THE ‘Good Old Days’ returned to Winchester to raise an estimated £2,000 for the Mayor’s charities.

The mayor, Eileen Berry, and Master of Ceremonies, Richard Chisnell led a talented company and the large audience in a medley of favourites at the close of a hugely entertaining concert at the Theatre Royal last Friday.

The Old Time Music Hall, staged as a fundraising event, was played out in the best traditions of variety theatre.

The genial and good-humoured Mr Chisnell setting the mood from his flamboyant opening entrance to the rip-roaring grand finale.

The Winchester Musicals and Opera Society opened the evening with the colourful and uplifting Ziegfield Follies number Row, Row, Row and added sparkle to the first half with a lively tap routine entitled Hitchey Koo.

There were solo performances from Carole Miles-Kingston, Ronni Davis and Deborah Cleary that ranged from comedy songs to light opera, a brief appearance by the Barber Shop harmony group, Designer Stubble and a medley of World War I numbers from the Colden Common Music and Drama Group.

Producer Sylvia Mould enhanced the musical mix with the enthusiastic presentation of Putting on the Ritz by the Blue Apple Theatre dancers, a menacing and highly amusing melodrama from a group called ‘The Geriactors’ and a clever routine performed by jugglers Dan Newman-Farr and Juliana Teichert.

Cllr Berry had promised fun, colour and spectacle and this came in good measure when the Can Can dancers from the Florian School of Dance burst onto the stage to open the second half.

Their high kicking, cart-wheeling and skirt-lifting performance was pure Pigalle and drew well deserved cheers and applause from the audience.

Carole Miles-Kingston displayed her own vocal versatility when she followed her earlier rendition of Vilia with the music hall favourite When Father Papered the Parlour.

Solos from Frank Allen and Penny Bullough, a Flanagan and Allen medley and a set by the Winchester Uke Jam continued the strong musical theme while melodramas from The Worthy Players and Blue Apple Theatre, and the trickery and tom-foolery of ‘Magic Dan’ Newman-Farr carried the programme to its finale.