Lawford Smith (Honorary member of BFO) sadly passed away on 27th August 2023. He had recently moved to a care-home near Bedford, closer to his family, and we signed a good wishes card for him at that time. He was listed in the obituaries in the recent Bury Free Press.Lawford SMITH Obituary (2023) - Bury Free Press (legacy.com)
His life was celebrated at a service at the United Reformed Church on 16th October 2023.
Order of Service
Lawford was a huge supporter of the BFO which continued after he left the orchestra (he played viola). After leaving, he attended all the concerts that he could and when we last saw him in February 2023, just prior to our Spring Apex concert, he would have loved to be there, but was having mobility issues that prevented him from attending. For many years he continued to slip cheque donations to BFO in envelopes to the orchestra when we were least expecting it, for which we are all very grateful.
Lawford was also a great contributor to the life of Bury St Edmunds, mostly as a musician. He played the organ until very late in life, despite his agnosticism. He provided music at his home in Guildhall Feoffment in College Street for the annual hidden gardens event. As a viola player, he was an important part of Bury St Edmunds Friendly Orchestra, supporting us and our concerts as long as he could after he had to give up playing.
He was such an important part of the restoration of Bury St Edmunds Theatre Royal that Danusia Iwaszko portrayed him as one of the leading figures in her play A Labour of Love, which celebrated the theatre's restorers. It was performed at the Theatre 16-25 July 16-25 2015.
You’ll see from some of the comments in the obituary link what a lovely, fun-loving, kind and generous man he always was, and he has certainly left his mark as an inspirational musician and music teacher to several of the BFO members. For many years he arranged music for BFO and led a small group of the BFO players at the World Horse Welfare Christmas concert (conducting us all in the candlelit darkness with his white gloves on so that we could see his hands in the dark!)
