Crouch End

Coordinates: 51°34′47″N 0°07′25″W / 51.579712°N 0.123729°W / 51.579712; -0.123729

Crouch End is an area of north London, in the London Borough of Haringey.

Location

Crouch End is in a valley between Harringay to the east; Hornsey, Muswell Hill and Wood Green to the north; Finsbury Park and Archway to the south; and Highgate to the west. Crouch End is located 4.6 miles north of Charing Cross and 5.1 miles from the City of London.

To the immediate west, it is bounded by Highgate Wood, and the adjacent Queen's Wood, as well as a large expanse of playing fields. To the north is Alexandra Park and to the south Finsbury Park. The Parkland Walk, a former railway line, connects these two parks. Other parks in the area include Stationers' Park, Priory Park and Crouch Hill Park.

Nearest places

History

Crouch End (short story)

Crouch End is a horror story by Stephen King, originally published in New Tales of the Cthulhu Mythos (1980), and republished in a slightly different version in King's Nightmares & Dreamscapes collection (1993). It contains distinct references to the horror fiction of H. P. Lovecraft.

A television adaptation aired July 12, 2006 on TNT, as part of Nightmares and Dreamscapes: From the Stories of Stephen King. A song by British black metal/dark ambient band The Axis of Perdition uses excerpts from the story as lyrics.

Plot

On August 19, 1974, two police constables, alcoholic veteran Ted Vetter and young newcomer Robert Farnham, are working the night shift at a small station in the London suburb of Crouch End. They are discussing the case of Doris Freeman, a young American woman who came in to report the disappearance of her husband, lawyer Leonard Freeman. Nearly hysterical, Doris arrived in the station speaking of monsters and supernatural visions.

She related how she and her husband were searching for a potential employer's house in Crouch End, but as they did so, they became lost. As they wandered the streets, their surroundings seemed to change subtly and become infested by what appeared to be monsters. Doris escaped with her life, but her husband was not so lucky, being consumed by an enormous, hideous, otherworldly being. (Implied to be the malevolent Lovecraftian goddess Shub-Niggurath due to a reference to 'the Black Goat with a Thousand Young' made shortly before the creature's appearance)

Crouch End Festival Chorus

Crouch End Festival Chorus (CEFC) is a symphonic choir based in Crouch End, a northern suburb of London. CEFC was formed in 1984 by John Gregson and David Temple, who remains the choir's conductor. Unlike other large symphony choirs the chorus is independent, promoting its own concerts of choral and choral-orchestral music in venues including the Barbican and the South Bank Centre as well as smaller venues in North London and elsewhere. Its repertoire spans the entire history of Western choral music. It has commissioned works by composers including John Woolrich, Joby Talbot, Howard Haigh, Orlando Gough, David Bedford, Paul Patterson, Robert Hugill, Simon Bainbridge, Sally Beamish and Ian Lawrence.

In August 2008 Crouch End Festival Chorus performed in its fifth BBC Promenade Concert. It has also featured in the BBC Electric Proms with Ray Davies of The Kinks as well as Oasis in 2008, and in the Barbican's 'Only Connect' series. The Chorus has collaborated with the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra, London Symphony Orchestra and BBC Symphony Orchestra among others. It has performed a number of times with film composer Ennio Morricone and has recorded a significant amount of material for film and television, appearing on more than 60 CDs including albums by Katherine Jenkins, Alfie Boe, Jonathan Ansell and Lesley Garrett and by pop artists Travis, The Divine Comedy, and Ray Davies.