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 The
instant and universal availability of amplified music is a mixed blessing.
It has tended to turn culture into wallpaper - with graffiti. Sue and
I went to a wonderful concert with fireworks at Wilton House last July.
I was amazed at the number of people who behaved as if they were sitting
at home in front of their television sets, as if the musicians weren't
real people who might be sensitive to chattering, pottering audiences.
But there were thousands of people and - yes- it was amplified.
There's
a wealth of music in the county - to suit all tastes. And one man's music
is another man's noise pollution. But if we can choose real ale let us
have real music, too. Many towns in France are wired up to play compulsory
amplified music to passing citizens. Did you know that wired into the fake
'granite' setts in our 'refurbished' Salisbury High Street are pillars
which rise out of the ground so that street artists can plug in their amplifiers?
We are told by our masters this is all part of the "café society" which
is what Salisbury needs. Virtual Salisbury is upon us. But what is being
thrown out along with the car?
Most
long-established residents don't want to put the clock back. But we do
want to record the days when real Wiltshire streets were about real people.
As a child I saw the bustling High Street fall still and silent with respect,
awe and fear as the Assize Judge strode with the Police Chief from the
Close to the Guildhall. The upholder of the rule of law in step with the
man with the power of life and death.
People
in the streets meant soldiers in uniform, too, streaming in and out of
the old NAAFI (now Woolworths) or the 'new' NAAFI (now the County Court
- which incongruously still boasts the finest sprung dance floor in the
county!).
New
Canal was bustling with animals on their way to or from the auction yard.
The Market Place sold the full range of farm animals. The stench and muck
were memorable. In contrast, Gibbs Mew were brewing, Robert Stokes was
roasting coffee and the Snells were working on their chocolate creations.
Pritchets were busy in Butcher Row (then a two-way street), Greens were
dealing in fish and game in Fisherton Street, Butts in fruit and veg in
New Street. Tap-water tasted like water. Milk tasted like milk.
Back
at home in the Close the loudest sound was the cathedral clock - followed
by the drone of 'Ginger' Rogers' giant lawnmower generating mountains of
pungent clippings. Lazy summer days were spent afloat in our little dinghy,
exploring the creeks and leets, listening to the rushing and splashing
of water through the hatches and the 'tic-tac' of the water-bailiffs' weed-cutting
pontoon.
By
the age of ten I was completely hooked on local archaeology. My birthday
treat was a picnic lunch on a barrow beside the Roman road at Handley Cross.
The skylarks may have been the only sound - but of course the legionnaires
were there, too. Why not? I'd heard and seen stranger things in Salisbury
Close.
Those
vivid memories are in the past. But in Wiltshire past and present are inseparable.
Next time you wander down a familiar shopping street raise your eyes above
the screaming shop-fronts and contemplate the timber, stone, brick and
tiles of the roofs and chimneys that tell their own tales of Wiltshire
life.
My
Wiltshire is a county of searing white summer light on the Plain, of orange
and violet sunsets over Stonehenge, of silky moonlight on the soft Chilmark
stone of the Cathedral and the pitch-black of winter nights in the country.
We should not put those qualities at risk by over-zealous, careless light
pollution. How I'd love to wave a millennium wand, bury all the cables
and aerials and replace all our orange street lights with the latest elegant
technology, in sympathy with our heritage.
Wiltshire
should also be touched. Touch is such a wonderful sense. Recently I was
walking along Exeter Street from the Guildhall to my home over the Ayleswade
Bridge, beside the ancient Close wall. I stopped to touch one of the carved
stones brought down from the ruins of the first cathedral at Old Sarum
to start a new life in the 13th century. It was therapeutic. The texture
and smell of the grainy limestone and the contours created by the mason
communicated down the centuries.
So,
touch the stones, touch the chalk, feel the soil, run your hands through
the clear spring water. Connect with Wiltshire which has so much to celebrate,
such a future ahead.
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