Daughter’s Birthday To Celebrate

Press, Volume CV, Issue 31005, 10 March 1966, Page 2

Daughter’s Birthday To Celebrate

After her last curtain call this evening, Vera Lynn will > slip easily out of her role as a concert artist to become hostess at a small celebration for her daughter. Virginia Lewis, who will be 20 todav.

“It is a bit difficult having a party when you're away from home on tour. We haven’t planned anything, but we’ll certainly do something after the show,” Miss Lynn said yesterday.

Next year it will be a vastly different matter. Two twenty-first birthday parties will be necessary in London —one for relatives and one for friends when the vivacious girl who acts as her mother’s tour secretary comes of age. “When my husband and I celebrate our twenty-fifth wedding anniversary in August. I should think we’ll need two parties for that also.” Miss Lynn said.

Vera Lynn, the war-time “Sweetheart of the Forces,” is always happier to talk about the affairs of the closeknit family of three than her own career. Last Long Tour “This is my second visit to New Zealand and my last long tour, simply because my husband (Mr Harry Lewis), who runs the H.M.V. music publishing company in London, cannot take so much time off,” she said. “And I would not consider travelling without him.” The tall, elegant blonde with a flawless complexion and ready smile is not retiring from the theatre. “1 shall be doing tours on the Continent and giving performances in England which don’t take me far from home.” she said. “Then there

is my television and radio work. I gave up a weekly radio show in England to come on this present tour.”

Home is a word that comes often into a conversation with Vera Lynn. It is very much her central point in family living. “I do all my own cooking and shopping for it, because 1 enjoy cooking and because my husband and daughter don’t like anyone else doing it” she said. They are easy enough to please so long as a bit of garlic goes into the stew, on the grill or roast. Home is also the place where Vera Lynn can get into her garden, make her daughter’s clothes or take time off to paint portraits and still life. She has shown pictures in art school displays and theatrical charity exhibitions, but paints mainly for relaxation. Wherever she goes, the singer with the plaintive voice that reminded servicemen of the womenfolk they left behiend them, meets old friends. Old Memories “Men still keep popping up after concerts recalling memories of some place or another,” she said. “Most of the New Zealanders I meet were in Cairo when I was there.” Of ail the songs identified with her name, Vera Lynn has no favourite. “I like a song that has a nice lyric, a tuneful melody —and a bit of sentiment,” she said. Though they are having a quick tour through New Zealand, with only four nights in Christchurch, the Lewis family are seeing more of the country than on their previous visit. “Three years ago we travelled mainly by air. This time we have been using buses and we have a much better picture of New Zealand to take back with us,” said Miss Lynn.