several people have helped us today SO much, I can't quite believe what they accomplished between them! Praise the Lord for Christian friends who willingly gave up their time and energy on this very hot day.
Two gardens readied for our departure (from pretty parlous states), cupboards emptied and cleaned, things taken to charity shops, shipping cartons constructed and a lawnmower cord severed by exciteable mowing!
Also came across a little note from when I was reading The Shack. On p.90 we come across God (Father) listening to funk. Which reminded me of The Mighty Boosh - a couple of stellar episodes about jazz, exploring our ignorant prejudices about it as well as mocking its producers and enthusiasts.
Wasn't quite so convinced by some of the theological speculations in The Shack, it has to be said. For example, Young suggests that "fathering" was most lacking when creation was broken and that's why God appears as "Father" (p.94). But don't the eternal relationships within the Trinity shed some light the other way - towards our meagre understanding of what father-son means? Of course, I mused, that formulation seems to leave "woman" out of the picture, which is not good. James Jordan's provocative thoughts on hair and glory may give us some pointers here... [PART 1] and [PART 2] of his "liturgical man / liturgical woman" essay, another collection of not-wholly-convincing speculations slightly more to my taste!
The earlier one is on faded old manuscript paper in my childish hand, and was performed by me and Ad on piano and euphonium at the Widcombe Baptist Church New Year's Eve party and talent show in 1992 (or maybe 1993). One of our finest collaborations. Completing Halo on the X-Box a couple of years ago is not far behind, especially given my incompetence at such games.
The later version was longer (32 themes!) and for piano solo, and was put on while people had some drinks and nibbles at our friends' wedding in December 2006 (or thereabouts). One team got 100%, which was impressive - and scary, because some of the themes were obscure and, I thought, only in my head... It is written in my slightly maturer hand without the use of musical notation, in the back of the old account book.
Ahh, nostalgia, followed by disposal. Definitely the way to go...
...and the penultimate one in Cambridge for quite some time, if all goes according to plan with our shift eastwards. I was under the influence of man-flu, ibuprofen and paracetemol so my emotions were suppressed in the service of finger art, but it was still exhilarating and moving (for the performers, at least, though the audience seemed quite happy, too!) It was nice to end with Brahms 3, which has long been a goal, and very gracious of Jane to indulge me by learning my Fantasy in G minor, which has been performed once before, in Cricklade College, Andover, by another great violinist, Daphne Moody - also a pupil of Grinke in the 70s... small world! There were quite a few kids in the audience last Wednesday at the URC, and they all said they liked my piece the best - so take that, Mozart & Brahms.
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart Sonata No.18 in F major Andante cantabile Allegro Andante con variazione
Written in 1788, this was Mozart’s final violin sonata, though by no means his most dramatic. There is an almost serene gentleness to the outer movements, with touches of cheeky humour, and only the central Allegro (in sonata form) betrays any agitation. As was customary for the classical period, the piano takes centre stage and most of the good melodies.
Johannes Brahms Sonata No.3 in D minor, Op.108 Allegro Adagio Un poco presto e con sentimento Presto agitato
Brahms’ last violin sonata is a much darker, brooding work. Mystery, and a sense of circling round something unpleasant characterises the opening movement. There is tremendous stasis in the harmony—the whole development section is worked out over a dominant pedal, like an insistent drum beat, a menace that is only finally put to rest in the coda over a tonic pedal. The slow movement brings much needed warmth before an ambiguous scherzo and brutal finale. In this last movements the composer completely upsets the pulse and the expected rhythms, pushing his idiom and his interpreters to their limits.
yours truly Fantasy in G minor (1998)
This Fantasy is a teenage pastiche of all that I loved about romantic virtuoso music. Taking in Verdi’s Requiem, Grieg’s Piano Concerto and Peer Gynt Suite, James Bond and a Rachmaninov prelude (plus a few others) I weave together three themes—one martial, two reflective—in various minor keys, before the triumphant conclusion in the tonic major. There are a lot of notes—I apologise for that… what can I say? I was young and foolish.
My old account book from Downing days. Fiscal rectitude was drummed into me by the folks, and I kept (almost) comprehensive accounts up to the Christmas of my second undergraduate year. Weekly expenditure seems to have fluctuated somewhat: £231 in w/b 18th March 1999 down to £6.76 for October 18th-24th 1999 (though mostly around £70 p/w). Wonderful to see how I was sustained by gifts from Grandma and Auntie Celia, complaint to the railways that netted me various vouchers, and the odd psychology experiment.
I was quite pleased with owning several credit cards and being generally a liberal sort of chap, so there are numerous receipts from the Eraina Taverna and the Ghandi for hundreds of pounds, which I used to pay on behalf of whatever party I was with, and then recoup. If I'd have been smart I'd have charged a fee for that service of course!!
A Star Wars game in an envelope. I designed and made some sort of board game (back in 1996?) based on those rather fun novels by Timothy Zahn that are set in the years after Return of the Jedi. Some of the biro artwork is quite neat, though I say so myself, but I think it's value as a game is probably rather limited!
Very neatly organised in swanky plastic wallets, the old notes from a Pilgrim Homes conference on elderly people in the church, whih a team from Rock went to a few years back. Brought back memories of a care home close to my heart, Bridgemead, in Bath, set up by Christians about 20 years ago - one was our family GP, another was a local businessman and chess player who was a good friend to me when I was in my teens. I used to go in and play the piano for Sunday afternoon church services, taking a stroll down leafy Cleveland Walk from our bungalow near Sydney Gardens. Now that my Mum works for another care home in Bath (doing a heroic job in a place where her employer simply does not put in the resources necessary) I have yet more reason to consider Bridgemead the only really decent place I have come across for elderly people who are not able to live on their own. Sounds like Pilgrim Homes have a tremendous reputation, too, though, so let's hope that more such places are opened.
An old L'Abri cassette catalogue - listing all sorts of interesting letures I shall not have time for! The ones of various bits of classical music looked partiularly interesting. Nevertheless, it went the way of all flesh... I am surprisingly cheerful about offloading all these old (and some new) bits and pieces, so praise the Lord for that. Hopefully a good sign that my treasure is in heaven.
I particularly enjoyed what various peoples had to say about the Hallelujah Chorus from Handel's Messiah: like a jet engine, "crying music" or “not steady.” This last group "wondered how a song with so many high and low pitches and loud and soft volumes could be considered fine art". Ouch.
Also managed to rip 18 more albums to the back-up drive. Don't want to take all 600 CDs to the othe side of the world when they can sit in the attic and something the size of a large filofax can do the business.
Which is not to say that doing without most of my sleep tonight will be pain free in the hours to come. Perhaps the possible collapse of the old laptop has been preying on my mind rather too much. There are a LOT of files on there (not backed up since about Christmas, alas) I would be very sad to lose! And almost all of our projects for the next 6 weeks will be up the creek... Back to praying not preying.
Old music is getting the once-over at the moment. A few sad volumes have decayed so much (or are missing the solo parts) and have had to be junked, which feels very wrong. One simply shouldn't throw books away, especially not sheet music!
Came across some compositions by me. A work claiming to be the solo piano arrangement of the finale of a concerto in A major (entered into a "perform your own composition" class at the Mid-Somerset Festival in 1996?), which never actually existed in any other form except for several drafts of the first 20 bars of so full score. There are a great many drafts of the most recent classical piece I tried to compose - sometimes for clarinet, sometimes viola, sometimes euphonium, and with various attempts at writing out the piano part. A sad end to what could have become quite a nice pastiche work if on;y I'd had the time!
Also came across equivalent material from the 60s in the form of Gordon F's sketchbooks. More completed compositions than I managed - lots of short works for intermediate piano, and the drafts for his excellent Prelude & Fugue, which I've performed a few times.
Plus the copies of pieces I was asked to record for my sister to sing a few years back when she was well enough to be going to the Welsh College of Music and Drama for woodwind and voice on Saturdays. And a lovely handwritten note (her writing is a perfect feminine version of Ad's!)
... If I didn't have man flu and thus no strength to spare I'd be bawling me eyes out at all these dusty home-made pieces of culture and history.
Some old sheets of glossy local authority propaganda, on that back of which Nick had written out the chords for some jazz standards so that I could provide the lower part of some 4-hands jazz a few years ago when he visited us in TG. He does have a wonderfully florid hand!
Nostalgia at every turn, as our house has spilled its guts all over the floors.
We had Tim Keller from Redeemer Presbyterian in Cambridge last week to speak at Great St Mary's the Corn Exchange for "Passion for Life". Saturday (which I didn't hear) was the Reason for God; Sunday (which I did) was Counterfeit Gods. Each evening was loosely based on key ideas from his two best-selling books. By all accounts the Sunday one was better - I certainly found it stimulating, and it contributed greatly to the conversation started between Dave and Dave months ago, which I joined in the Panton Arms shortly before we wandered up to hear Keller.
What a great chat that was - stimulating and intimate, the history of philosophy, the perspective of faith, music, searching, questioning, formulating, reformulating, just what our brains were made for. Looking forward to continuing. Probably have to read some Schopenhauer, now...
It really took me back to the panelled rooms of Downing College at the end ofthe last century, staying up all night with green tea and my agnostic best friend and best man, whiling away the hours on everything - not to mention back to the studying itself, a historical whip-round political thought and ethics from Plato to Nietzsche (in amongst more prosaic [and poetic for that matter] stuff on medieval social history or Renaissance literature).
And that got me thinking about another friend who stayed up all night patiently trying to explain chemistry to me (in those days I was still under the impression that A-level chemistry was "true" and was pleased with myself for having done some science as well as all the arty-farty business), while writing beautiful fractals on the computer. We managed to discuss Reformed theology and the Christian life quite a bit, too, and it was great to see him again at my 30th in the summer after a gap of many years.
Praise the Lord for such wonderful experiences, and for keeping me following him since then. What a wonderful world, what wonderful creatures, what a wonderful Creator.
O LORD, our Lord, how majestic is your name in all the earth! You have set your glory above the heavens.
From the lips of children and infants you have ordained praise because of your enemies, to silence the foe and the avenger.
When I consider your heavens, the work of your fingers, the moon and the stars, which you have set in place,
what is man that you are mindful of him, the son of man that you care for him?
You made him a little lower than the heavenly beings [c] and crowned him with glory and honor.
You made him ruler over the works of your hands; you put everything under his feet:
all flocks and herds, and the beasts of the field,
the birds of the air, and the fish of the sea, all that swim the paths of the seas.
O LORD, our Lord, how majestic is your name in all the earth!
I am 5 days behind on The Economist (i.e. last Friday’s has not yet been opened). Either my bowels are moving more quickly than usual (the magazines are generally stored in the bathroom), or else it’s been a productive week in other areas of endeavour. Anyhow, as I finished off last week’s edition this morning, I was taken with the style of the obituary, as often happens. The page on Alexander Haig (American General, White House Chief of Staff under Nixon, head of NATO, foreign policy spokesman for Reagan, etc, etc) closed with a sweet metaphor from the General’s book Caveat, riffed by the journalist…
“The [Reagan] White House was as mysterious as a ghost ship; you heard the creak of the rigging and the groan of the timbers and sometimes even glimpsed the crew on deck. But which of the crew had the helm? …It was impossible to know…
If someone evidently had the helm, General Haig saluted. If not, rather than let drift and uncertainty give any comfort to America’s enemies, he had acquired the habit of seizing the wheel himself.”
Grand sentiments, steely nerves, national business – all in a day’s work for the rich and powerful, I suppose. Even the little people like me can get dewy-eyed about this sort of stirring stuff, actual or fictional (as happened when I re-watched the ludicrous yet strangely charming cornfest that is Independence Day over lunch on Tuesday). But let’s be aware of the mythic and ideological guises of the state, the nation, human hierarchies, construals of enemies, and so forth. Let’s remember what really lasts, where the city with foundations comes from, who it comes from, and what really counts...
Jane and I have loved the Grieg-Beethoven combo over the past year or so, and audiences seem to have got into the swing of things, too. Wednesday witnessed a very swashbuckling performance of Beethoven 3 and Grieg 3, and we hope to repeat it with less swash for the University of the Third Age (what a good idea that is) next week.
Ludvig van Beethoven (1770-1827)
Violin Sonata No.3 in E flat, Op.12, No.3
I Allegroconspirito
II Adagiocon molt’ espresione
III Rondo (Allegro molto)
Beethoven’s first three violin sonatas were dedicated to his teacher, Salieri (an Italian composer who didn’t poison Mozart). They display clear adherence to classical forms and were designated sonatas ‘for piano and violin’, with the emphasis definitely on the piano. In these early works Beethoven was writing music for the concert platform and music to pay the bills, not music driven by a need to express deep inner passions. There is a certain foursquare-ness to the design of this sonata. Nevertheless, more than its fellows in Op.12, this third work looks forwards. The opening Allegro sticks to the letter of classical sonata form, but is busting with dark, wayward harmonies and crams in far more notes than one might expect from such a stately opening. The Adagio’s extended coda gives space for plenty of jolts and surprises, characteristic of the composer’s maturity. In the final Rondo Beethoven employs his skills in counterpoint to good effect, along with a gift for folksy melody that one normally associates with Dvořák or Grieg.
Edvard Grieg (1843-1907)
Violin Sonata No.3 in C minor, Op.45
I Allegro molto e appassionato – Presto
II Allegretto espressivo alla Romanza – Allegro molto – Tempo I
III Allegro animato – Prestissimo
Twenty years separate Grieg’s second and third violin sonatas. The earlier work was carefree, experimental in form and infused with Scandinavian folk music. This sonata – and particularly the first movement – is angry, extremely simple in structure and more sparing in its melodic inspiration. The opening theme rushes around before collapsing into the more lilting second subject. The development offers mystical cascades and a violent bass, ending up in a flurry of gruff diminished chords that fade away into a quiet false recapitulation. The real recap is impossible to miss! And see if you can spot Grieg’s jazz moment just before the coda. Norway seems to exercise more influence over the sweeter second movement, a simple ABA of melodies that do the hard work and various patterns of accompaniment that don’t. In the C minor third movement, a binary AB/A’B’, we are subjected to constant buzzing and foot-stomping (A) alternating with pure romantic indulgence (B). The insistent coda may be in C major, but was Grieg protesting too much in this, his final chamber work?
While I was away in a mobile phone blackspot last week my post was opened and a message left on my mobile (which I could just about pick up if I held the thing upside down while standing next to the external kitchen door of the Harby Centre, so long as I didn't move my head at any point!) by the lovely post-opener to the effect that I had passed a music exam with distinction.
I was quite chuffed, as it was the Associated Board's LRSM, the second-highest diploma one can get round here, and I'd had to wait about 7 nervy weeks to hear the result. In fact, I was awarded a distinction, which was extremely pleasing, since when I took the exam in the heady summer of 1998 (the last time I did anything exam-like on the piano) I failed!
I don't think I've got all that much better over the last 12 years, but I am sure that the ABRSM's diplomas have got a lot easier. Just compare the syllabus pre- and post-2005. Back in the good old days there was a 3-hour essay-based repertoire paper and a long listening test that included fiendish 4-part dictation... before you could get anywhere near the recital! This time it was just a long programme note and viva that was required in addition to the keyboar-based stuff.
So, chuffed indeed, but well aware that the value of the piece of paper has been roughly in keeping with the value of sterling over the past decade!
With a proper pianist playing the secondo part for Mozart and Brahms, and then a swop for the final number...
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, Sonata in C major, K521
Allegro
Andante
Allegretto
This is the most beefy of Mozart’s sonatas for 4 hands, and also the final one. It was written in 1787 and dedicated to Babette and Nanette Nortrop, daughters of a wealthy Viennese merchant and pupils of the composer. Mozart considered it “rather difficult”, and since he was one of the most accomplished keyboard players in history we find no reason to quibble with that verdict. Difficult for the pianists, but easy for the audience. From the bold double-dotted main theme, the gentle second subject (which the other performer keeps trying to spice up) through various brilliant episodes and flourishes, the first movement is instantly appealing. Even the tender slow movement has its virtuoso passages, particularly the central, minor section. A deceptively simple, almost twee theme sets the tone for the rondo. The pianists keep interrupting each other, sometimes to change the mood, sometimes to amplify it, and sometimes as if to say ‘I can do better than that’. The coda is robust, and some silky chromaticism slides the music to its jubilant conclusion.
Johannes Brahms, Variations on a Theme by Robert Schumann, Op.23
With a slow-moving theme built of falling scales and a date of composition just a few years after Schumann’s death, we have a recipe for a very moving work. The first three variations grow in their complexity and figuration before a dirge in E flat minor (redolent of the Horn Trio’s Adagio) almost brings everything to a halt. After that Brahms takes in a graceful Viennese waltz, a rambunctious pub ditty, a meandering study in thirds, a sinister scherzo, and a dark, angry outburst before the final variation. This is a slow march, celebratory yet tinged with sadness – not the sadness of a funeral but of warm memories of a chapter now closed.
.
Erik Satie, “La belle Excentrique”, a serious ballet
1. Grand Ritournelle
2. Marche Franco-Lumière
3. Valse du “mysteriex baiser dans l’oeil”
4. Cancan grand-mondain
This little suite is utterly ridiculous from start to finish – both in its musical ideas and in the challenges set for the performers, who keep jumping in each other’s way, reaching over and even crashing into each other. Originally an orchestral ballet score for the famous French dancer Madame Caryathis, Satie penned it in 1920 and 1921, before making the arrangement for two pianists in 1922. Enigmatic as ever, he commented on the work, “My music likes an atmosphere: a woman calling to mind more a zebra than a doe”. The Marche contains hints of the theme to Spiderman (particularly in its incarnation as ‘Spider Pig’ in The Simpsons Movie). The waltz “concerning mysterious kisses on the eye” (!?) is the only dark corner of the suite, but it pokes fun at various dance styles along the way before the final romp, a “very smart Can-can”.
Jane and I headed back there in November to do another recital, and thoroughly enjoyed the whole place. My Grandma came down from Lincolnshire and has waxed lyrical about it ever since. I hope we will return - we are plotting another Beethoven-Grieg combo, which seems to be what comes up when we go to Norwich!
Beethoven, Violin Sonata No.7 in C minor, Op.30, No.2
I Allegroconbrio
II Adagiocantablie
III Scherzo & Trio (Allegro)
IV Finale (Allegro)
This is pure Stürm und Drang Beethoven. From the dramatic first subject of the Allegro con brio (a declaration of war?) to the insane coda of the Finale, the Sonata is dark, brooding, angry and full of passionate outbursts. The second subject of the Allegro con brio may be in a major key, but it sounds like an army on the march, and the buzzing semiquavers of the tonic minor are never far away. This driving busyness underpins even the lyrical passage at the start of the development section, and after 16 bars the violin gives up, reasoning, “if you can’t beat ‘em, join ‘em”. The main subject of the Finale (a rondo) is even more bold, swelling to a tremendous crash that announces each new section. The momvement is peppered with counterpoint, false starts and more notes than you can shake a stick at. Thankfully the middle movements provide some much needed respite. The vast Adagio cantabile contains one of the most beautiful and yearning melodies ever penned, with aching dissonances on the third beat of each phrase that cry out for resolution. In the various episodes of this slow movement Beethoven strays a long way from the warm key of A flat major (the same key as the slow movement of the famous Pathétique Sonata, also in C minor) and spices up the pacific mood. The miniature Scherzo and Trio are in C major; the former light and spiky, the latter like a rustic dance, whose innocent fun is soon to be shattered by the arrival of the Finale.
Grieg, Violin Sonata No.2 in G major, Op.13
I Lento doloroso – Allegrovivace
II Allegretto tranquillo
III Allegro animato
Written 65 years later, in 1867, the optimism of this work is in complete contrast to the Beethoven. And yet the opening Lento (a slow introduction in the manner of the classical symphony) is a lament in G minor that only gradually finds its way to sunnier keys. The rest of the movement is a lively rondo, built from elements of Norwegian folk tunes. Shortly before the end it seems as though the spirit of Elgar is hovering over the music, as one of the dance themes is slowed right down, and harmonised richly in a very noble, ‘English’ fashion! The E minor slow movement is in a straightforward ABA form, in which A starts gently but ends up as dramatic and angry as Beethoven and B is a distant pastoral song in a bright major key. In the last movement Grieg returns to the “springtans”, a Norwegian dance. The tranquil middle section, whose melody returns more grandly before the final flourish, is redolent of the slow movement, and in fact all the themes of the sonata are re-used and developed as the work progresses. See if you can spot the famous ‘Grieg’ theme from the opening of his Piano Concerto. Grieg wrote this sonata in just three weeks, while on his honeymoon, and his feelings are pretty clear!
Fabulous Crimble pressie from the parents – Miaskovsky’s complete symphonies, on 16 CDs with several filler pieces, too (overtures, string suites, etc), making each disc at least 75 minutes long. AMAZING value! Notable symphonies so far would be two of the shortest; No.19 for brass band – the first movement recalls Candide’s sweeping melody, and the slow movement starts like the Skye boatman’s song – and No.8 in a very bumptious C major. There are many moments redolent of 20th century English string writing, and so far few dichordant or revolutionary elements. How Miaskovsky can have been denounced as formalist (in 1948, just 2 years before his death) is beyond me, though perhaps his final works did display more ‘modern’ features. That notwithstanding, the spitefulness of state censors (nor, tempting though it may be, the irrational behaviour of awkward people like me) is hardly something I should expect or particularly wish to understand.
I recently sent this email to someone who asked me about my experience of this phenomenon/condition, along with sub-queries on a particular (though theoretical) key and 'sadness' in music.
...
My synasthesia is not very strong. I don't usually see colours when I hear single notes, but more when I get harmonic impressions. Sometimes I might get a weak colour sensation from a single note, and it will tend to be the colour of that note's major key.
It's definitely the case that people with synasthesia experience colours differently - I read about Scriabin's very pronounced condition and many of the colours were different to mine.
"G sharp major" does not really exist for me, since I would hear it as A flat major. That is a dull, but rich red with hints of purple. (I'm not sure what I would see in the almost inconceivable case that someone was in B major and then modulated through sharp keys all the way to G sharp major!)
"Sad keys" are partly determined by musical context. All the minor keys are potentially sad. Perhaps I could say that E flat minor and B minor are particularly "sad", while G major, A major and E major are particularly "happy" (I omit D major from that list because it seems richer than "happy", but this is leaving the question of colours somewhat). Here's a non-systematic and incomplete list of impressions...
Greens come from E, E flat, G and G flat Yellows come from B and D Reds come from A, A flat and F sharp minor (F sharp major is like arainbow, with orange emphasis) F minor is ivory and purple, sometimes pink C minor is black, dark brown, also gun metal, and other things hard toput into words (C major is like a shiny version of that, or sometimes can be matt, like peat) B flat is almost white; the minor is grey D flat is almost colourless, but also sometimes off-white C sharp minor is impossible to put into words! But I love it.
A short story I wrote at the age of ten. Well, I say wrote, but in fact (in eerie foreshadowing of my maturer struggles with finishing projects and love of peripherals) what I actually wrote was…
the contents page
Chapter 1 – The Exam Day
— “— 2 – The Kidnapping
—“— 3 – Weedkillers
—“— 4 – Design & Making
—“— 5 – The Last Stand of Base 2?
the opening page of chapter 1
THE EXAM DAY!
Chapter 1.
Saturday is the worst day of the week and this one was really bad. It was the day of my entrance exam to King Edwards School. I was eating my breakfast and reading a comic and I needed some more milk. “Pass the milk Dad,” I said with my mouth full. He put his paper down to pass the milk and it was then that I saw the Headlines….
the back-cover blurb, on the back cover of the little notebook I had commandeered…
A boy goes to an exam and is taken 3,000,000yrs into the future. The humans want him to design a weapon to destroy plants which have evolved into Giants.
Can he do it before they make a mazzive raid on the Base?
Will his weedkiller weapons work?
FIND! OUT! BY! READING! THIS! BOOK!!!
UK - £1.50
NZ - $5.50
Notice the happy acceptance of evolution! Must have been in my unreflective phase before I went to that seminar by creationists ;-)
These days I am giving lots of recitals with Jane, tanking through the violin repertoire, so anything other than that deserves a special mention! The month of January will see the first of two duo recitals with an excellent Japanese pianist, Yukie Smith (whose website is here). Mozart, Brahms and Satie for the first one: we'll try to blend sublime and ridiculous, established masterpieces and hidden gems. And for some reason this combination of musicians lends itself more readily to humour than any other, except maybe Hoffnung's garden hose + orchestra... ;-)
Servant of Jesus Christ; husband, son, brother; musician; researcher; editor; conversationalist; ex-local government officer; eccentric; lover of fine foods, drinks, books, art and Autumn drizzle.
