A Lark Ascending

Been re-exploring my Australian jazz records over the last couple of weeks. Whilst hunting around came across this sad news: Australian Jazz community mourns death of drummer and composer Allan Browne It also mentions that the much mentioned Bennetts Lane Jazz Club has closed. Read a lot about that place whilst investigating.

Like the look of that. Always like reading books about the Cold War from particular angles. Came across some of this in Tim Werner's book on the CIA. I've read a fair few books on the Napoleonic era navy in recent years - this give a much broader context.

If you look closely you can see Putin climbing the one on the left stark naked, chest-wig to the fore.

He always sounds slightly out of tune to me from the mid-60s. I suspect it's a form of colouring that I'm not relating to...just sounds shrill to these ears. I appreciate others hear differently and are most likely attuned to things that escape me. I read the book of interviews with him some years back which were fascinating - he clearly thinks a lot about what he is doing.

How things change. A photo taken by my dad in 1967 when we lived in Singapore.

Yes, I would never use a comma before an 'and'. The comma serves a purpose in separating out a list up to that point. I've never quite understood why it is sometimes inserted before the 'and' when the 'and' does that job.

On balance I prefer 40s/50s Konitz to Desmond. But once you get into the 60s I'd rather listen to Desmond...there's something in Konitz's tone from there on that grates on me and prevents me enjoying whatever else may be happening. That reaction has bugger all to do with 'intellectual'.

Finally finished: Not an easy read. Very dense and quite hard to keep your brain on the overview - Bickers gets caught into all manner of minutiae on the way (especially memorials built to commemorate fallen comrades and their propaganda intent). But gives a very clear impression of how the West (Britain as the focus here) bullied and manipulated its way into China using the cloak of free trade as a way of pursuing avarice. Now onto a easier to read book with a much better sense of ongoing narrative: Back in '72 when I was studying the English Civil War for my 'A' Levels I was completely taken by a quote from a Colonel Rainborough at the Putney Debates (1647). "For really I think that the poorest he that is in England hath a life to live as the greatest he; and therefore truly, sir, I think it’s clear that every man that is to live under a government ought first by his own consent to put himself under that government; and I do think that the poorest man in England is not bound in a strict sense to that government that he hath not had a voice to put himself under…”. This book tells the story of the family in the mid-17thC - merchants, fighters against Barbary pirates, settlers around Boston in the New World, soldiers and political and religious radicals. Fascinating stuff. As it happens I stayed in a hotel on Putney Bridge over the weekend - just over the bridge was the church where the Putney Debates took place (with the quote above inscribed on the wall). Well worth a trip if you are in and around London - you now enter the church through an excellent coffee shop. Superb! In the previous novel of the series (no 13) pregnant Inspector Lynley's wife is gunned down and killed at her front door. You end the book utterly devastated and hating the perpetrators. What George does in this sequel is turn the whole situation on its head by tracing how one of the people involved in the murder, a 12 year old, came to that point. A harrowing tale of a life of chaos in poverty stricken North Kensington. The way the young boy is trapped into a sequence of events in his efforts to protect his younger brother is brilliantly traced. One of those books that haunts you long after you have finished. The main characters of the series only have the slightest of walk on parts. Interesting to read the reviews on Amazon where some readers really struggled with the absence of those characters.

I think you'll find that was dug for Georgie Porgie's Northern Powerhouse idea. Expect it to be filled in before the triumphalist Autumn Conference.

Yes to both Evans, who is highly active and versatile, and McGann. http://www.goodbaitbooks.com/newsletter.htm is my essay about McGann's CDs, which are strong latebop music. [Haven't heard Oehlers.] Thanks for the link. Had a glance at the article and it seems just what I need to navigate his catalogue beyond the little I have. Bit busy at present but will follow it up in the next week.

But can they swing and do hep-talk?

Australian jazz musicians tend to get overlooked as a whole...I only came to notice them because of Kenny Weir's advocacy some years back (where did he go?). Three who immediately spring to mind: Bernie McGann - some excellent live recording out there of this veteran who recently passed away.Jamie Oehlers - wide ranging modernist who moves between a range of contemporary styles right out to the free.Sandy Evans - plays both straight contemporary jazz but also a great deal in world music styles. Saw her over here last weak with the wonderful Australian Balkan band Mara!Where they fit in the great 'who's best?' hierarchy I haven't a clue but they've given me much pleasure.

On the proper TV the other night. Dull. First three episodes. Read some whinging about it but I've been engaged so far. Must re-watch the Richardson series again - I've not seen it since it was first broadcast.

I can relate to that. Not sure if the thousands of discs hemming me in are indicative of being a jolly soul or an excessive response to manic depression.

I love this: And not just for the pictures!

An unusual outing: From 'The Northstar Grassman and the Ravens': Musicians: Sandy Denny - acoustic guitarRichard Thompson - bassBuddy Emmons - pedal steel guitarIan Whiteman - pianoGerry Conway - drums

Interesting one:

Stairway to Devon. Lovely little chocolate box village on the south coast of Devon. All very Butterworth/Vaughan Williams.

this post makes me painfully aware that English is not my first language. Well, it's certainly not written in the language of jazz! The language of jazz is but one of many dialects in the Babel that is music. Uli, you have a second language (maybe more!). Like most Brits I'm painfully aware that I can only manage one.

Jim Causley - Young, funny and erudite. Looks like one of the YouTube generation but sings mainly West Country related songs in a traditional way avoiding cod-ploughboy. Faustus - amazing what amplification can do. Melodeon, fiddle/oboe, guitar/bouzouki used for songs and tunes with loads of welly. On record this band never caught my attention - live the were a hoot. That's it. Smock traded in. Back to a more balanced musical intake. Though I'll be joining the toffs for a few nights at the Proms next week.

Another great day yesterday. John Kirkpatrick & Martin Carthy - must have seen these two a zillion times in the last 40+ years but they never disappoint. Models of how to carry superstardom with total humility. Carthy's voice may be showing the years but his utterly unique guitar style - one he seems to have carved out himself to fit round the irregularities of folk song rather than smooth them out - is as stunning as ever. The instrumentals in particular were amazing. Leveret - new folk supergroup of Andy Cutting, Rob Harbron and Sam Sweeting (melodeon, concertina, fiddle) playing gloriously relaxed versions of traditional and recently written English tunes. The CSN&Y of morris. Julie Fowlis - like Andy Cutting, someone I seem to be stalking. Angel-voiced singer of Gaelic song and mouth music with a thrilling Anglo-Scottish band. She's had wider success since first bursting out ten years ago, most famously as a voice on a Disney film. Thankfully this has done nothing to thin out her main career - no Sting or Springsteen songs (though she does a lovely version of 'Blackbird' with the only English verse of the whole concert in the middle - it sounds great in Gaelic).

Patrick O'Brian - The Fortune of War Stalled half way through this last year. Got back into it this week and finished it. I usually struggle with historical fiction before the 20thC but O'Brian gives a real sense of early 19thC patterns of thought. Set at the start of the War of 1812. Apparently Keith Richards is an O'Brian fan. Could imagine him as a gnarled deckhand.

I too was puzzled by the large number of Middle Eastern cafes on the east side of Hyde Park with those smoking contraptions. Not part of London I frequent often, noticed it for the first time last year. I spent a lot of time in London in the early to mid 70s but have only visited occasionally since. Across the whole city it's become a much more multi-cultural place. Though the thing that has struck me most on recent visits is the in-your-face conspicuous wealth on display ( side by side with much deprivation). It's nothing like that blatant where I live.

Rachel Newton - Scottish singer/harpist who also plays on The Furrow Collective (actually, everyone in the UK is in that quartet). Lovely solo concert of songs mainly about fairies replacing babies. Martha Tilston - first time I've seen her live - so good that I went to see her twice. A bit of a hippy chick but an excellent songwriter and performer. One wonderful piece where she was definitely tapping into Van Morrison of the turn of the 70s, trance-like repetition of fragments. Also a first for me in any genre - a guest appearance by an historian!!!! Sam Willis, the chap who writes excellent books on naval history - not a natural singer but not a bad guitarist. Just praying David Starkey doesn't turn up in the later events.

Best day yet at Sidmouth. Emily Portman Trio - the 3 women from The Furrow Collective singing Emily's weird, spooky songs. The spirit of the ISB without the hippy vibe. A very impressive young Scottish duo called Twelth Day playing harp and fiddle - folk based, elements of minimalism, expansive almost proggy arrangements. The mighty Blowzabella - veteran instrumental (with a few vocals) band playing English and French tunes with much welly. Double bagpipes, hurdy-gurdy, melodeon and much more. Best of all - Mara! An Australian band playing Balkan music in Devon! Saw this lots 30 odd years ago during the World music boom when you couldn't move for bleating lambkins. Absolutely spectacular last night. But the big bonus was seeing a face I recognised from another musical world - saxophonist Sandy Evans who I know from my Australian jazz explorations. Wonderful to hear her explode into Aylerisms in this music. I often miss the informality of folk in jazz concerts that are generally more self-consciously arty; but I really miss the extemporisation of jazz solos in instrumental folk where the tendency is to stick to the tune. Mara! Found the magic balance. A great encore with Mara and Blowzabella together, starting with an English folk ballad (Bushes and Briars) and then erupting into a mental Balkan piece. One of those concerts that etches itself on your brain.