We visited this superb City over the weekend 21st to 24th October through the town twinning scheme and played two concerts, including one at the City's Peter Cornelius Music Conservatory. We were fortunate to have had such carefully made arrangements made for our visit - the achievement of Angela Neumann and Peter Fletcher, respectively the Mainz and Watford twinning officers.

We visited the cathedral and by chance met the organist, Albert Schoenberger who despite having completed his duties and about to take a deserved break, generously spent some time talking to us about working with the choir, the magnificent organ and managing delay times of between six and eleven seconds as the sound echoes round the vast building. He even gave us a demonstration including the splendid, and very rare, mechanically deployed horizontal trumpets.

Following the visit to the cathedral and sight seeing around Mainz, a civic reception was held at the Town Hall followed with a welcome speech, presentations, ‘photos and drinks and on to a splendid lunch.

Saturday's concert was at a large, church run home in the outskirts of Mainz which had been thrown open to the public.We played to a large, warm and very receptive audience and shared much hilarity as Tom struggled to get his tongue round some German vocabulary in his carefully prepared (but probably not practised enough) announcements. An encore was called for and given and a retiring collection raised a large sum of money for the old folk.

Post performance - we were taken to dinner with the guitar quartet "Sonido", teachers and guitar ensemble from the PCK who had performed as part of the concert. The Anglo German alliance was cemented with much eating, good humour and quaffing of the various beverages for which that part of the world is justly famous.

Sunday morning and an excellent boat trip up the Rhine to enjoy the views of the vineyards, palaces and castles on the hills that rear up from the river banks. We disembarked to take a look at the tourist town of Rüdesheim and took a cable car up to the gigantic memorial that marks the defeat of France's attempt to push her borders up to the banks of the Rhine and the subsequent formation of the German Republic.

Following lunch we made our way back by train to Mainz to get ready for Sunday's concert at the Konservatorium.

	The HGO performing at the Peter Cornelius Konservatorium
	The Guitar Ensemble of the Peter Cornelius Konservatorium

Once again, Angela Neumann had done a terrific job with the publicity for the evening concert at the PCK and we had a full house. The audience was every bit as warm and receptive as the one on the previous day and were just as amused by Tom's mangling of the German language. That was a first for Tom. He had never done a comedy act before!

"Sonido"

After the concert, our final dinner and some close conversation with Michael and his wife Ute who is also a guitar teacher. It was nice to able to discuss music, teaching methods, the finer points of technique, arranging music for a guitar ensemble and so on, with some one from a different country and with a different background.		Ute Koch
	Michael Koch

Needless to say, we have invited Sonido and the Guitar Ensemble of PCK to come to Watford next year. We benefitted from such excellent planning and organisation of the two town's Twinning Officers and in particular Angela who did such a great job in Mainz and received such wonderful hospitality it would be really nice to be able to return the compliment.

All that is left to say is a big “thank you” to both councils for giving us the opportunity and the funding to make the trip. Finally, you can read the report from the German press:

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From Vivaldi to Led Zeppelin:

Guitar music in a large stylistic range impresses in the PCK.

By Daniel Honsack - Allgemeine Zeitung- 25th October 2005

There exist very few compositions for guitar ensemble, which is why Tom Parsons and Alan Haigh have themselves arranged works from the Classics through to Rock for their ensemble. Both musicians are members of the Hertfordshire Guitar Orchestra, which gave two concerts in Mainz this week-end.

In the Peter Cornelius Conservatoire the Ensemble, consisting of professional and amateur musicians, presented a stylistically diverse programme. From the very first notes it was clear the guitarists had a profound mastery of their repertoire.

The Allegro from the “Spring” of Antonio Vivaldi's “Four Seasons” created a new and original listening experience with the arrangement for concert guitars, electric bass and electric guitar. Gabriel Faure's “Pavanne” was measured in tone while there was a resounding rendition of Led Zeppelin's interestingly arranged hymn, “Stairway to Heaven”.

In addition the Guitar Orchestra played works by Claude Debussy, Eric Satie and Sergei Prokoviev. In all the pieces the musicians displayed gravitas and inspiration in their exposition.

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