A Lark Ascending

The first edition with a black peel off moustache on the cover? It's worth following the editions. Attendees mentioned as present in the sleeve notes of the first edition vanish in subsequent editions.

I want a copy of that set of a Stalin speech where side 8 is the applause. Vinyl only, please!

Something rather unexpected: Due in a couple of weeks: http://www.amazon.co.uk/Family-Thomspon/dp/B00NSOP8SO/ref=sr_1_1?s=music&ie=UTF8&qid=1414876324&sr=1-1&keywords=richard+thompson+family

6th might be US date? In the UK new releases come out on Mon; I get the impression Tuesday is the US date.

Has a January 5th release date on Amazon: http://www.amazon.co.uk/Dejeuner-Sur-LHerbe-Jazz-Orchestra/dp/B00P0IF6GU/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1414861767&sr=8-1&keywords=new+jazz+orchestra

New biography just out: (Along with a compilation CD)

Good record - I have a fairly basic CD-r copy Neil Ardley put out himself. Be nice to have a fully restored version. Thanks, Roger.

I tried reading that a few years back, just to have my prejudices confirmed. I found he'd done that conclusively by page 100 and began to find it repetitive. Never finished it.

Yes, thank you, Roger.

Enjoyable (if standard) whodunnit. Bought this in the excellent Wellington Quarry museum in Arras earlier in the week. Though I've been to Ypres, Vimy and the Somme many times I had never visited these extraordinary underground caves. The Arras Offensive of 1917 I only knew as an event on a timeline - the story is harrowing. When you are stood looking up towards an exit into daylight with the sounds of battle going on in the knowledge that this was where the troops had to emerge in April 1917 your blood chills. Recommended if you are ever on the motorway from Calais to Paris with a few hours to spare.

Warmest Halloween on record.

RIP Can't say I followed him beyond the 70s but Cream, those solo albums and his contribution to Escalator Over The Hill and some of the Mike Mantler records mean he gets played here regularly. Fascinating pre-Cream career too.

Must play the Sun Ra Disney record again - rather low-fi concert recording, I think. Sun Ra's 'Elephants on Parade' is one of the highlights of the Wilner disc (I'm always melted by Bonnie Raitt's 'Baby Mine' too!).

Tubby and the Hans Christian Anderson records were all on that tape of my Dad's. We played them again and again c. 1966/67. Coltrane picked up on Inchworm!

I find that whole idea oddly intriguing and tempting. I don't know why but maybe because it harks back to early childhood music/book packages, some great tunes and combuines that with a cottage-industry/craftsman, self production ethos. I'd love to hear and see one in the flesh Do you know this: Brilliant (though high production) set of completely varied Disney interpretations. Imagine the Disney songbook up to the late 60s played by the houseband on Pinocchio's Pleasure Island. A rather disturbing listen.

'Tubby the Tuba' is a wonderful introduction to variation principle for kids! Thank you Danny Kaye.

You'd be hard pressed to find a better example of music that 'evolves' and varies than Wagner (OK, there are long passages where the storyline gets repeated like one of those Channel Four documentaries) across 'The Ring'. Not that my parents would have know - it was very much greatest hits! Ride of the Valkyries, Lohengrin Wedding March etc. R + H is rich in the sort of harmonic variation (unusual shifts to distant keys) that you don't get in the rawer forms of Afro-American music (I'm not criticising the latter - I've come to appreciate the very different richness of blues music subsequently; completely different approaches to harmony).

I can recall sitting at my parents' dressing table in their bedroom doing my homework at 14 (the only place I could get any quiet) with Radio Luxembourg on c. 1970/71. I had no idea about how music was structured - but I remember being irritated by music where every verse/chorus repeated the previous one. 'Why don't they just vary it?' was going through my brain. It's not a long jump from there to classical sonata or variation form or the variation form that dominates much jazz. I had absolutely no formal musical training - it was all instinct. But I suspect a lot of my preferences were subconsciously absorbed from my parents' collection. There was a lot of Rogers and Hammerstein there - I can hear the links to a lot of the Late Romantic classical music I enjoy there. Earlier in the year I came across a loose leaf book my father kept of records we'd had taped. In Singapore in the mid 60s you could go to a market stall, pick out a dozen LPs and they'd stick them on a long reel-to-reel tape for the following week (The Original Andorrans). Tapes ran from Wagner to Frank Sinatra to Danny Kaye singing the Ugly Duckling to Mario Lanza. And those recordings were on constantly from the age of 9 until about 12. Even though I did the obnoxious teenager thing of rejecting it in my teens, it took root. When I bought my first Miles Davis records, I knew the tunes!

It's always about context - which is why I find attempts to assert the greatness or superiority of X, Y or Z so tiresome. All sorts of things can influence that context - what we hear by chance, the directions we then choose to follow (either in response to what we've enjoyed, what we feel we 'ought' to be listening to or from a much colder perspective of 'I've just decided to follow this specific route'). My context was early 70s rock coloured by half absorbed music from my parents' record collection and radio tuning - crooners, show tunes, popular opera and classical nuggets. Very Western, very European. Even before I started thinking about why I liked the music I did I knew repetition irritated me - so unlike you, soul music bored me and I had to work very hard at things like African music which seemed harmonically uninteresting. I've discovered other things to enjoy there - but it remains peripheral to my interests. At heart I'm conditioned by Western tonality - the music I warm to most is goal orientated (in the harmonic sense) rather than cyclical. An album like Caravanserais works for me because there is an enormous range of colour from track to track and a sense of movement across the album, almost a narrative. The album builds towards the final track, reaching early climaxes, then drawing back before moving on again. But I can see why listening from a very different context would find the whole record totally uninteresting (as I find most funk records dull as ditch water).

For me, Santana played some very exciting music in the early to mid-70s. After that he seemed to fit to what would sustain some degree of commercial success. What has never altered is his unique tone - you can always tell him a mile off. Even though I don't care for the later records, I'm still drawn by the sound he gets from the guitar if not the arrangements he is playing. A great example of where he hits home is on Hooker's 'The Healer'. In that respect he has the quality that draws me to a lot of players - Lester Young, Coleman Hawkins, Stan Getz etc. A signature sound. I just don't feel he fully realised the possibilities - the aforementioned names had a great sound but then did other things with it.

I tend to play more 50s/early 60s jazz in the autumn. Also Shostakovich. And a lot of early 70s rock - I think the falling leaves get me nostalgic for the return to university. It's not really anything in the music itself, more my associations of when I first heard it.

Agree entirely - except that I find Bailey quite glamorous!

A series I've only ever seen 10 minutes here, ten minutes there in other people's houses. Always intrigued me so hired the first series. Slow to get going but marvellous characters and a thrilling episode 5. Another 3 series to take me through the winter. Didn't realise this was Sally Wainwright too. Does she write everything good on TV?

Will give this a play a bit later - a 2 CD I've had for quite a while in this area. Includes El Chicano.

I'd be interested in hearing that record you mention, MG. Not sure on the genre authenticity angle, but I'd argue that 'Caravanserai' by Santana is as good a rock/Latin record as I've heard (you probably sold it by the bucketload in your record shop days). I like the band from the first record through to 'Welcome' (gets a bit soully there, which might suit you). After that I lose interest. That 'Supernatural' record has little of the spirit of the original band(s) - too many celebrity guests for my liking (not from genres I'm keen on). But 'Caravanserai' is sublime - probably a rock record with Latin additions but they sound wonderfully well integrated to me. Not just Cuban either, some lovely Brazilian rhythms, especially on the version of Jobim's 'Some Flower' (which was my introduction to Jobim). The guitar playing throughout is outstanding - much more than the standard Clapton/Hendrix imitation of the time.