Sunday 28 September 2008
9am, Crazy Mocha, Shadyside, Pittsburgh, with a big cup of sweet chai and an obscenely unnecessary peanut butter cup cheesecake that I saw here yesterday, but figured at the time that a sandwich and a salad with a ton of raw garlic in it was a wiser option just before a concert
We got back around 2am from the aftershow party last night at Annie and Pete’s, and I still woke up early enough to get myself out and be here for the café opening up.  It was a good show I think: all Chris’s research paid off, the actors were good, everyone played well, almost everyone got a chance to show off, and the audience at Synod Hall went nuts: that’ll do.

a quiet moment in rehearsal

making faces backstage: DG, Chris, Kris, Nick, Andy, Alison

Nick gets the prize for the most spectacularly wrong drum intro ever, after an unexpected brain fart while changing instruments to his less than ideal military side drum: we’re hoping that this moment will eventually appear on YouTube, with the inevitable Nick Halley clockwork automaton appearing on the market sometime afterwards, reproducing the moment in all its glory. But his effortlessly classy frame drum solo later in the show more than made up for it.

'Do I have to play this thing?'

Looking down at the sugar-and-dairy-fest in front of me here reminds me that before rehearsal yesterday, Alison and I went for a late breakfast at Pamela’s which was a similarly full-on culinary experience. The combination of their hotcakes (hot pancakes), which are saturated in butter, and their home fries, which to the Scottish palate are a bit like cheesy salty stovies fried in butter until there are crunchy bits, was quite sublime (along with eggs bacon and syrup of course … and whipped cream, and some token big fat blueberries for vitamins). We agreed that living here would lead us both to be clinically obese within a couple of months.

later, flying to Philadelphia
There have been storms in Philly today so all the flight times are messed up. Wonder if I’ll make my connection home or be diverted via Heathrow. I know which one I’d prefer…

Even after the peanut butter cup cheesecake, which took me 80 minutes to finish while dealing with my email inbox, Alison and I returned to Pamela’s again today for only slightly less enormous amounts of food for lunch. She reckons that this is food you would never cook for yourself as you’d look at the ingredients lined up and say ‘I’m not eating that’. But for someone else you’d think ‘They’re going to love this’ and heap in the butter.

late breakfast/early lunch

home fries in closeup

There was just time to say goodbye and thanks to our wonderful hosts Russ and Kathy before our cab took us to the airport. Staying in a calm home within walking distance of the venue and some good eateries makes being away from home much easier and more enjoyable.

Friday 26 September 2008
bedtime in Pittsburgh
We seem pretty well (but not fully) prepared for our Fort Dusquesne extravaganza tomorrow night. Alison and I have managed to fit in two excellent lunches here, and I’ve had plenty of relaxed evening time talking to hosts Russ and Kathy over a glass of wine. We did a school show to a hundred or so 8^th grade history students this morning which was really enjoyable, and tomorrow morning I only have to tune my melodica.

I’ve not written much for a couple of days as all my computer time has gone into an academic task, which is now accomplished (whew) and was emailed to its destination in tonight’s rehearsal break while sheltering from the light rain on the steps of a nearby café, using its wireless bandwidth.

Wednesday 24 September 2008
flying to Pittsburgh
We really didn’t know what to expect from yesterday’s gig at The Castle in Boston University . We knew it was for the Philosophy Department welcoming their students to a new session; what we didn’t know was quite how much fun it would be, and how enthusiastic and knowledgeable they were. Even in Scotland it’s rare for someone to come up to the CD table afterwards, spot a copy of ‘Fiddler Tam’ and say ‘wow, Kellie, he was quite a guy, wasn’t he?’  We played for about 75 minutes without a break and it felt like a lot less. And among the desserts on offer afterwards was a quite astounding trifle. I was too busy eating it to take a photo, so here’s one of my hotel bathroom instead.

I played the Duncan Burnett Pavin instead of Reinagle’s East Nook of Fife, as I’d spotted a 5-volume leatherbound history of the Queens of Scotland at the back of the room, and the Burnett/Kinloch/Mary connection seemed like an interesting story. It wasn’t until this morning that I realised that Reinagle had an opera house in Boston after he left Scotland, and I didn’t play his music there. Next time …

A tableful of seafood seemed like a great way to finish the day off, before it was time to say our farewells to Steve. As well as being our sponsor for the week, he’s had the very valuable skill of knowing what kind of people might enjoy what we do, and how to attract them. This goes well beyond the business of organisation and underwriting: somehow he’s ensured that each time we’ve played this week it’s been a satisfying experience on many levels. Now that’s impressive.  Thanks Steve.

in Boston, cycle path signage is very clear 

There was just time before leaving to visit this great comic shop – my bedtime reading is now the Acme Novelty Library vol. 17 - and to make a couple of phone calls about an academic task that has to be accomplished this week.  We had a brief moment of drama when the taxi dropped us at the airport and drove off with DG’s briefcase, but we got it back in plenty of time.

Tuesday 23 September 2008
between Kansas City and Boston

We’ve hitched a lift to Boston with Steve Karbank in his Beechjet 400A, and it’s a very civilised way to travel. Our crew, Gray and Rhonda, have provided coffee and donuts, and Steve popped into the local Swiss bakery on the way here, so it feels more like a relaxed breakfast in a friend’s living room. Our lobby call at the hotel was 30 minutes before takeoff, and Steve simply drove right up to the plane on the tarmac. No security queue then.

Anyway … time to backtrack a bit.

On Sunday we headed over to Steve’s to say hello, and then got ourselves settled into the White Recital Hall at UMKC.

In the course of the day my melodica got ideas above its station and got friendly with a couple of classy pianos. The musical unions were certainly successful (I was playing melodica and piano simultaneously in the Saint Malo set) but I don’t think any other offspring will ensue.

Then it was back to Steve and Janette’s for a really fun house concert to an unexpectedly enthusiastic audience – as you can see, the Fazioli wore socks even though I didn’t. 

Incidentally, Janette has disproved my contention that nice people never drive Range Rovers: maybe in North America my rules don’t apply.  Steve was generous with the contents of his wine cellar and his champagne collection – the mushroomy thump of the Pol Roger ’90 would have knocked my socks off if I’d been wearing any, but Chris preferred the spectacular floral bouquet of the Taittinger ’96.  Eventually we made it outside to the sound of the locusts in the trees.  I have a couple of souvenir mosquito bites from exploring the garden.

Then yesterday we were installed back at UMKC for a morning rehearsal, and a good masterclass session with some students on Vivaldi, Telemann and Haydn.

We’d been wary of giving the class on the afternoon of the concert, in case we were too tired afterwards, but in fact making some musical connections with people on the day of the gig was a real help, and business and conversation were brisk at the CD table afterwards.

Chris hosted the room party back at the hotel, with Steve and Jim Mobberley joining us to savour the delights of the least wanted music while drinking beer and eating our green room leftovers …

bedtime
I came back to the hotel to get my concert gear before the gig tonight and was the only person wearing a bright red jacket not to be walking in the direction of the baseball stadium round the corner to get to the Red Sox game. When we walked back again after the concert we could hear the roars of the crowd.

Monday 22 September 2008
Kansas City
My body clock hit back with a vengeance this morning, waking me up at 3.15am. On my early morning walk I realised that although Brussels has Manneken Pis, in Kan. City they think a bit bigger.

Sunday 21 September 2008
Kansas City
Well, as Wallace once said, “That went as well as could be expected.” I got here without ever having to stand in a queue, wait around for luggage, or be asked awkward questions, I slept all the way through the flight here from Philadelphia (much quieter than the first one), and I woke up this morning at about 5.45am, not bad for having done a 6 hour time difference.  The low orange moon was spectacular over the city as my driver brought me into town too.  If travelling was always like this, I might be tempted to do it more often.

My comfortable hotel room has free wifi, so I’m making use of that first thing, to the civilising accompaniment of Georg Muffat, before going for an early swim in the hotel pool.  Vortex 3 plan to meet at 10.30 after breakfast to go and suss out our venues.

 in September??

I went for a walk instead as the sun was beginning to poke through the mist.

Saturday 20 September 2008
flying to Philadelphia
I haven’t been on a plane since Boxwood two months ago, and I’d forgotten how incredibly noisy it can be - I’m keeping my earplugs in at all times on this US Airways 757 anyway - and I’d forgotten that the smell of hand soap is plane lavatories is strangely appealing.  (On my second visit to the bog I realised that it’s the almonds.)

Anyway, everything’s gone very smoothly so far, no queues at checkin or security, and takeoff was ahead of schedule. The book I wanted to read en route even dropped through the letterbox at home an hour before I left this afternoon: Alex Robinson’s Too Cool To Be Forgotten. Unlike many more 'edgy' comic artists, Robinson's characters tend to be likeable, so that you want to spend time with them. He’s even sufficiently upfront about his stylistic failings to let his publishers berate him on the back page for not bowing to their criticism of one particular page.

Last night I went on the radio with Vic to be silly for the last time: it’s been a lot of fun.  And there can’t be many shows that follow a 1956 track by The Drifters with Anthrax, not to mention the increasingly ridiculous collection of programme idents. Vic gave me a Daniel Johnston T-shirt as a leaving present which was very touching.

Thursday 18 September 2008

This afternoon 'I are been mostly' sorting out notation for next week. Given that excess baggage charges are becoming an occupational hazard, part of today's job was scanning and printing from volumes that I only need for one piece. So all the notation for three concerts fits in one folder, rather than a folder and a pile of heavy books. 

An observation from yesterday's lunch, about people who talk loudly in restaurants: the amount of noise they make is generally directly proportional to the amount of talking they do about themselves, and inversely proportional to how interesting their lives are. Thanks to our wonderful waitress at The Sisters who took pity and moved us to a secluded corner, which magically provided complete acoustic isolation from Mr Tedious.

I started organising the cello samples last night, and to my great surprise the more I organised them the less interesting they got. If they were scattered randomly across the keyboard, then it was a real adventure to play and to listen to. Organised into pitched and non-pitched, creaks and bangs and scratches or whatever, it just sounded a bit dull.  Hmm.

Tuesday 16 September 2008
on the train home
I’ve spent the relentlessly rainy morning getting ID cards, usernames and passwords for various libraries in Edinburgh. Going to a new music library for the first time can leave me a bit dizzy from all the possibilities on the shelves. But at least today I didn’t try to visit special collections at the university as well, or for that matter the rare books department of the NLS.  I very nearly did, but I noticed just in time that although I did have a laptop, pen and notebook with me, I didn’t actually have a pencil or any music MS paper, so I wouldn’t have been able to leave with very much useful information.  But I’d only set myself the task of registering today so that’s just fine.

later
A reorganisation of computer resources is underway to make the most of my new laptop. All the music software is running a treat, which is more than can be said for my more ergonomic but now overburdened desktop PC. The hour spent a few months ago recording Alison making strange thumping and creaking noises with her cello is about to pay off, as the noises are now finally beginning to find themselves spread across a sampler.

Meanwhile, I have some light reading from Nicholas Gurewitch and Mark Newgarden. OK, it's not light reading, but it does have pictures in it.

Sunday 14 September 2008

I've just taken a break from standing up a ladder wielding electric hedge trimmers, and over lunch I've been reading Robert Philip's keynote address from last year's RMA/CHARM conference (thanks to Beverly Woodward for pointing me in its general direction). And would you believe it, he puts very carefully and succinctly what I was trying to say in my last diary entry about playing classical music. I hope he won't mind me quoting the relevant bit - you can read the whole paper for yourself here.

The most satisfactory performances are those in which we seem to perceive with absolute clarity what the composer meant. Of course different performances can seem to achieve this – the ‘meaning’ is not fixed. But clarity is the essence of great performance, and the essence of extracting and conveying meaning. And this involves a sort of focus that not only identifies meaning, but also excludes the meaningless, and does not seek to add to what is meant. The greatest performances are not those that seem most heavily weighted with meaning. Performers all too often seem anxious to demonstrate that they are deeply serious, by burdening the music with as much meaning as they can give it. But extra meaning beyond what is meant does not clarify, it obscures.

Isn't that great? To that I would add that performers all too often also seem anxious to demonstrate that they are deeply clever or talented, which if you're playing someone else's music should be a secondary consideration rather than a primary one.

later
Hm, can I really be one of the 200 people in the world who enjoyed this? I've been clearing up my study (and my computer desktop, on which this has been lurking for some time) so I finally subjected myself to the 25 minutes of the world's least wanted music while bagging up hedge clippings ... and while I'm in no hurry to hear it again, it did make me laugh several times, most notably in the Yom Kippur Wal-Mart childrens' chorus section. You can hear it here: it's worth 25 minutes of your time, honest. As long as you're doing something else more worthwhile too. Of course, the Most Wanted song is really horrible.  Musicians listening to the Least Wanted can mentally tick off those aspects of it which inhabit their own work.  And contemplate their lack of commercial success.

Thursday 11 September 2008

After a few years of resistance, I finally gave in yesterday and bought a laptop. But not an iBook like every other musician I know seems to have, a used Dell D410 with a huge hard drive put in it. The theory is that once it’s got my music software installed, it’ll be a portable recording device, but in the meantime I’ve got it loaded up with useful tools for on the move: Firefox, Skype, MS Office, that sort of thing. And I've gone through the tedious rigmarole of getting Windows Media Player to play DVDs and 24-bit wav files.

This morning I’ve been editing basslines for our Pittsburgh gig with Chris, refining a press release, and sketching out potential programmes for 2010. We might just spend some time around then as a baroque group playing more-or-less standard repertoire, something else I’ve always had some resistance to. Aren’t there quite enough baroque groups in the world playing that stuff already? For it to be worth doing, it has to be a fresh and rewarding musical experience, which requires rather more effort and investment (personal and financial) than is commonplace in the classical music business. So let’s see.  

later
I've been testing out my laptop battery by having it play the DVD of Step Across the Border over in the corner of the room, with Mr Frith ruminating 20 years ago about how performance should ask questions of the audience. There's an interview of similar vintage here. All of which is relevant to our current planning, as we have the possibility of a revival of our show with the Tiger Lillies, as well as the potential 2010 Vivaldi/Bach/Muffat thing that I've been looking at today.

I'm certainly not interested in playing a piece like the Four Seasons, for example, if it means delivering to an audience's expectations. But it is a great piece of music with rewards of its own if you take it on its own terms. If you try and play what Vivaldi wrote (or rather, our best guess at what he seems to have meant by what he wrote), it can be very interesting indeed, and possibly a challenge to the expectations of musicians and audience alike.

But most musicians use the piece as an excuse to show what they can 'do with it'. That doesn't interest me at all any more. In fact, the last time I played in it, the first thing the soloist/director did in rehearsal was to reverse Vivaldi's first two dynamic markings, with no explanation. The message being 'I can piss all over Vivaldi if I want, I'm the soloist now'. Well, good for you sunshine, but why don't you do your homework first?

On the other hand, just before we went on stage at the Usher Hall with the Tiger Lillies last year, I turned to Martyn and said, 'well, no-one out there is expecting what we're about to do', which was to play a 25-minute long, slow repetitive song telling the story of Orpheus and Eurydice ... which may or may not have been an artistic triumph. Perhaps bits of it were. But revisiting that is an interesting prospect. 

Tuesday 9 September 2008

It's dawned on me that the next couple of months are going to be very busy indeed, so I've been trying to clear the various piles of un-dealt with paper that are littered on and around my desk. It's a slow process.

Meanwhile, here a couple of photos from the last week or two that I just found on my phone ... first, a shop window ad in Edinburgh.

And one of Glasgow's great cycle lanes - at least this one, unlike some others, doesn't double as a bottle bank. I've never seen this gate unlocked.

For reasons too boring to go into here, I got a copy of the new Flipron album in the post today, despite the fact that it doesn't come out until November 3.  And of course, it's brilliant - the single comes out next Monday.

Tuesday 2 September 2008

In the mail today from Kirsty in Halifax came her helpful repertoire suggestion for our forthcoming Pittsburgh concert: an Edwardian 'march descriptive' for piano called Battle of the Nations, which is deeply silly and includes a pipe band playing The Campbells Are Coming.  But ... it's by E.T.Paull, who in 1903 composed The Burning Of Rome, which formed a major part of my musical education.  Of all the pieces that my gran would play on the piano at home, this was my favourite: it opens with the dash of the charioteers for position, and then a march two-step for the race itself, the parade of the victors, the evening song of the Christians, alarm of fire, people running through the streets in consternation, the fire fiercely raging, a reprise of the big tunes - topped off with a spectacular cover in typical Paull style, with Nero fiddling in the foreground. Awesome. It's like a silent movie without the movie.  I've just played both pieces to Susie, who says it's the best music she's ever heard. So there.

Monday 1 September 2008

I nipped back to the studio last night to do my harmonium overdubs, so that today would be a day off. Alison was in Scotland today with a day off too, so we met this morning with tentative plans to jump in a loch, which we then did. It even stopped raining just when we got there.

cellist emerges from loch

the view back to Glasgow from the hill

Thanks to Iain McGillivray for drawing my attention to the very enthusiastic review that the remastered Red Red Rose album got a week ago in the Herald - it's now here. 

Saturday 30 August 2008

Back from an enjoyable afternoon at Green Door Studio doing overdubs for Alasdair Roberts, with Gordon Ferries on 19th century guitar and Alison on gamba. I really didn't think we'd get the harpsichord through the green door (which is actually black) as there's a killer angle between the two soundproofing doors on the way in, but at the second attempt somehow we did it. I forgot my camera so these photos are from my phone ...

the harpsichord seems at home amongst the guitar amps

Ali has a Rick Wakeman moment at the harmonium

Friday 29 August 2008

An intriguing morning at the Queens Hall today, where the Jerusalem Quartet's recital was disrupted five times by political protestors, and then again by a broken string. On the way home I found a shop unexpectedly selling a fantastic range of chocolate and bought some Amedei 9. 

If you need cheering up you can't do much better than this (if you were brought up in the UK that is). I thought Mark Vidler had retired from mashups, but Go Home Productions was back in production in April - wish I'd noticed earlier. 

Thursday 28 August 2008

I've just woken up from two hours asleep on the sofa - oops.  I was in Edinburgh this morning to listen to Steven Osborne play some great Messiaen in the Queens Hall, stepping in for an ill Ivan Moravec at short notice.  I was backstage a few minutes before the gig when Jonathan Mills appeared, looked at me and said "What the hell are you doing here?" I had to reassure him I wasn't planning to go onstage and play the piano.

There was time to drop in on Simon Frith at the University before coming home - trying not to eye up the huge collection of vinyl in his office too obviously - and then I met Eddie McGuire on the train. That's not a bad set of encounters for a Thursday: a composer, a music sociologist, a pianist and a festival director, and each of them more multi-talented than such short descriptions would suggest.

Wednesday 27 August 2008

I walked past the fridge the other day and saw this - Susie gave me permission to post it here.

Nothing much of interest's been happening to me really, apart from walking past Sir Sean Connery in Princes Street on Monday, who to my great disappointment didn't say "David, ye're a shite ... a shite for shore eyes". Meanwhile lots of people seem to have bright shiny new websites - the last week or so has brought these from Suzie, Pamela and Kathy. There's no mention on Pamela's of her stylophone playing, oddly enough.

later
While I've been scribbling possible viol parts for Alasdair Roberts's songs today, I've neglected to notice an invitation lying on the harmonium stool, to the opening of Joe Davie's exhibition at the Castle Gallery in Inverness next Friday. Besides his own work, Joe is responsible for the paintings on many of our album covers, and for our wee dug mascot that's at the top of this page. My study here has a fair amount of his work on the walls: if you're near Inverness, go and see it, and buy something; or you can view the whole exhibition here.  

Thursday 21 August 2008

Alasdair Roberts came round this morning with his guitar and we played through a song or five. I could tell from the look in his eye when I mentioned the possibility of getting the harpsichord down from its usual position against the wall, that he thought this was a good idea. And he was right: studio time has been booked. I also got to see his amazing guitar tunings in action at close quarters: I've never seen anyone tune the bottom string to F sharp before - that's the F sharp below its usual E. 

Later in the day I told Sushil about our getting together, and he said 'Oh yeah, the word is out'. 'What?' He'd mentioned us to a comrade in mutant pop, whose reaction was 'Concerto Caledonia? Is that the guys who're working with Ali Roberts?' At that stage we'd only met for a cup of tea in Heart Buchanan and exchanged a few emails, but 'word is out'. Cool. 

Wednesday 20 August 2008

I like it when people send me interesting things that they've made. While I'm still digesting Fred Frith's acoustic guitar CD, today's mail brought Bill Drummond's new book in which I make a couple of very tiny appearances. It's with some reluctance that I've put it down to type this and catch up with some emails. Like 45, it's largely episodic, so it's very easy to open it at random and get caught up in a narrative, a train of thought, or just a wild idea. People like Bill are important because when they see something, they don't just see what's there, they see what could be there. Now isn't that really How To Be An Artist?

I listened to a lacklustre concert in Edinburgh this morning which made me doubt all the things that DG and I had been telling the participants at Boxwood, about involving your whole body and self in music-making. Today's performer involved his whole self but not in a good way; you have to get the mechanics and the discipline right too.  I also have to spend less time listening to lacklustre music.

Tuesday 19 August 2008
on the 2030 train to Edinburgh
Let's hear it for private enterprise: a burst of expletives rather than a cheer. I had a hospital appointment today to see a hand surgeon, who to my great relief isn't going to do anything, and when I came out I found that the private company that now runs the hospital car park (one CP Plus - I wonder what they think the 'plus' signifies) had given me a £40 parking notice, despite my carefully paying for a ticket and displaying it in the car window. OK, I thought, I'll find the attendant and show them I've got a ticket already. No-one to be found. OK, I'll call the company up then. Eventually I found a sign with a London number on it, to find that the company 'only deals with appeals in writing'. So to be avoid being liable for £40 I wrote them a letter, enclosing a copy of of my pre-paid ticket, and a photo of it prominently displayed in situ. Bastards. If I hadn't been rather busy and preoccupied I would have reported them to the police as well, as it could well be quite a little earner across the country taking advantage of the people who can't be bothered writing to the London office, and who just pay the fine over the phone. No wonder the staff at the hospital near us use our street as a car park: I have more sympathy for them now.

Anyway, just as I emerged from the hospital, Andrew called to say that he was going to see the Tiger Lillies tonight, so now so am I. I've brought my sleeping bag and I've been offered a night's kip at the BBC audio crew's festival flat. 

Also today I fitted in 10 minutes in the People's Palace at an exhibition of Camera Club photos of Glasgow in 1955. Odd to think that Glasgow then is more like it was when I was growing up, than it is now.

later
We gatecrashed John Eliot Gardiner's party afterwards so that I could see Kathy Fuge, having completely failed to meet her for lunch as planned this week. Who should meet us at the door but Anneke Scott ... I still think the best thing about festivals isn't going to gigs, but bumping into unexpected people. 

Monday 18 August 2008

Back from a weekend in Edinburgh and Portie. It didn't rain for two whole days: this is rare at the moment.

First, I must correct an error from a couple of weeks ago: it's the Call of the Cuckoos Tent that meets in the Britannia Panopticon - here is the proof.

Robert McFall wrote last night in his role as guardian of Received Pronunciation to confirm what I'd suspected about a passage from Israel in Egypt, where 'the floods stood upright as an heap' (Exodus 15:8). I'd guessed that in 18th-century London, the 'h' in heap would still have been dropped, hence 'an heap', rather than 'a heap' as in current usage. But if you sing this in Scotland you get 'the floods stood upright as a neep' which although pretty funny, is not really what Handel had in mind. I tried to explain to Emmanuelle that a neep was a humorous vegetable, and she nodded sagely and said 'Ah, je vois' but I don't think she did ... . If you're going to perform the piece in Scotland, do you adopt Mockney accents and drop the 'h', or drop the 'n'? You don't want to sound like one of those BBC newsreaders who say 'an historic' because they think it's correct, and carefully enunciate the 'h'. 

In the mail on Saturday from Fred Frith came a copy of his beautiful new acoustic solo album. It's very cheering, but it should really have an accompanying DVD video to prove that he is actually playing it all just on a single acoustic guitar - you'd never guess.

Thursday 14 August 2008

A very welcome day at home after last night's gig. By  Tuesday I was sauntering through rehearsals in a nice relaxed way. Which was foolish: I'd forgotten how Emmanuelle ramps up the energy level about 20 notches as the performance approaches, so I spent the Tuesday night run-through in an exhausted mess, scrabbling around trying to remember what key I was in or what instrument I was supposed to be playing. Normally I'm reluctant to write anything into the score or parts, but there was so much happening very fast, that this week my score ended up full of very explicit pencilled instructions: bass figures, what instrument I'm playing next, what the registration will be, what notes lurk over the next page. It's good to be stretched sometimes, and I recovered control over what I was doing by the performance last night, even if I did drop a stinker of a bum note in the middle of Robin Blaze's beautiful aria towards the end - fortunately I found him standing outside a pub afterwards and could apologise. It's all on the radio on 16 September. But a great joy to work with the musical whirlwind that is la Haïm again, and to be an honorary member of the SCO cello section for a few days, which has always been the coolest orchestral section in the known universe. 

The Boxwood 2008 flickr group is growing nicely - you have to sign in to see all the photos.

Monday 11 August 2008
on the way home from Edinburgh - I cadged a lift from Alison Green, my bike's in the boot
Today was marathon Israel in Egypt rehearsal day, with three sessions. In the third one I thought 'I'm really knackered now, could do with a break' and looked at my watch to see we'd only been going for 10 minutes. Oh. It's the first time for a while that Sarah B-B has played in an orchestra too - after the first session on Saturday she told me she'd been sitting thinking 'OK, time for a cup of tea' and then realised that she was in an orchestral rehearsal and would have to wait until the break rather than just getting up and making one.

Anyway, Emmanuelle is great fun as ever. At one point this morning we had differing opinions on what tonality a particular bit of Handel bassline was in, and she said 'Well, I think it's this way, but ... c'est ton claveçin, live your life!'  I played it her way; she was right of course.

The biggest challenge for me is the multitude of quick changes from organ to harpsichord and back again, necessitating some unusual playing postures while the score is still on the wrong instrument. This would be fine if I didn't still have a sore neck from four hours on Saturday spent copying figures into my score.  Balanced on the harpsichord beside the score today was a huge punnet of raspberries picked up from a Stockbridge fruit shop: the cello section helped me finish them off at the end of the night. I also picked up the makings of a picnic from Mellis's cheese shop at lunchtime, and headed for the Botanic Gardens in the teatime break. The arboretum reminded me unexpectedly of the Jardin Botanique in Montréal.

Heading north from Haymarket station this morning I nearly got knocked off my bike by a bus, as its back end veered across the bike lane. Meg was harpsichord tuning today, and she'd had a similar near miss coming in from Waverley. I get the feeling that Edinburgh motorists are more generally hostile to cyclists than in Glasgow. Is this true? As if the cobbles weren't enough of an obstacle.

In an idle moment at a piano before rehearsal I figured out a sketched arrangement of XTC's Burning With Optimism's Flames which I'd listened to on the train, starting my list of possible songs for Barb. 

Saturday 9 August 2008
on the 0900 train to Edinburgh, with a bike
I'm starting a few days of being a professional musician (in as far as a musician is someone who makes sounds - regular readers will know better than this). OK ... pretending to be a professional musician by sitting in the Scottish Chamber Orchestra for Emmanuelle Haïm.

On Thursday I somehow made it along the flooded railway lines to the Queens Hall just in time for Barb Jungr's gig, and was very fortunate to meet Caroline from Linn Records in the box office queue, as she had a spare ticket. Barb had arranged a ticket to be put aside for me, which possibly explains the bizarre email I got from Assembly Direct on Tuesday night, full of marketing BS about "taking advantage of all the opportunities that are presented" and inviting me to register as a promoter on their website so that I could be entered on their database and my "ticket request would be processed". Um ... no.  I hadn't requested any tickets, I'm not a promoter, an artist invited me to her gig. It turns out that if I'd actually filled the thing in, I would probably have had to pick the ticket up on the other side of town, which would have been impossible anyway given that all the trains were running late. But the end result of all of this is that the promoter gets more ticket revenue at the expense of the artist's being able to invite people to their own show. If anyone makes any money on the Edinburgh Fringe, I think we can see who it might be.

Anyway, Barb was great and I came away with a much better idea of what sort of songs we might try and tackle together. I also had a very useful chat with Darryl, gave our board member Sandy Matheson his copy of our new single, and drank some of our neighbour Scott Williams's fine beer at the bar: the Queens Hall has the remarkable good taste to stock the Williams Brothers' entire range.  On the way there it was very cheering to see the posters for the Tiger Lillies' Seven Deadly Sins show "the filthiest show in town" which I must make sure I attend before the festival is over.

I picked up lots of nice things from the picture framers yesterday and then had a really good laugh on the radio with Vic Galloway - you can hear us being stupid and childish for the next few days here. And before going to bed I went out to the garden, lay down on the trampoline, and watched the shooting stars overhead - quite spectacular, I've never seen them so clearly.

later
I need to get some more experience of cycling in Edinburgh's New Town if I'm going to be any good at it. Cobbled streets are very pretty, but cycling up steep cobbled hills in the rain isn't much fun.  I stopped off at that haven of civilisation, the Book Festival, to pick up the rest of the family on the way home; we didn't see the Prime Minister though. 

Wednesday 6 August 2008

Just back from a family outing to the Britannia Panopticon for a meeting of the Bonnie Scotland Tent (Oasis #021) of the Sons of the Desert. For the uninitiated, this involves sitting in the remains of the wooden theatre where Stan Laurel first took to the stage, watching Laurel & Hardy movies in congenial company. Highly recommended - the first Wednesday of every month. We only just made it in time to get the last seats. The last time I attended a Sons of the Desert meeting, about 20 years ago in Sloan's Bar, the evening started with some Tom & Jerry cartoons, to get us warmed up for a couple of two-reelers and a feature, shown on 16mm film. They've got a DVD projector now but it's just as much fun. LeRoy Shield's music still sounds great too. 

Thanks to the Panopticon, which about a century ago served as the base for A.E. Pickard's carnival, waxworks, freak show and zoo, I now have a T-shirt bearing the image of 'Princess Christina The Human Fresco': a kind of Glaswegian equivalent of Lydia the Tattooed Lady. She's a bit scary.

Tuesday 5 August 2008

I'm having a long-awaited afternoon back at my desk, after avoiding any notions of productivity for a week and more. There's still four-week-old mail to be opened and dealt with too. A package of mailing cartons for 7" vinyl arrived this morning, which I hope will prove useful when we finally get around to telling people that our new record is out. 

Sunday's post wasn't quite true in that I've been picking up a guitar occasionally and can now almost play the solo from side 4 of Mike Oldfield's Incantations (except that only having 22 frets, I can't sign off on the high F sharp), something I've been meaning to learn since I was about 14. 

Meanwhile outside my window a posse of local kids are having a yard sale (it's for charidee, people) in the front garden, which makes for good entertainment. There's a steady stream of customers (most of whom we know) as I type.

Today I started reading Lucy Green's Music, Gender, Education - I haven't got very far yet, but her definitions of intrinsic and delineated musical meaning in the introduction are very useful.  

Sunday 3 August 2008

Well, I'm halfway through my fortnight of not having to go near a musical instrument, which has been rather good. If only I didn't have to go near computers either. I've been rebuilding our kitchen computer from the ground (motherboard) up after it died a few weeks ago, which seemed like a good idea at the time, but of course the job has got more and more complicated as it's gone on, as the various peripherals want to distance themselves by differing degrees from the influence of Windows.

But I did get to the picture framers on Friday (getting a parking ticket in the process) with some Sea Squares and Joe's original Lion CD artwork, so I'm looking forward to the results of that very much.

later
I've finally ordered some 7" mailing boxes, so our new single is available for sale here! I'll get around to writing a suitably inflammatory press release later this week I think.

Wednesday 30 July 2008

Ha! Got it this time ...

Also today came an invitation from Sushil to play some Daniel Johnston songs, to celebrate World Mental Health Day later in the year. Very hard to resist.

Tuesday 29 July 2008

My favourite exchange of the day today was at the bank when I was paying in a cheque and  the clerk said 'I should charge you £5 for this, but the manager at the bank here's really pissing me off, so you can have it for free.'  

I was back on my bike this morning for the first time in ages, and as an urban cyclist you can easily develop prejudices about the drivers of various so-called 'prestige' marques, their character, and their behaviour on the road. Over time these prejudices get challenged: for example, you'll encounter a number of polite, considerate BMW drivers, or a Jaguar driver will cut you up. But one of mine still remains steadfast: that there is no reason whatsoever to drive a Range Rover except to demonstrate that you're a [insert most vile expletive here]. If you have a personalised number plate on your Range Rover then you're clearly a real [again], and if you're also driving while on the phone, then really you should consider your reasons for existing on the planet at all. Somebody prove me wrong, please. Well, anyway, this morning I rode past a Range Rover (and I wish I'd stopped and taken a photo to prove I didn't just imagine this) with the number plate AR51OLE - you have to squint a bit to get the idea. At least the owner was honest.

Monday 28 July 2008

Home again. I've been lying in the hammock in the back garden making conversation with the foxes who trotted through or stopped for a scratch. OK, I did most of the talking.

There's a huge pile of mail still waiting to be opened, and other things that have come through the front door include my harpsichord, which I'd hired out to another group, and ... a big box of 7" EPs! We'll get these available for sale in the next week or so. On top of the pile of mail, Helen left this story cut out from last Friday's Guardian.

After flying into Glasgow yesterday morning, I'd planned today as a buffer zone in which to mow the lawn and start to get back into 'home' mode. But the contents of my suitcase are still in neat piles all over the floor. I think it will take me some time to get up to speed. 

I got stung for $60 baggage excess at Toronto on the way home, by Zoom this time, after having to empty my bags on the concourse all over again. I'd somehow got my suitcase under 20 kg, but my carry-on was too heavy this time. I should have been charged $80 but I didn't have change ... 

Saturday 26 July 2008
flying from Halifax to Toronto
Time to backtrack a bit.

After teaching on Wednesday I made it into the Parish Hall just in time for Edmund's shape-note hymn singing session ('Great! We need a bass'), and then after dinner Nick and I ran away from the ceilidh and went sailing instead with his dad Paul, sister Vanessa and 7 week old nephew Win. Many G&T's were drunk, and we got back in the dark with Nick playing the Trumpet Hornpipe (that's the Captain Pugwash theme to British readers) on the melodica, just in time for supper prepared by his gran. When he dropped me off in the early hours of the morning at the Butlers', we agreed to get up the next morning and go to Anne-Marie's early dance class, and as a result of Thursday and Friday's classes, I'm now just about barely competent at the menuet, branle, gavotte and bourrée (pas de bourrée, pas de bourrée ...) - a great way to start the day.

Thursday night was Boxwood talent night where I found myself reverting to type, playing some gospel piano for Pat (wow), singing shape-note hymns again, having a minuscule speaking part in the Cult of the Bambologists (don't ask), and (hooray) conducting my wonderful listening class in a performance of Fred Frith's 'Screen'. I was expecting a 'Springtime for Hitler' kind of audience reaction, but several people told me afterwards how entranced they had been, even though they had no idea what was going on. Here we are after our openair afternoon rehearsal, when the birds and the foghorns joined in.

DG and I share the same wedding anniversary - not to each other of course - so Laurel kindly took this picture of us looking suitably miserable at the back of the hall apart from our spouses.

Yesterday I gave in to requests for an extra listening class, and used my one tiny remaining spot of free time to buy some of Mariëtte Roodenburg's Sea Squares, with Mariëtte helping me choose. If in doubt, ask the artist! Her photographs of fog are breathtaking, but I couldn't fit any of those in my suitcase. She does ship worldwide though ... 

There was just time for a quick rehearsal before the Boxwood finale concert - apparently there had been a real rehearsal at 3pm, but no-one told me!  I got to play the quite exceptional Yamaha piano in St John's Church when Vortex 3 did their thing in the second half, and we roped in Max Kasper and Nick to become Vortex 5 for 'a good start'. The first half finished with another serious klezmer workout with Adrianne, and in the interval, she said possibly the nicest thing anyone's ever said to me after playing a set, which was 'If I never play with you again ... I'll kill myself!' So I look forward to going berserk on the harmonium again some time in the future. Pierre's amazing dancing in the final set of tunes had Kyla dub him 'firecracker shoes' - 10 minutes earlier she'd been fast asleep on the floor at the front while dad Ethan was getting cool shots of us all on his amazing little Panasonic HD camera ...

After a quick beer DG and I headed for Halifax, and he posted me through the door of the Neville/Money household at about 1.30am. This morning Kirsty and Kyla took me shopping for presents (including here), and we watched some of Ethan's video footage of yesterday. It's fascinating to watch well-shot pictures of yourself teaching and playing, sometimes in closeup. It becomes very clear what's working well and what isn't. 

Wednesday 23 July 2008
back on the sofa at Solomon House, Lunenburg, NS
I've moved house to the Butlers' place overlooking Mahone Bay. Sadly I got up just too late today to watch the whales who were feasting on mackerel there, but the hummingbirds at the window made up for it.  DG and I taught our daily baroque class this morning, which is becoming really interesting.

Yesterday was a bit of a milestone: I've been holding a listening class in the afternoons which has helped me to focus my thoughts and opinions on how I think good music works. And yes, it's about listening - but regular readers will know this already. But the whole of the day reaffirmed it rather clearly.

Last night's gig in the church was a huge pleasure, for me anyway. Pierre Chartrand and Anne-Marie Gardette did a baroque dance set with Gilles Plante playing, Bill Coulter played a solo acoustic set, then after the break Brian Finnegan let rip with Bill and various guests, including me. I got roped in during my listening class - we'd just started the exercise of sitting still for a minute and trying to listen in as much detail as possible to the sounds around us, when there was a knock at the door and Brian squeaked in on the shiny wooden floor to say 'David, fancy playing a couple of tunes with me tonight?' He looked a bit confused by the complete lack of activity in a room full of people with their eyes closed. I said 'Sure, and you're being listened to', which left him completely baffled as to whether I was going to show up for the gig or not.

I went along to the church for a quick rehearsal with harmonium - it wasn't until the first half of the concert was nearly over that I realised I hadn't played the melodica all week, so Jennifer Publicover gave me a lift to the Fire Hall in her hi-tech Toyota Prius to get it. I can't imagine what Brian thought when I produced it out of nowhere for the second set of tunes, after Nick had stolen the harmonium mic for his drum. Suzie got up to scat, and much fun was had by all in various time-signatures, with lots of active listening on stage. Music doesn't have to be micro-managed as long as the solutions can be found musically. It's where the unmanaged parts are logistical, that everything can go badly wrong.

Monday 21 July 2008
Lunenburg, NS - on the very comfy sofa in the guests' parlour at Solomon House
I've carved some free time from my schedule today after a crazily busy weekend. Saturday began with a Tempest rehearsal in DG's house in Halifax before I enforced compulsory lying on the floor doing nothing, and Kirsty drove us to Lunenburg. I figured correctly that it would be the last opportunity to do nothing for a long time.

By the time Paul and Nick Halley's concert came along that evening I'd found myself playing in 8 pieces, including some really loud organ stuff, only one of which I'd seen more than 24 hours previously. Cue a frantic day of learning notes, rehearsing, and harpsichord tuning, while hoping for somewhere to stay that night and pointing out that I was going to be just a bit too busy to act as a taxi service all week for people staying 5 miles away. (Sometimes saying 'No' is quite easy.) CBC were recording the show for broadcast too. So no pressure then. And none of us benighted artists seemed to have been given any helpful information about what was meant to be going on. In Concerto Caledonia we have a saying 'RTFS', which stands for Read The Something Schedule. But there wasn't one. At one point, having discovered that the harpsichord was half a semitone sharp and the tuning key was still a few miles away, I was moving purposefully between the church and Chris's place where I'd left my suitcase, when Janet Palmer called a hello from her doorstep and asked where I was staying. 'Good question', I called back, having resigned myself to the nearest sofa. Instead I found myself in her wonderful 18th century B&B for two nights. As Suzie put it, 'You lucked out'. 

After the concert, I was so relieved to be able to stop, but still so fuelled up with adrenaline that I walked up and down my room telling myself how happy I was.  My bedside reading here includes a pre-WW1 reading primer from Nova Scotia, full of short fairytales and improving moral poetry. Just about my level.

Yesterday's concert was the Tempest extravaganza, which included a completely wild set of klezmer tunes with Adrianne Greenbaum - the craziest noise I think I've ever made on a harmonium. Face-cracking grins all round from the rhythm section. And beforehand, an interesting discussion of rhyming and historical pronunciation in ballad texts with Edmund Brownless. I wish I'd not made such a hash of John Munday's Fitzwilliam Virginal Book setting of Bonny Sweet Robin - I played it perfectly in the afternoon, but by the concert, my brain was too fried to be entirely reliable. At least CBC weren't recording that one (not that I knew about that until the mics didn't show up). 

I've taken myself out of some of my teaching duties today, to help effect the transition from last-minute preparations for performing, to giving my attention to other people. If I get a good night's sleep tonight, I might just begin to function adequately again. Playing a couple of concerts really doesn't have to be this exhausting. This is why we have management.

Friday 18 July 2008
flying from Toronto to Halifax
I've just moved at great speed from Terminal 3 of Toronto airport to Terminal 1 after my flight in from Glasgow was two hours late, and I made it to the gate with 5 minutes to spare. I was delayed further by the Air Canada guy who made me take 7lbs of stuff out of my case and put it into my carry on bag instead, to avoid paying an extra $75. All the stuff was going on the plane one way or another, so to me it seemed a rather pointless exercise from the airline's point of view. 'Hey, thanks for doing that for me' he said, confirming my impression of Canadian airport staff as unfailingly polite but unstintingly rigorous. Anyway, at least the flight from Glasgow was half empty, so I had a whole row of seats to myself and could lie down and snooze whenever I felt like it: economy has seldom been so luxurious, even on a tatty old Zoom 757.

Yesterday morning I was still on holiday in Islay: 13 days which included a lot of jumping in the sea: I'm not telling where all my favourite beaches are. New experiences include the excellent food at An Taigh-Osda just up the road, and Robbie and I making it to the spectaular canyons and caves at Gortantaoid with Hop (here are someone else's photos of much the same walk with lots of people in it - we didn't see another soul). And we rode horses along Machir Bay at last.

I didn't read as much as usual - I was probably too busy jumping in the sea - but I was enthralled by George Mackay Brown's An Orkney Tapestry, which I found in the cellar at home, intrigued and challenged by Clive Brown's excellent book on Classical and Romantic Performance Practice, and cheered by Charles Gore's latest offering from the Highland Music Trust.

The mighty Flipron are playing at the Edinburgh Fringe (hooray) - through frustratingly it's in the middle of the night at Late 'n' Live in the Gilded Balloon Teviot 4-8 August (I think - if you can get sense out of the Fringe website you're doing better than I am). Boo. I'll have had my body clock messed around with enough by then I think. 

Anyway, when not snoozing on the 7 hour flight here I was trying to get my head around the large pile of music I printed out last night, for concerts tomorrow and Sunday. I've been practising by  playing the tray on the seat in front with my right hand, and the side of my head with my left.

Tuesday 1 July 2008

Well, one gig cancelled, but another few turn up instead. There's been some good movement today on the concert diary front for next season. And ... a release date for our 7" single! 4 August in the UK, 25 July in Germany. Look out for details at aufgeladenundbereit. We'll be selling them here, and I might just have a few advance copies with me at Boxwood too.

©2008 David McGuinness
all opinions are those of the author - you don't have to share them