A Lark Ascending

From "Another view of London's night life – in pictures" here: http://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/gallery/2015/nov/21/another-view-of-londons-night-life-in-pictures

I recall seeing some Cotman paintings in Norwich about 40 years ago - will have to look again. Only vague memories. See what you mean in the pictures scrolling through here: http://www.museums.norfolk.gov.uk/Visit_Us/Norwich_Castle/Past_Exhibitions/2005/The_Golden_Age_of_Watercolours/John_Sell_Cotman/index.htm

Forest of Radnor, with the Black Mountains in the distance - Francis Towne. 1810 Saw this the other day in a room full of 18th/19thC paintings and drawings; was struck by how 20thC it seemed.

Mine was in the mail when I got home this morning. Will listen over the weekend. I suspect much of the success is due to exceptionally fine applause in the centre, five or six rows back.

I love this post-1970 cover:

Like me with punk in 1977! For you Coltrane was contemporary music; for me it was on the same level as listening to Elgar or Richard Strauss.

I once drew that cover and put it in my GCSE art folder (I used a grid to get the proportions right). My art teacher - a very trendy, late 60s hippy type who spent most of his time helping the prettier girls - praised me to the skies for it and said it was a pity I hadn't done anything as good earlier (we were only a few weeks from submitting porfolios). He hadn't a clue it was just a copy! I think it might have been the only time in 2 years he showed any interest in me...like my PE teachers, he obviously assumed I was a lost cause!

I absolutely loved this. I wonderful tale of a woman dealing with grief after the death of her husband, trying to work out what to do with the rest of her life. You very quickly warm to the central character yet as the novel unfolds become aware of how she frightens those around her. Set in the late 60s/early 70s with 'The Troubles' as a distant backdrop - I much prefer novels that glance against historical reality than those that attempt to have their characters at the centre of all the key events. That's how most of us experience the historically significant events of our lives. So much Irish literature from O'Faolain onwards seems to be about unfulfilled lives set in a provincial, small town, suffocating environment where everyone knows your business and the representatives of the church see it as their duty to tick you off if you step outside of the moral and social parameters they have set. Toibin is also brilliant at evoking the way people rub one another up the wrong way, never completely connecting; and also the muffled but no less vicious impact of the various layers of social snobbery at work in communities. There's some lovely sections about the impact of music as well; Norah starts to get meaning back into her life through discovering a love of classical music. Some wonderful passages evoking how music can just flood your world with colours and feelings that might not be there in the everyday landscape. I didn't want to leave the characters in this book.

I never had Bill down as a King Crimson fan!

My grandparents (in Ireland) kept their front room 'for best'. They lived in the kitchen. Quite common at that time, as much to do with heating costs as anything else, I imagine. My parents had various things 'for best' like a huge set of crockery they brought back from Singapore. It was still something expected then. My father was obsessed in his last years as to who would inherit it (I happily allowed another sibling to take it!)! I don't think I keep anything 'for best' (I do have a jacket I only use for formal occasions; though as I no longer have to do parents' evenings I doubt that it will get much use). I tend to associate the idea of 'for best' with an older world (I may not have lived the sex, drugs and rock and roll lifestyle of the Sixties but I embraced the informality wholesale); however, I'm still cursed by the Depression/Post War Austerity outlook of my parents when it comes to spending money. I paid for a taxi from a rail station to a hotel last night (£13) instead of waiting 25 minutes for a bus (£2.70). It's something I can afford yet I still feel like I ought to go to confession!

Just back from a few days in London taking in some concerts at the London Jazz Festival Maria Schneider Orchestra/Liam Noble at Cadogan Hall (deep in the heart of Toffland at Sloane Square, temporarily transformed into Lapland) Lovely 30 minute solo piano set from Liam Noble including a couple of pieces not usually associated with jazz (Wouldn't it be Loverly and The Way We Were) as well as one that is (Body and Soul). Wish I'd gone to his Sheffield gig a few weeks back; 30 mins was too short. I've been following Schneider for about 15 years after hearing an interview on the radio one night driving back from London. Absolutely beautiful performance - those lush, almost Ravel/Debussyesque orchestrations that just seem to roll off the orchestra. Some marvellous soloing throughout - I was particularly taken by a Frank Kimbrough solo in 'The Thompson Fields' that had me thinking Ives!; and a storming pair of solos from Scott Robinson and Donny McCaslin. One of encores had Robinson playing flugelhorn which seemed to even take Schneider by surprise. Proper review here: http://www.theguardian.com/music/2015/nov/18/maria-schneider-orchestra-review-cadogan-hall-london-jazz-festival Nice to chat to Mark (mjazzg) as ever (thanks for the gallery tip...well worth the visit) ************************** Kenny Wheeler - An Evocation (again at Cadogan) This was very special. A host of musicians associated with Kenny Wheeler in various permutations, all paying tribute (an overused term but here used sincerely) to the man. With 20-30 minute segments it was never going to be a concert where anyone would have the time to really dig in but there were some remarkable performances. Opened with the band that made one of KW's last recordings, 'Song's for Quintet' - Stan Sulzmann, Martin France, Chris Laurence, John Parricelli and Gwilym Simcock. augmented on one track by Henry Lowther. Took a bit of time to warm up but the third song, 'Od Time', was afire. Then Ralph Towner, first solo and then two songs with Norma Winstone. Beautiful. Foxes Fox (Evan Parker, Steve Beresford, John Edwards, Louis Moholo-Moholo, Percy Pursglove) marked another side of KW's musical personality with an explosive 20 minute free improvisation. A band I definitely need to see in a full concert though I suspect their performances are rare. Before the first and second sets an 8 piece trumpet chorale led by Nick Smart played short arrangements of KW pieces from the gallery above the stage. Wonderful idea. Part two began with Dave Holland and Norma Winstone, a particularly fine version of 'By Myself', a song that concludes my favourite KW recording, 'Music for Large and Small Ensembles'. The heart from then on was provided by a band of Nikki Iles (one of the UK's best kept secrets), Holland, Martin France, Mark Lockheart augmented or reduced as various stages. Two songs from the 'Mirrors' album with the London Vocal Project made me realise how I'd not given that record the attention it's due. Never realised these were pieces KW wrote for smaller forces and then filed them away. Brought to life by Pete Churchill. Also a beautiful trio performance by Holland, Iles and France of piece of Holland's called 'Waltz for Wheeler'. The home straight saw Lowther, Smart, Winstone, Parricelli and Sulzmann rejoin the core for two really exciting pieces - one of those wonderful pieces with ever shifting chords from 'Music for Large and Small Ensembles' and a thrilling 'Foxy Trot' ( a great tune). Two really poignant moments. One where Norma was almost overcome in introducing a song played with Kenny and John Taylor and referring to the additional loss there; and then Dave Holland ended the concert by playing a solo three minute recording of Kenny in his prime. I doubt if there was a dry eye in the house. Certainly solved the problem of the encore rituals - you couldn't follow that. I expect there will be a Guardian review at some point - I'll link it if it appears. Edit: No Guardian review but one with pictures from London Jazz News here: http://www.londonjazznews.com/2015/11/review-kenny-wheeler-evocation-at.html

Very enjoyable standard thriller set in Perpignan/Rousillon in France (I had to look up exactly where that was...I knew it was around the Pyrenees but apart from that half remember it changing hands in one of Louis XIV's peace treaties). Like in Donna Leon's Brunetti novels, the main cop has a (largely) happy home and nice family...you don't get much of that in detective novels. They're normally socially dysfunctional. Odd cover...gives no indication of what the book is about (except that the weather is very hot throughout). Finished 'Passchendaele' which was superb - extensive quotations from the archives from participants brought out the horror; at the same time you got a real sense of the military strategy and the terrible dilemmas facing the staff. The authors got a nice balance between praising the successes and recognising the difficulties alongside condemning the errors (principally launching further attacks into the mud without adequate preparation or real hope of success). Had me thinking how often we all take decisions based not so much on careful calculation as the hunch that what we want to happen might - in this case Haig and the other staff's conviction that the Germans were about to break.

Yes, awkward. But the sentiment of the song as a national symbol have long outgrown the content. If I remember rightly it was written at a time early in the French Revolutionary Wars when France was under invasion. So it seems appropriate to the current "La patrie en danger" situation. I suspect Britons would sing 'Rule Britannia' without wishing to re-establish the Empire. I'm not sure 'God Save the Queen' has quite the same rousing feel (in tune or lyrics).

The best thing I've heard recently was the sound of the crowd exiting the football stadium on Friday singing the Marseillese.

Temascaltepec, Mexico: The first monarch butterflies appear in the oyamel firs forest in Temascaltepec. The insects almost quadruple in the area during their hibernation http://www.theguardian.com/world/gallery/2015/nov/13/photo-highlights-of-the-day-costa-blanca-brits-and-monarchs-in-mexico

I love the Beeb. They do so much right and the whole of British broadcasting would deteriorate without them. But given that they devote so little time to jazz and that they are currently under existential attack and need to demonstrate their worth loudly I'd have hoped for something more original than another 'Who is the Greatest?' The BBC still seem under the illusion that what the public want is interactivity. What I suspect most of us want is good programmes that surprise us. They frequently do that...this just seems such a poor idea.

As ever, the most vital question facing civilisation. The BBC have bombarded us Brits for the last few weeks with the exciting news of a temporary online Jazz station during the London Jazz Festival. And they came up with a really innovative idea for the site - asking people who their favourite jazz performer was. So we've all been sat on the edge of our seats for weeks and, at last, the results are in: Miles Davis Louis Armstrong Duke Ellington John Coltrane Ella Fitzgerald Charlie Parker Billie Holiday Thelonious Monk (8=) Bill Evans (8=) Oscar Peterson Good Lord! What surprising results. It's great to see the BBC out there on the edge with its ideas for jazz programming. http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/entertainment-arts-34827355 [This post was written with generous aid from the British Society for the Promotion of Sarcasm]

I'm afraid the closest I've been to that coast (apart from the Cumbrian part) is the M6. Useful flood warning map on the BBC website. Good for house hunting! http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-26189096 I'm in the clear; except that I have to drive into Sheffield later and the Don is highlighted.

Don't know if these film clips of the original Fairport are well known: http://www.eyeneer.com/video/countryfolk/fairport-convention/time-will-show-the-wiser http://www.eyeneer.com/video/countryfolk/fairport-convention/reno-nevada Remarkably good quality given the age. The camera angles are pretty restricted and Judy Dyble looks bored throughout (or maybe that was just serious musician insouciance). The version of Reno Nevada is especially worth it with some great early RT. It was their extended jamming piece of the time.

Blackpool yesterday http://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2015/nov/13/heavy-rain-warning-for-northern-britain-in-wake-of-storm-abigail

Episode 5 of River - constantly inventive. Programme 3: Summer Breathtaking time-lapse photography. I can now see how the snails ruin my hostas.

Three men drink vodka as they travel by a pioneer motorised railcar on their way to Kalach From an intriguing set of photos: A Soviet time capsule: the village at the end of the line – in pictures - In a remote corner of the Urals region at the end of a narrow-gauge railway is Kalach, population about a dozen. The village has no telephones, no mobile reception and only a few hours of electricity a day http://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/gallery/2015/nov/13/soviet-time-capsule-village-end-of-the-line-pictures *********************************************** I love this next one: Birds look for food in the fog in Yinchuan, China’s Ningxia Hui Autonomous Region http://www.theguardian.com/environment/gallery/2015/nov/13/the-week-in-wildlife-in-pictures

Utterly dreadful. Started to hear about it on the World Service through the night. Very moved by the pictures I'm seeing this morning.

Admirers of the McLaughlin book will be looking forward to Colin Harper's new one: Let's hear it for eclecticism!

It is depressing...but it's all part of the warp and weft. I'd like a little more reliable sunshine in the summer (memories of putting my tent up in a gale in Cornwall last July) and guaranteed snow from 6.00 pm to 8.00 a.m. on 24th/25th Dec...but apart from that I wouldn't want to be anywhere else for more than a holiday. Glad I'm not here: An ominous picture as Abigail approaches Ellanbeich, Argyll and Bute. Taken by Zim. Or here: Wet and windy in Breakish, Highland. Captured by Skye Woody. http://www.bbc.co.uk/weather/features/34803702