World War II
From September 1939 to June 1942 he was a member of the Police Reserve – again on wages of £3 a week - having been turned down for service in the armed forces - he was dogged by kidney problems throughout his life.
Throughout the war, he was singing in shows for the Council for the Encouragement of Music and the Arts (CEMA) and ENSA, entertaining the troops, under the direction of Walter Legge and performing with artists including Maggie Teyte, Joyce Grenfell and many others. After 18 months, he left the police to concentrate on performing, and, in all, he sang in over 500 concerts during the war.
In the latter years of the war and when hostilities ceased, Edgar toured the main theatres in the UK and Europe, singing with the 'Anglo-Russian Merry Go Round Company’ performing in a number of cities, including Paris.
Read more about this topic: Edgar Evans (tenor)
Famous quotes containing the words world and/or war:
“However backwards the world has been in former ages in the discovery of such points as GOD never meant us to know,—we have been more successful in our own days:Mthousands can trace out now the impressions of this divine intercourse in themselves, from the first moment they received it, and with such distinct intelligence of its progress and workings, as to require no evidence of its truth.”
—Laurence Sterne (1713–1768)
“The war was a mirror; it reflected man’s every virtue and every vice, and if you looked closely, like an artist at his drawings, it showed up both with unusual clarity.”
—George Grosz (1893–1959)