five series of Barrymore and My Kind Of People. Stars In Their Eyes occupied me almost continuously between 1990 and 2006 and I also worked on Soapstar Superstar and the first two series of Pop Idol.   Trevor continues to play with the big bands and for many years has played keyboard for the immensely popular Syd Lawrence and his Orchestra and, the Indian Virus permitting, will continue his engagements with the band when they restart their tours in late June.