A Lark Ascending

Thanks for the alert on this. I also really like the Fernandez/Guy/Ropez trio (and where I've heard him elsewhere). Downloaded it from Bandcamp for just over £18. Bargain!

They don't sell camels in WH Smith's in Worksop so we're not at risk. Fresh produce and baskets of fish surround a woman at the Siti Khadijah market in Kota Bharu, Malaysia Another gorgeous 'from above' image. A frosty morning along Tangled Creek in Yellowstone national park, US Not likely to look like that here in the near future. Both from a set of National Geographic's best travel photos of 2015. Other beautiful ones there too: http://www.theguardian.com/travel/gallery/2015/dec/23/national-geographic-best-travel-photos-of-2015-in-pictures

Some spectacular photos taken from drones: The annual Al Marmoum Camel Race in Dubai Early morning as the water slowly turns Mont Saint Michel in Normandy, France, into an island once more Other lovely ones here: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/in-pictures-35151041 Might ask Santa for a drone.

Mid-Winter in Worksop...in a brief clear sky gap before the onslaught of Storm Eva sweeps all the mince pies away:

Anyone hoping streaming would be a flash in the pan, soon to be replaced by the return of the cylinder disc, will not be pleased to see this: Fab Four’s full catalogue will make Christmas Eve debut on Spotify, Apple Music, Google Play and Amazon Prime, ending long streaming site holdout

May not be 'Art' (harumph!) but this is proving a wonderful (if uncomfortable!) read. Viv Albertine is just a year older than me and I recognise so much in her description of growing up in late 50s/60s/70s Britain (though she had a more unstable family life and grew up streetwise in London). Interesting that up to the early 70s her musical interests weren't much different to mine, though she took a sharp left in the mid-70s. Communicates brilliantly the obsession about music that I recognise (can't say I share her obsession with clothes or boys!). I think what drew me to buy it was a picture of a stub from a KIng Crimson concert in October, 1973 at The Rainbow which I also attended (there's a not very pleasant encounter with Robert Fripp later in the book). Utterly honest about her life experiences - the chapter on getting crabs will have you squirming - and a personality that seems both insecure and vulnerable yet determined to walk on the wild side (there we have nothing in common; I'm the the definition of risk averse). I may not care for punk and what followed but this is a riveting read. Have just got to her learning the guitar in a rather unorthodox way. Makes an interesting contrast to the bio of Gustav Holst that I'm getting towards the end of at present!

After the 1965-8 set, this is my favourite of the Miles boxes. The original 'On the Corner' disc made no impression on me at all. But I did like things I heard on 'Get Up With It'. 'He Loved Him Madly' is as good as anything he ever recorded. I also downloaded the box and it greatly exceeded my expectations.

Don't know if this was just standard newspaper Chicken Licken syndrome but they were saying that the winter solstice temperature today is higher than the summer solstice in June!

One for Manfred. Rhineland, Germany: A fire engine on its way to an emergency with lights flashing comes over a bridge before daybreak in Frankfurt http://www.theguardian.com/world/gallery/2015/dec/21/photo-highlights-of-the-day-a-moose-on-the-loose-and-an-xmas-tiger

Believe me, most English teachers are as frustrated by what they get to choose from on exam syllabi as the poor students who have to study those choices. Obviously you can't just have books that give instant identification/gratification; there needs to be challenge there. But the impact of imposing 'worthy' texts - and that has got worse in the last couple of years - will at best lead to indifference, at worst turn kids off all sorts of things for life. I've not touched Dickens since being made to read him between the ages of 11-14. 20thC books (like 20thC music) was where I first connected for the reason you give....it speaks about life as I knew it. And it's still what I mainly read. I actually did enjoyed Austen, Elliot, Hardy etc but it was in my early 20s (there's a lovely line somewhere about how a 14 year old boy is supposed to make sense of the bizarre rituals of late-18thC courtship). By that time I had the historical context of the 18th/19thC to make sense of them. ********************** A good short cut to 'Middlemarch' is the BBC series of 15 or so years back. Excellent production though much reduced. They've got War and Peace down to 6 episodes for a series starting in the New Year.

Jazz critics voted it No. 4? Don't they realise they exist to disapprove of things!

The people who design exam syllabi and, above all, the government ministers who tell them what to do always seem to be driven by what they think should be good for kids and their place in the future of the country (i.e. embedding a very particular, British sense of identity, a reverence for The Canon). Rather than thinking about what might get kids interested in reading and then lead them on to Austen etc later on if they so choose. Why they've never worked out that most kids dutifully do what is needed with the books they are made to read to pass the exams whilst doing their own exploration elsewhere is beyond me. Michel Rosen is very good on this.

Museu do Amanhã, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil If I was planning a house extension...though I'd imagine the birds would be a bit wary. http://www.theguardian.com/travel/2015/dec/21/10-best-new-museums-new-york-venice-germany

I had to read Middlemarch at school and didn't get on with it. Fortunately I moved schools and didn't have to finish it. However, I tried again ten years later and found it a really rewarding read. Worth persevering or parking it for a time.

The Bridge - Series 3 Final two episodes. Very exciting. Sofia Helin is just brilliant - Saga Norén must be one of the most compelling characters in contemporary TV.

Kurt Weill Although many of his songs were written in the States some of his German/European tunes have been used in jazz. The most obvious is 'Mack the Knife'. There are many Weill themed albums drawing off the before and after.

Negenborn, Germany - A couple carry a freshly cut Christmas tree at a plantation Oruro, Bolivia - The tracks of tyres are seen on the dried Poopo lakebed. The lake, formerly Bolivia’s second largest, has dried up entirely. http://www.theguardian.com/world/gallery/2015/dec/18/photo-highlights-of-the-day-a-new-dummy-and-an-illluminated-train

Some good ones there - I like " Hark, the Herald Angels Sing, Sing, Sing”. What long list! Presumably compiled by a very bored elf in the post Xmas period before toy making recommenced.

I'm very different. It would be false modesty to say a skate over the surface but I don't have the technical musical understanding to plumb great depths. I tend to butterfly between records, relishing the change from one genre to another. There's nothing deep, analytical or intellectual in my listening. I listen to be entertained, nothing more. I also find with most recordings there's a golden listening period from about the third to tenth play when I get overwhelmed; then familiarity starts to take off the sparkle, although leaving a record unplayed for a long time can bring the fun back. As a result I tend to space out listens to new records so they don't lose their sheen too early. Having three very different centres of gravity - jazz, folk and classical (well, four....nostalgia for old rock records from my youth) - which I've generally kept more or less running at the same time also means I never get jaded on music. But I do need to hear new and different things. Which is where I find Spotify helpful.

Which is how it should be; no point trying to evade your rock cliches only to take on those of another genre. I'm intrigued.

My tongue was in its cheek (as ever). I'd imagine most listeners wouldn't give the jazzers a second look. But I'd hope some listeners might want to know what McCaslin does in his day job. That's how I got drawn into jazz (admittedly at one of its fashion downturns [mid/late 70s]).

Charles Mingus - "Better Git It in Your Stocking"

Of course - globalisation, unfettered free-marketism, the deliberate emasculation of trade unions. Hoping that consumers will simply select on the basis of morality can't compete with that. It's part of the £3 t-shirt world. I remember when I was a kid my parents and their friends were always moaning that we all had too much today and didn't appreciate it (they were of the Depression/WWII/First Austerity generation). I have infinitely more access to a wide range of music than I did 40 years ago. Do I enjoy it less. Hard to calibrate but I don't think so. I enjoy it differently - then so much was the thrill of the new but that is offset in later life by knowing the context of the music more widely and hopefully hearing things beneath the surface I'd not have heard then.

Quite. It exists. It's up to the individual to take as much or as little from it as they want. There are serious issues revolving about how performers etc are being remunerated. But I'm not sure they're facing anything that any other industry confronted with technological change have had to face.

I've always felt we were better off when there wasn't enough food to go round. We may have gone hungry but at least we appreciated the rare meal we got.