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So here's the question. If Samuel Barber'sÌýgreat great great grandfather had stayed in Derry, would the world have had "Adagio for Strings"?Ìý

According to Barber's biographer Dr. Barbara Heyman, who talked to me on artsextra, the Barber connection can be traced back to a man called John Beattie who moved from Derry to the United States as a boy.

His family settled in Pennsylvania and John went on to fight in the Revolutionary war. He ended up in Valley Forge,Ìýthe now iconic military operation of the new United States of America under General George Washington that lasted 6 months from December 1777 to June 1778.Ìý

Even though no battle was fought there, those 6 months sound awful, a grim siege, with no food, inadequate clothing and housing, all set against freezing conditions.Ìý

I'm trying to imagine this young Derry man in the middle of it all. Has he lost his accent? Is he remembering the streets he grew up in? Is he wondering should he have stayed in Derry?Ìý

Little does he know that he is going to have a great great granddaughter whose nickname will be Daisy. On the 9th March 1910 she will give birth to a boy called Samuel. He will go on to write some of the greatest music of the 20th century. Perhaps his most famous will be "Adagio for Strings".Ìý

It will be chosen by Albert Einstein to be played at his funeral, it will be used as the soundtrack for the Vietnam war movie "Platoon", a war centuries forward from where John Beattie is now standing, and it will be the same music that we will hear on countless tv documentaries against images of the twin towers coming down on 9/11.ÌýÌý

And yet it's a piece of music that transcends the horror of war. A fitting tribute for his Derry ancestor standing in a frozen field in Pennsylvania.Ìý

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