Press Release - Golden-Oldies televised on National Lottery Awards

PRESS RELEASE
 
Wednesday, September 19, 2018

The 2018 National Lottery Awards will be televised next Wednesday evening, September 26, on BBC1 in a show presented by Ore Oduba.
 
The prestigious Awards are across seven different categories, one being Education. These are selected from thousands of Lottery funded projects across the UK. This category has been won by the WW1 ‘Armistice Cantata’ from the Golden-Oldies sing and smile Charity.
 
‘Goldies’, as it is more fondly known, was started by Bath’s music man Grenville Jones in 2007. Grenville wanted to take fun singing to older isolated people in community rooms. From four initial sessions in and around the Bath and Bristol area the charity has now grown to the point where it runs over 160 across England and Wales.
 
The sessions take place in Yorkshire, the Midlands, Essex, across the South West of England and in South Wales under the Goldies Cymru banner.
 
Grenville introduced intergenerational projects in the early years of the charity encouraging schools to open their doors to older people in their communities. This year the theme was the final months of WW1. Grenville’s grandfather lost his life in the early days of The Somme. He says;
 
“I believe it is so important that younger children are aware of what happened 100 years ago. It is, of course, a very complex subject but through music and singing those much-loved WW1 songs such as Tipperary, I believe that they can come to have an understanding of how the years 1914-1918 made such an impact on our lives and communities today.”
 
As part of the Goldies intergenerational project this year Thornhill Primary School, Cardiff, worked with Grenville on the research and writing of a 30-minute production which could be made available to all schools to perform as part of their WW1 commemorations. ‘Armistice Cantata’ was selected for the UK National Lottery Awards and won the Education Category.
 
Grenville will receive the award on the show with Claire Holcombe, Head of Music at Thornhill Primary School. Claire led the project with the children’s choir at the school.
 
ENDS
 
Our picture shows Katherine Jenkins with Grenville Jones last week. Katherine made a surprise visit to Thornhill Primary School to announce the winner.
 
Press enquiries to Grenville Jones on 07778 282934.

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