Sheila Tracy talks to Maisie Ringham

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One of the small regrets of my musical career is that I've never played any jazz," says Maisie Ringham, Principal Trombone of the Hallé Orchestra for ten years at a time when women sitting in the brass section of a symphony orchestra was almost unheard of. "Playing in a dance band, as a member of the Salvation Army, would have been frowned on at that time. I nearly joined Ivy Benson and actually spent a day with the band, but my parents didn't think it would be the thing for me to do, so I didn't take up Ivy's offer. They were always very supportive of my musical career, but as Salvation Army officers, it would have been an embarrassment to them."

Maisie came into the world with music ringing in her ears. On the day she was born at Woolwich, the Abercarn Salvation Army Band from Wales was on a visit to London and spending Sunday in Woolwich, where Maisie's parents were the SA Commanding Officers. On hearing the news of the birth, they played outside the Ringham house.

As a small girl, she was accustomed to seeing various musical instruments lying around the house. Her father, who played the bass trombone, came home one day and found his seven year old daughter playing the scale of C on a euphonium which was almost bigger than she was. The time had come, he decided, to give her some lessons; and when, four years later, Maisie picked up a trombone that happened to be in the house, he taught her to play that as well.

In those days, Salvation Army Officers were paid what the local Corps could afford and my parents didn't get a big salary, but they saved and saved and sacrificed quite a lot to buy me my first trombone which cost £15. It was a Triumphonic Soloist, a Salvation Army make, and it was a very good trombone."

While still at school, she was awarded an Exhibition scholarship at the Trinity College of Music where she studied on Saturday mornings under George Maxted, who was then Principal Trombone of the London Philharmonic Orchestra. By the time she had left school, Maisie's parents had moved to Stockport, and her father took her along to the Royal Manchester College of Music - as the Royal Northern College of Music was then called. His faith in his daughter's ability was justified as she was awarded the Candlin Wind Instrument Scholarship and an Exhibition, and after studying for three years under Sam Holt, Principal Trombone of the BBC Northern Orchestra, became the first trombonist to gain an ARMCM Performer's Diploma. One of the examiners on that occasion was Wally Jones, orchestral manager of the Hallé.

While I was at the College, I had done two summer seasons on St. Anne's Pier, Blackpool, playing in the orchestra. At the end of the course, when I was think about joining the ATS band, a friend of mine, a professional trombonist in Blackpool, said to me "There's a job going at the BBC in the Midland Light Orchestra, why don't you apply?" "Rubbish," I said, "I'd never stand a chance." "Well, it's experience and I think you would stand a chance," he said. So I got an audition and got the job on Principal Trombone."

But something even better was waiting just around the corner for Maisie Ringham.

I'd been with the MLO for just over a year when I got a telegram from Sir John Barbirolli saying they had a vacancy in the Hallé and would I like to join them? Not only was that a tremendous thrill, but it was the fulfilment of an ambition, because I remember my father taking me to hear the Hallé Orchestra when I was still quite small and my whispering in his ear, "Dad, I'll play in that orchestra one day." I never really believed it - but it happened.

There was another girl in the brass section, a horn player, Enid Roper, and we always used to stay together when we went on tour. I used to have my leg pulled quite a lot because I was Salvation Army. I remember turning up for a rehearsal for the first time in my uniform becasue it was a Sunday and I had been to service. Sir John Barbirolli met me in the doorway and was so thrilled to see me like that, he threw his arms around me and kissed me!"

Sir John wasn't so thrilled the day his Principal Trombone lost her trombone. "We used to rehearse in the top floor of a factory in Manchester, and when we came back from engagements, the porters unloaded the instruments and left them on different floors. When we arrived for rehearsal, we collected our instruments from where they were always left, and when I went to find the trombones in their large coffin-like boxes, my box wasn't there. It wasn't to be found anywhere, and we even rang Bradford, where we'd been on the previous engagement, so we decide it must have been stolen. At the start of rehearsal, there was I standing at the back of the orchestra, talking to the porters, when Sir John Barbirolli put down his baton and shouted at me, "Maisie, why aren't you playing? Sit down and play." I said, "I'm sorry, Sir John. My instrument has been stolen." "Go and get another one then!", he roared. As far as he was concerned, I was being payed to play, not to stand around talking. I eventually got my Super Olds with the fluted slide back after the police raided a house at three o'clock in the morning and found it."

So, what was Sir John like to work for?

He worked you very, very hard. But then he worked himself hard and set the pace - but he was good to work for. After he'd shouted at me when I hadn't got my trombone, he came up to me after rehearsal and put his arms around me and said he was terribly sorry and wanted to know about how it had been stolen."

After a decade spent touring the world with the Hallé, having been married five of those years, Maisie left in order to raise a family and has a son, Karl, and daughter, Sue, neither of whom have followed their parents into the music business. Maisie's husband, Ray Wiggins, was also a Salvation Army trombonist, and whenever Maisie performs with the Salvation Army, she uses her married name.

After leaving the Hallé, she continued to be in demand both as an orchestral player and as a soloist, undertaking tours of Canada, Australia, New Zealand and the Scandinavian countries. She has had several trombone works composed especially for her, including Concertino for Trombone and Band by Erik Leidzen, and as a soloist with the Hallé Orchestra, she gave the first performance of Fantasy for Trombone by Paul Creston.

Nowadays, playing a Conn 88H, Maisie divides her time between performing and teaching trombone, euphonium and tuba, which she does at several London independent schools, including Harrow.

Once you start teaching, it snowballs. I've been teaching at Harrow for ten years and I also teach at a prep school in Harrow and at the North London Collegiate Girls School."

Not so long ago, Maisie Ringham was approached by a radio station compiling a programme on women in orchestras.

They first asked me what problems I had playing in a top symphony orchestra. I was rather taken aback and told them I had no problems. The next question was what problems I had when I applied for the job. When I told them i didn't apply but was invited to join the orchestra, I heard nothing more! But I will say this: women have to be quite a bit better than their average male counterparts to get the job. I honestly do believe that."

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