other OA in this year’s obituaries section who returned to teach at the College, Garth Davidson, Stuart came to Dulwich from St Bartholomew’s Primary School in Sydenham, with an ILEA assisted place, although nearly 25 years after Garth, who returned to teach at Dulwich in the same year that Stuart arrived as a pupil. He had already been learning the piano for some years, but at Dulwich, he was able to make his innate musical talent really shine. He was in Raleigh with another musical enthusiast, Chris Field, as his housemaster, and he took up the violin but soon switched to the viola, which he learned with David Price, then Head of Strings. Under the influence of Director of Music, Alan Morgan, Stuart played a very full part in the musical life of the College. In his final two Festival Hall concerts, he was one of three soloists who performed Mozart’s Piano Concerto No. 23 K.488, and then performed Saint-Saens’ Carnival of the Animals with Bernard Robertson. Stuart was also a talented sprinter, who was very rarely beaten over 100m and 200m in his early years at the College. But his slight physique coupled with increasing musical demands caused him to abandon serious athletics. He was appointed as a school prefect. After leaving the College, he spent a gap year partly working for an insurance broker in the City, with the other part spent as a waiter on the shores of Lake Constance. In 1977 he went to Cambridge University to study Music at Fitzwilliam College. While at Cambridge, he was able to give full rein to his musical interests, making many lifelong friends and playing a prominent role in music, both at College level, and in the wider University. He graduated in 1980 and was almost immediately invited back to Dulwich by David Price as a string tutor, a role he also fulfilled at
His main research interests lay in the classical Japanese Noh musical dramas and in the Japanese written language, but he was also an inspiring teacher. His publications, especially An Introduction to Written Japanese, which he wrote with Senji Yanada, one of his wartime tutors, have been of enduring benefit to British and North American students of the Japanese language. Other successful books and teaching aids followed, especially about his interest in the organisation of language study. Pat spent many sabbaticals researching in Japan and was visiting Professor at Michigan University in 1961-62. He was President of the British Association of Japanese Studies in 1981-82, and his contribution to Anglo-Japanese relations led to his being appointed to the Order of the Rising Sun (third class) in 1987. The burden of administrative work and the lack of time for proper teaching led him to retire from SOAS at the age of 62, when he also gave up Japanese studies altogether. But his ongoing interest in the study of languages meant that he was inspired by his granddaughter’s first steps in learning French to develop a manuscript Dictionary of French Word Groups, based on the idea that “the key to increasing vocabulary quickly and efficiently is to learn words in related groups.” In 1951, he married Diana Howard and they had one daughter, both of whom survived him. Stuart John Orford [1969-76] 04.11.1957 – 30.10.2015
Dulwich Prep, combining this with professional, freelance viola playing for a few years. He formally joined the teaching staff at the College and became a boarding house tutor in Blew House in 1982/83, also becoming a de facto assistant to Alan Morgan at this time. During his time on the staff at Dulwich, he started a junior string ensemble and took charge of various chamber music groups, as well as helping to organise the music for a number of successful drama productions in the Edward Alleyn Theatre. He also became a Lower School form master, which involved some memorably enjoyable trips to the Field Centre in Wales. After Alan Morgan retired, Stuart stayed at the College for another year to help Michael Ashcroft settle in as the new Head of Music, before accepting an offer to join the music staff at King’s College School, Wimbledon. But he never liked the longer commute across more of South London, and he remained there for only one year. He obtained a TEFL qualification and would have tried to work in that area, but he was invited to step in as temporary Head of Music, firstly at Streatham and Clapham High School for Girls for six weeks in 1989, and then at Sydenham High School for Girls for the summer term in 1990, while the incumbent recovered from a broken foot. She chose not to return to her post at all, and Stuart was appointed as Head of Music at Sydenham High. He successfully performed this role for 3 years until he retired from teaching altogether in 1993. While at Cambridge, Stuart met Julia, a law student at Trinity Hall College, when they both played in the University Chamber Orchestra. They married in 1983, and a daughter, Isabelle, and a son, James, followed. Stuart “retired” from teaching in
Stuart Orford was the son of a stockbroker father while his
mother was a housewife, and he grew up in Sydenham. Like the
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