Basil David Moss 1935 - 2020
Some Memories of times with Basil
Harvey (Norton) OP 1949-1954
Basil and I met at St Paul’s School in 1949 from where we formed a life-long friendship.
We performed regularly in the schools ‘Colet Clubs Reviews’ where I vividly recall an ‘indelible’ (the only polite way of describing it) performance by Basil playing Eddy Calvert’s hit “O Mein Papa” only erased from the audience’s memory by the riotous performance of (Dr) Jonathan Miller imitating Danny Kaye which followed Basil! We never heard the trumpet again except in the disciplined confines of the school orchestra. Basil did what he did best in numerous sketches in the reviews and once, I remember he auditioned to sing a song which was ‘blackballed’ after 10 seconds by the producer , a Mr Harbord.
Basil demonstrated early his solid ‘faith’ at school with his membership of the Christian Union and the holiday ‘House Parties’.
In 1963 I invited Basil to be my ‘best man’ at my wedding in West Malling Kent.
Basil by this time had become a household name as ‘Alan Drew’ in the TV soap ‘Compact’ and even made a pop song in the charts!
Basil and I could always be found in the ‘gods’ at the Royal Opera House during the ‘Wagner Seasons’ - twice we ‘did’ the whole season - 24 hours of solid Wagner in a week! Plenty of time to discuss ‘unresolved suspended 9th’s!! '
Basil’s ‘fixation’ with Wagner and then Mahler continued on but alas mine did not!
We joined the Royal Marine Reserves together as he said “its the only way to do our National Service in the regiment of our choice”. The RMV Drill Hall was down the road in Hammersmith so it was an easy ‘escape’ from school! I hoped then he was not harbouring desires to play his trumpet in a Royal Marine band!!
It is an great irony that ultimately Basil went off to be an officer in the Royal Marines whilst I ended up as ‘the Bandstand Singer’ in the Royal Marine School of Music at Deal and touring the resorts of the South East singing endless Drake’s Drums and Sea Fevers and the like with the RM Bands!!
My abiding and everlasting memory of that day is walking with alone Basil from my parents’ lowly’ dwelling at the ‘bottom’ end of West Malling up into the High Street on the way to the ’top end’ of the town where my wife to be’s parents lived opposite the Church.
As we stepped into the High Street there was a sudden stampede of hundred’s of teen-aged girls and older others surrounding us a screaming ‘love cries’ to my best man! We were both ‘rescued’ by a bevy of constables and helped up to the ‘safety’ of the Church with a very valuable escort behind us . Basil in his inimitable style simply turned to me and murmured nonchalantly “don’t worry Harvey it happens all the time these days”.
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