What a great bloke he was to have
as a teacher. No pushover though.
He took us for a short while in
the first year and one day
started to teach us some binary
maths. While he was standing
there teaching he was also wiring
up a strange primitive calculator
with loads of bulbs and wires.
Anyway, he wrote out a 4 or 5
digit binary number and asked us
its value. A few hands went up
and he asked me the answer, which
I gave. He smiled encouragingly
and asked me to explain how
I’d arrived at my answer. I
foolishly went through a
description of how the values of
the columns from right to left
went up 1,2,4,8,16 etc and the
implication of a 1 or a 0 in each
column. He looked very pleased
and asked to explain how I knew
all that. So, even more
foolishly, I proudly told him how
we’d done it before in my
Primary School the year before.
All through this he nodded and
smiled approvingly, and when I
finished told me the answer was
wrong. Cool as you like with that
amazing ‘Pancho
Gonzales’ moustache and loud
check jacket, he was also a
pretty good jazz pianist.
| At
some point in about 67 or
68 we had a school
concert and
‘Pedro’ sat
down at the piano and
started to play. Within
the first bar or two the
whole school had
recognised the tune,
Bach’s ‘Air on
a G string’, and a
loud giggle went round
the SB Hall. This was of
course as a result of the
TV ad for Hamlet cigars.
Well ‘Pedro’
was not in the slightest
amused and stopped
playing, glared about the
whole Hall, asked what
was so funny and then
only started playing
again when silence
returned. Some ominous
‘Jazz
Man’………yeah……wow……cool.
By 68–70 concert
going was the thing for
us. Went to a few,
especially at L’pool
Students’ Union.
They nearly always seemed
to be by ‘Ten Years
After’. Saw them at
least four times and I
swear that at each gig
when I went to the Bar
for a lemonade (yeah,
right) Warwick
‘Pedro’ Evans
was always sitting
there…..reading a
book....having a
pint.....True. Always
gave a cheery greeting.
Good bloke indeed! |
 |
Editor's
note: Sadly, Warwick Evans passed
away in July, 2000 after a long
battle against cancer. A memorial
postcard of Warwick at the
electric piano, titled, 'Let the
Good Times Roll' is pictured
above. Please find a further
article entitled, Celebration
of the Mathematics Life of
Warwick Evans
[2ndJune,2001] by
Trevor Powell
|
