Election fever strikes and Cosmic Mansions is plunged into a maelstrom of apathy. I’m not going to write anything obviously political about it here or elsewhere – even were I not a public servant and therefore bound to draw a discrete veil over my thoughts, I should not think that you would be particularly interested. I might make some comments about the process itself – just my own fancies though rather than some in depth epiphenominological analysis. I am particularly sceptical about the much trumpeted role of bloggers in the electoral process and may well comment on that.
Also “off” were Robin Williamson and John Renbourn whom I went to see last night at Edinburgh Folk Club. I posted the following across on the Footstompin’ forum.
Judging by the enthusiastic audience reaction I suspect that this will be a minority view, but I was disappointed by the Williamson/Renbourn gig.
There was a certain charm to two old pals playing some songs and tunes together but I thought this wore thin and their lack of rehearsal was painfully obvious – particularly in the second half which effectively became the Robin Williamson show with Renbourn gamely mugging along to songs with which he seemed to have only a passing familarity. My friend with whom I went to the gig first saw and heard Renbourn with Pentangle around 1967 and has followed him doggedly through the years and thought it “sad” that he had been “reduced to this”.
I wasn’t expecting a Renbourn solo show for guitar geeks but I was expecting that there would be a performance in which each would have sufficient familiarity with the material to contribute their skills equally and that wasn’t the case. When it did happen – Mull of the Mountains was one such – it was magical.
Anyway, here is a reminder of Renbourn in his prime – The South Wind and the Blarney Pilgrim. The former is in DADGBD and the latter in DGDGBD – spot the nifty retune of the 5th string at the transition. I see a project coming on!
My “friend” at the gig was fellow Mons Meg dancer Trina and we were discussing musicians who had formed some kind of soundtrack to our lives – Renbourn in her case. I had a little difficulty answering this since, while there are musicians and particular pieces of music which have stuck with me for a long time, even in their cases I do not buy everything that they release. The four artists I think I have been listening to longest and to whom I have listened continuously would be Tangerine Dream, Tom Paxton, Dory Previn and Joni Mitchell, all of whom I started listening to in the early nineteen seventies.
My first encounter with Tangerine Dream was Phaedra at John Hardy’s house. Joni Mitchell I first recall hearing on a John Peel show singing Court and Spark. Dory Previn was first played to me by Mike Graf and Tom Paxton seems to have been there for ever.
There are others of course but I think that these are the most longstanding.
In other news, my blod pressure medication has been changed and I had to come home from work today feeling distinctly light headed and sleepy. This happened last time too and settled down after 24 hours or so.
I bought a bike today. I went along to check them out but found one that I liked and had the money sitting in a Building Society account so I bought it. I’m very pleased with it and will no doubt take some photos tomorrow to post here – when it has stopped raining.
Things have changed a bit though. The last time I rode a cycle regularly was when I first came to Edinburgh. It was heavy with drop handlebars and a whole 5 gears: this one is relatively light with flat handlebars and 24 gears (count ’em)
Meanwhile I have been re-reading Jan Siegel’s “Prospero’s Children” trilogy which I had left to lie for a while in the attic. They are fantasy novels but hit two or three sweet spots for me – well written with that intangible quality which I think of as being a classic British rhythm and cadence to the sentence structure. She wrote three later novels which are tangentially linked under her real name of Amanda Hemingway and I hear rumours of something else in the pipeline which would be a good thing.
They are a useful reminder that in the sci-fi/fantasy world there are some decent writers lurking behind the blood and thunder of hard sci-fi and space opera. I have a high hope that some if this will bleed through into the new series of Doctor Who which began last night here in the UK. Last night’s programme had the principal aim of introducing the new Doctor and companion and setting the tone of the series and in this it succeeded admirably I think. And I am smitten by Karen Gillan who plays the companion – Amy Pond.
However I shall miss next week’s episode when it goes out because I shall be in Derby for DERT. On the whole I can live with this – and as you may have guessed from this and the previous post, I’m really looking forward to DERT. We have one practice to go to take of some remaining rough edges and that happens tomorrow evening and then it is time to iron the white shirts, polish the shoes, practice stepping whenever the opportunity arises and enter into that special meditative state which is necessary when you know that there is a brewery in Derby which has created a special beer just for the event…
I had a strange couple of days on Tuesday and Wednesday – I went down to London for a meeting by train (and the excitement level of the meeting can be seen from the extract of my notes reproduced to the right!). Overnight Monday/Tuesday and Tuesday morning had been extremely wet and I knew bad weather was coming in but it was only when we got south of Edinburgh that I began to realise how bad.
There were impressively heavy, grey seas all down the east coast through the Borders and into Northumberland with lots of standing water in the fields. Streams and rivers were in spate and from their colour a lot of topsoil was being washed downstream. As I watched the seas along the Northumberland coast I thought, perversely, that it would be a great day to be wrapped up and walking along the coastal path, the salt lash and stinging wind giving testimony to the joys of being alive.
And then a train in front of us broke down. We were already late leaving Edinburgh because we waited for connecting trains which had been delayed by bad weather further north and in some respects I wasn’t too worried because I had plenty to keep me occupied but as time rolled on it became clear that the train ahead of us was going nowhere and neither were we. We eventually got to London 2 hours late.
Overnight there was heavy snow in Edinburgh and the Borders and a landslide on the railway line so when I got to Kings Cross for my train north I was redirected to Euston where our tickets were being recognised by competing train companies going up the West coast. In fact the journey was without incident, albeit crowded, but because of the delay in London I was still 2 hours late getting home.
Rapper practice on Monday was ace. We were pretty sharp anyway from having an extended practice and mini tour on Saturday in St. Andrews. The pic on the left is some of the team practicing really hard for the upcoming competition in Derby for which we have one remaining practice.
You will find my report on last year’s DERT in my entry for 18 March 2009 here. The difference this year is that we are a better side and, with a bit of luck, a more confident side as well.
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