... ERNEST LOUGH At the age of 15, Ernest Lough, who has died aged 88, made his famous recording of Mendelssohn's Hear My Prayer, with its aria 0, For the Wings of a Dove. That was in March 1927, and six months later the wax master was so worn that Lough, a treble soloist with the choir of Temple Church, London, had to do it all over again. The recording had a remarkable effect on the public at ...

... Mervyn Saunders In his heyday. Mervyn Saunders. who has died at the age of 89, was billed as 'the popular young BBC tenor and composer'. Early in his career, he played the 1938 Gaiety Whirl summer season in Ayr, later recalling: The experience gained at the Gaiety helped me tremendously in later years, for I was cast to play at the London Palladium for a year with Tommy Trinder. ending with a ...

... REG MAXFIELD Reg Maxfield, who died at his home in Sheffield aged 85, was still in his teens when he formed the dancing act The Three Dennis Boys and Rita with his brothers Percy and Cyril and 17-year-old Rita White. The act spent the summer of 1934 in the cast of the Gaiety Whirl summer show at the Gaiety Theatre, Ayr. It stayed there for 16 weeks and closed that December at the Palace, Hull ...

... DESMOND GRAHAM Desmond Graham, who arrived in London from his home in South Africa in 1950, died on December 31 after a short illness. He got a job as a dancer in Oklahoma! at the Theatre Royal, Dairy Lane, soon after coming to Britain, and from then on danced and appeared in many shows and television productions after joining the George Carden Dancers at the London Palladium. Graham, who was ...

... ARTHUR SCOTT ROBERTSON Well-known Scottish musician Arthur Scott Robertson died recently in hospital at Lerwick in the Shetland Isles. He was 88 years old. Robertson was introduced to Scottish traditional music as a nineyear-old schoolboy and became a talented fiddle player. He composed many tunes, made three records of Scottish fid dle music, and in 1970 featured at a major Bums Night concert ...

... SHAY GORMAN Dublin actor Shay Gorman has died in London aged 76. Gorman, of Dorset Street, Dublin, started his career at the Gate Theatre. In the forties, he toured the USA with the Dublin Players, and later travelled to Australia with the Old Vic Company. His television credits include dramas The Manageress and Boys from the Black Stuff and, more recently, the Channel 4 cult comedy Father Ted ...

... Charles Gray Versatile character actor Charles Gray, who is probably best remembered as the evil Ernst Blofeld in Sean Connery's last Cubby Broccoli produced James Bond movie. Diamonds Are Forever, died on March 7 aged 71. An expert in the art of creating an unoenying Teenng ot menace on the screen, he was, according to those who knew him, a charming man with good taste and a dry wit. He was ...

... JOHNNY GEDDES One of Scotland's best-known magicians, with a career spanning more than 50 years, Johnny Geddes has died at Dundee, aged 81. He was inspired to study the art of magic after seeing a show in a church hall during his school days. Starting out as a straight magician, he gradually introduced comedy into his act, and was soon presenting hundreds of shows a year in theatres, clubs and ...

... JAMES MARSLAND James Marsland, known as Jimmie, who spent almost all of his professional career with the original D'Oyly Carte Opera Company, died peacefully in hospital, aged 87, after a short illness. Although he served an apprenticeship as a carpenter, when he left school in his native Hyde, Cheshire, Jimmie spent almost all of his spare time with various local amateur dramatic and operatic ...

... ALEXANDER YOUNG Alexander Young, who has died aged 79, was an exceptionally stylish tenor of the post-war years, though his light voice made him a specialist in certain roles and composers. He did, however, make a considerable success, as much for his acting ability as his singing, in such operas as Richard Strauss' Ariadne auf Naxos and Arabella, Mozart's II Seraglio and Cosi fan tutte, ...

... DAVID KNAPMAN David Knapman, who died of cancer at the end of October, was an immensely talented and immaculately professional designer whose high standards, consistency and popularity were a major factor in the success of the Wolsey Theatre, Ipswich, where he was head of design for 20 years. His first connection with the professional theatre was in his home town of Worcester. While working as ...

... NELLO BARIO Formerly a very popular musical clown and eccentric, Nello Bario (Lionello Meschi) has died in Paris following a long illness, at the age of 81. His Italian-born father Manrico Meschi and uncle Dario Meschi formed one of Europe's leading musical clown acts in the twenties as the Dario- Bario family. Nello, born Lionello, in Alinxos, Sweden on August 28, 1918, became a member of the ...