A Lark Ascending

Is it this one??? Indeed - in fact here is a bigger picture... With a windmill! This is so funny.... https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2fg7w49UnGA Another one of those European "Art Movies" that go right over my head. 'But what does it actually MEAN?'

I have that one from around the time of issue.

Is it this one??? Indeed - in fact here is a bigger picture... With a windmill!

Extremely disappointed not to find a picture sleeve of the early 60s Ronnie Hilton classic.

Looks like Sidmouth with saxophones.

Not a festival but a good cause: http://www.barbican.org.uk/music/event-detail.asp?ID=17293

It was recorded around the time Plump appeared (autumn 1973). I recall buying the record in the spring of 74. It's not a great deal different to the original recordings but enjoyable. 'Waterloo Lily' is always interesting to me - Dave Sinclair, very much a rock player, had left and was replaced by Steve Miller (Phil's brother). Steve Miller was a more blues/jazz based player and the album is dominated by his piano/e-p rather than Sinclair's organ. There's a fairly workaday blues workout on side 1, livened up considerably by his playing. Some wonderful tunes on that record - where that gift for melody evaporated to after 1973 I'm not sure (Sinclair returned for record 5). Here's another great recording from that time from Steve Miller: Combines two albums plus some unreleased music. Much more jazzy and instrumental, as you'd imagine. I'd also strongly recommend:

The Tories keep threatening to abolish the May bank holiday (way too socialist) and replace it with Trafalgar Day in October - which would be Nelson Day, I suppose.

Seems to part of a short European tour: http://www.maryhalvorson.com/ A bit far from Worksop.

I might have imagined the Butlins bit - I know they do folk and 'classic' rock megabills. I suppose this is is the one to replace Appleby: http://www.naturistfoundation.org/jazz_festival/ I wonder if you are allowed to wear your beret? There are a lot of festivals listed: http://jazzfests.net/countries/?country=uk

There always seem to be a fair number of, for want of a better term, 'mainstream' festivals going on (often in Butlins!) - veteran (and younger) musicians playing music in the early/Swing/Bop styles. Suspect they have an established and loyal audience (that was the main focus at Appleby) and a dedicated and well-networked group of musicians and organisers.

Tatterdemalion Title of a record I downloaded yesterday.

Lean years since the recession bit - Appleby gone, Cheltenham leaning over-much to its populist side, Bath just a fragment of what it once was. New festivals aiming straight down the middle-ground. Please alert to anything interesting kicking off. Cheltenham promises the Sun Ra Arkestra (Marshall Allen led). We could really do with a more left-field festival outside of London, where most of the interesting stuff happens. The folk music world has adapted far more creatively.

I suspect that this falls into 'Listening to Mozart will turn Baby into a genius' or 'Listening to Coltrane will help you achieve Nirvana' territory. Listening to music that requires your attention probably improves your ability to concentrate. Learning to play music (like learning languages) must help in all manner of other intellectual areas, especially in developing skills of self-discipline. Beyond that I'm doubtful, especially when claims are made for specific types of music. There was a fad in schools about 15 years back for playing Baroque music in the background whilst kids worked - all sorts of claims were made for its ability to calm kids and make them focus. I know no-one who does it now (probably because the kids complained...not Corelli again!).

The only place I've heard her is on KW's 'The Long Waiting' - there she is much embedded in the orchestra sound a la Winstone. Her distinctiveness came across last night. If anything she reminded me of Maria Pia da Vito - but that's probably becauses she's Italian and does improvised scat solos.

John Butcher is on my list of people to see. Very taken by what I've heard on record (only really noticed him in the last year) - imagine he would but a real force live. There's an excellent Dominic Lash record with Alex Hawkins on from a couple of years back. In more lyrical territory: Billed rather plainly as John Taylor's New Group. John Taylor: piano; Julian Siegel: saxophones, bass clarinet; Diana Torto: vocals. Taylor must be one of the performers I've seen most often over the years - his style is always the same yet the contexts ever changing. Julian Siegel one of Britain's many excellent saxophonists - like Mark Lockheart, Julian Arguelles and Iain Ballamy, turns up in all sorts of contexts (most notably in the jazz-rock (with the emphasis on jazz) band Partisans). Tenor soprano and a lot of bass clarinet. Diana Torto from Italy I don't know at all - initially I was a bit uncomfortable with the accented English (my weakness entirely) but her scatting improvisations were superb. A really powerful singer with enormous imagination. In my experience people clap solos in jazz as part of a ritual - but you could tell the audience last night were genuinely excited by Torto's flights. Unexpectedly most of the tunes were Paul McCartney songs (I couldn't tell if he was joking when he said he was trying to get the latter to fund a recording!). Jazz does the Beatles generally doesn't do it for me - two very different harmonic worlds in collision. But these arrangements really worked - the sung melodies were intact but then the band took them off into improvisations that took them well away from the original shape and harmonies. Also did a couple of Italian pieces and two very poignant Kenny Wheeler pieces. If you enjoy the more lyrical (but spirited) end of virtuoso jazz, look out for them. Same world as Azimuth and Norma Winstone's recent trio...but different.

I'm never short of new music to keep me entertained (in all sorts of styles and levels of...ahem...'seriousness'). Nor of old music that is new to my ears. Enormous diversity too, I'm just not interested in duplicating what I've already got in the search for 'the best possible sound'. Even my favourite records get played at best once every couple of years (after initially getting to know them). How many more times will I play them? Not enough to justify another copy.

I've always felt new audio formats are doomed unless they do something substantially different to what is already there. Improved sound ceases to be an issue for most people after they've got what they consider to be 'good' sound (i.e. something they can listen to and enjoy without being distracted by imperfections). LPs, cassettes, CDs, downloads all succeeded because they made listening to music easier or more convenient. SACD was touted as the next big thing ten years ago (or more!) but has remained a minority interest of the audiophile. Similarly, those technologies from the 80s or 90s which ultimately survived as recording technologies rather than playback (can't recall what they were called). This new thing will survive or fall based on how far it can engage the audiophile. I'd predict a similar limited release future that you get with SACD. Seems to be different in the visual world - Bluray has caught on widely as a better visual experience than DVD even if it doesn't do much else different (except, perhaps, offer more space and audio possibilities). Maybe it's those big TV screens. Maybe it's just that people are more visually sensitive.

English Muffin: I have a dish of muesli on work days. At weekends either a crumpet (not comments please), toast, a bagel or a scone with honey, jam or marmalade. I like a fry-up when on holiday or away at a weekend. This is a crumpet: The holes make it different from the muffin.

BBC4 a couple of years ago. I watched it a few months back (it was stored on my recorder-box-thingy). Really enjoyed it. See if you can find a programme on Turner from around the same time - ties him in with the scientific discoveries and industrial developments of the time. Superb programme - got me reading some scientific history, well outside my usual area. BBC4 is what BBC2 used to be. The need to compete with commercial and non-terrestrial TV has led 1+2 into a race for viewers (quizzes, baking programmes, endless 'Who is the Greatest?' competitions). You get good non-mainstream stuff every now and then - and they still do extremely well with nature programmes. But in general they respond to the marketplace which, given the threat to the licence fee, they are going to have to do for survival, once they lose it. The idea that there are things that need to be protected from market forces in order to preserve diversity is regarded as dangerously left-wing by the people who finance the political ambitions of the leaders who make the decisions on these matters. Until things went haywire in his empire, Rupert Murdoch was putting intense pressure on our government to demolish the BBC as we know it. There are others who would like to move in and asset strip it. I wouldn't be at all surprised to see BBC4 axed in the not too distant future. Interesting looking BBC4 series starting this Friday: http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b04y4qpt It's not yet the end of the world as we know it.

It's also the title of the fifth track from this album: More evidence that I ought to pay more attention to records I own rather than constantly buying new ones. I have that on the Mosaic box. I've clearly been tergiversating about playing it again.

I'm holding out for the Japanese "Master-Pongo Files (especially remastered for tube amps)", expected in 2016.

Iain Ballamy is a wonderful player - one of those sounds you can distinguish immediately. I've yet to really connect with this band. When I saw them I found them a bit to ambient/noodly for my taste. Must try the records again.