A Lark Ascending

Bev, I hear where you're coming from. I like plenty of catchy, "light and easy" finales from that period. But I do feel like the minuet is probably the last segment of the 4-movement structure to break out of the routine. Well I too find those minuets the least engaging part of 18thC symphonies (interesting that you don't get them in most concertos) - but I suspect that comes from expectations created by later music. I'd have thought they were there to give a few moments of relaxation. For the alert listener it must have been a pretty intense experience following a piece of music you were likely never to hear again. Quite a bit of earlier music - 17th and 18thC - amounted to mainly strings of dance based movements. I'd imagine the minuet is part of that evolution. The movement that I generally find least engaging is the last. Again, expectations built up from later music leads me to expect some intense conclusion. Generally 18thC symphonies never quite match the power of the first and slow movements. Of course there are exceptions, the Jupiter standing out there.

True Art: Though he seems to have mutated into Robert Fripp of late:

I'd be interested in hearing your enthusiasms for things you really like. I'm enjoying exploring more recent 'classical' music - it's something I've done periodically over the last 35 years but often not really getting it. The last few years have seen things making more sense. I don't know if you know the NMC label - really interesting exploration of recent (and not too distant) British music. http://www.nmcrec.co.uk/ Buying records there can be a real leap in the dark.

So the two I have and these two are the only ones I need? No, you also need 'And The New Symphonia' and 'Cunning Stunts', and maybe some additional 70's live material (there's a lot of it out there). Yes. Get the New Symphonia record - listen carefully and you can hear me clapping! A rather wonderful weekend in London that started with King Crimson at the Rainbow and ended with Caravan at Drury Lane. There are some nice sections on 'Cunning Stunts' but I never cared for the more rote 'rawk' parts. Apart from the New Symphonia gig I saw Caravan 2 other times in their heyday. Once at Reading University (where I was a student) which was one of those concerts where everything just fell into place (apart from a bomb scare in the middle - these were the IRA years) and just had you beaming all night; and once in Oxford in late '75 with the 'Cunning Stunts' line-up where the new bass player (Mike Wedgewood?) really grated. Probably sounds quiet different looking down the telescope the other way. Rather than chancing it on other Caravan records go for the Hatfield and the North, Egg and National Health (or Henry Cow, though you are moving into more abstract territory there) albums of that same era which inhabit a similar world (and share musicians). There's a previous thread here:

Always waiting to pounce.

So are 'In the Land of Grey and Pink' and 'Waterloo Lily'. After that...

Perhaps we're conditioned by subsequent Romantic ideas to expect everything to be weighty. In their time I expect they were there to provide balance. And given the nature of the situations where they were first performed - probably with a lot of people with limited interest in music - I'd imagine they allowed for a wide range of expectations to be addressed. A bit like the jazz bands of the 20s and 30s doing 'hot' and 'sweet' numbers. The idea of writing uncompromisingly intense pieces for posterity comes from a later era.

What's that one all about, Mark? Charig was one of my earliest jazz links - King Crimson again alongside KT. He appears now and then in the 70s/80s (e.g. on the LJCO records) but seems to vanish after that. It's a fully improvised concert - Charig plays alto horn a fair bit as well as trumpet, Fisher the violin and Floridis clarinets, alto and soprano. Takes some listening but they create some very lovely combinations alongside some more abrasive passages. I found it in a Dalston record shop and thought it was worth a punt - it was. Not very reminiscent of King Crimson though! Like you, I know Charig's name from LJCO, Elton Dean and Mike Osborne. I assume you've heard Pipedream with KT and vocalist on Ogun? If not, give it a go. I think he teaches in Germany now Thanks. Yes I do have Pipedream - remember it coming out during my initial 'Ogun' period c.1977-8. I didn't buy it because I feared my very basic turntable set up would not cope with the dynamics. Then it vanished for decades. Bought it on the CD reissue a few years back. Charig has an important role in my musical education c. 1972 - there's a wonderful passage on the long 'Lizard' track of that KC album where the music settles into a bolero. Tippett, Charig and Nick Evans all take solos - the music moves from the sweetly melodic to near free improvisation. Initially I was bemused but over time I became more and more intrigued by the more irregular parts. Then on the title track of 'Islands' he plays some wonderfully emotional horn - but unlike what I was used to it had a sputtering stop/start feel that spoke to me. Buying Septober Energy on the back of that there's a glorious Tippett/Charig duet that ends the double album. Again, tonal but irregular. Provided me with very different reference points to what I was listening to at the time.

Hello Ligeti, Sure you'll find lots of interest here. It's a diverse place with lots of enthusiasm for music (and other things) expressed in a variety of ways.

Had this on the magic machine that stores TV programmes for nearly a year and finally got round to it. Read the book sometime towards the end of the last Ice Age so only vaguely recall the story. As with all these TV adaptations suffers from a sense of being compressed and hurried through but I'm enjoying it. A bit Downtown Abbey.

Some great singing on Escalator Over The Hill. Sad to hear.

Geoff...Hurst A true artist

You clearly fail to appreciate art. They said the same about Warhol, Hurst.....

What's that one all about, Mark? Charig was one of my earliest jazz links - King Crimson again alongside KT. He appears now and then in the 70s/80s (e.g. on the LJCO records) but seems to vanish after that.

Scones are on the hard side; biscuits, especially the ones depicted below, are on the airy side. One of the vague things I recall from studying French 40 years ago was that biscuit meant 'baked twice'. I'm pretty sure scones get baked once. Of course these things mutate and change, especially in moving from country to country. It's the folk tradition. The confusion is explained here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Biscuit Of course the biscuit (in the English sense) reached its height of deliciousness as the 'ship's biscuit', normally acquiring added protein during the voyage.

I'm surprised America has not taken up the challenge. Williamsburg recreated out of Oreos?

That's a scone.

My favourite, The Vaughan Williams (or perhaps the Robert Johnson) of biscuits.

You've shaved.

Oh, I think these are cheaper and nastier...

A topic I'll be teaching again in a fortnight. Felt in need of a good overview outside the standard UK textbooks. Alongside the above: 4th in Walker's detective series based in Perigord. A bit clunky plotwise but this series has a lovely sense of place. It's also one of of those series that goes to great pains to explain how the food is prepared - mouthwatering. Don't think I'll be eating foie gras anytime soon, though.

Excellent book - I read it when it first came out. I suspect the version you have is the more recent, revised version which I believe has additional material. If I remember correctly I more or less read it in one sitting; it was that interesting. Older discussion on the book and Harriott here:

I'm not. You are. [Four words; I win] Especially nice dunked in tea. Although there is an 'art' to knowing just how long to keep one in the tea before it starts to come apart and fill your cup with soggy mush; also in ensuring the entire biscuit absorbs the tea without burning your fingers.

Carlisle Castle recreated using custard creams http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-cumbria-23798997

I like composer based boxes containing music I largely don't have. The EMI Delius box from last year was perfect for me as although there was a fair amount of overlap with music I have already, there was a lot there that has never come out individually. The other ones I've bought over the last year are the Wellesz and Pfitzner from CPO (actually just the individual CDs in a cardboard box that I promptly binned) and the DG Boulez. And I've just ordered the DG Henze. All music I'm enjoying exploring. And yet...I can't help thinking that buying the individual discs over time, like I had to do 35 years ago, is the best way to do it. I was so much poorer then...and will be again fairly soon when I retire so I justify it to myself that way.