while baking a 7-apple crumble to salvage the near-extinction apples I bought a couple of weeks back. Peaceful times.
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I’m still exploring the new box set I bought last week – well, with 22 CDs, odds are I’ll be exploring it for a good long while to come! – and today I listened again to the disc of Poulenc and Britten songs (composers accompanying), and had my first listen to the Khachaturian disc (composer conducting), which has the Violin Concerto on it. I heard this piece on the radio the other day and was so taken by it that I had to switch it over from clock-radio to real radio to read the track info – so I was very glad to find I already had a recording of it. I’ve also been reacquainting myself with Peggy Glanville-Hicks’ Thirteen Ways of Looking at a Blackbird which I have loved ever since I first heard it sung by Gerald English at a composer conference in Melbourne back when I was at uni. It’s a really intriguing work, and relevant to me especially now because of the Whitman songs being similarly fragmentary and miniature.
I’ve also listened to an incredible piano piece – most definitely NOT miniature – by Carolyn Yarnell, called The Same Sky – you can hear it from a link in about the 6th paragraph down in Kyle Gann’s post ‘Aiming My File Cabinets into the Right Student’s Ears’. I’d link to it directly, except that Gann’s post also includes a chunk of very beautiful and daunting-looking score, which is worth seeing. And also because if you don’t know Gann’s work, you should get to his site and have a listen. I highly recommend, in particular, Custer and Sitting Bull, which truly shows how beautiful and emotive microtonal music can be.
And to celebrate djeli’s safe arrival home from the snow, I cooked another new recipe from my big Greek cookbook – ‘Drunken Pork’ – fantastically delicious and easy. Will have to pull this one out for guests sometime, I think!
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Peggy Glanville-Hicks’ 13 Ways of Looking at a Blackbird, a disc of Poulenc & Britten songs, performed by the composers and some Reynaldo Hahn songs. Hunting for a clear way through the transposition mire for the Whitman set.
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… conducting Les Noces, Symphonies of Wind Instruments and Symphony of Psalms, from the CD set I bought yesterday – amazing. Also transcribed a bunch of notes I made on the Walt Whitman prose works I’ve been reading, napped and played through two levels of Lego Indiana Jones. And the evening’s not done yet! Now, which CD to listen to while I read the next chapter of the Twyla Tharp book?
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with a much-needed 4-hour nap. Also had a massage to counter the tension headache, which has been quite horrific this week, baked oatmeal scones again, did a bit of work on djeli’s new hat (I’ve passed the turn-up and am on to the hat proper now!) and received the first part of my Amazon order – Wii Fit Plus (which obviously I can’t use until the sprained ankle is sorted out) and 3 Beatles albums – Magical Mystery Tour, Revolver and A Hard Day’s Night – woo! Also had a bash at one of my new Wii games – Lego Indiana Jones – which looks like a heap of fun. A lovely, relaxing day – can’t remember the last time I had one of those!
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at the King’s Place Festival – what a great event! Cheap, plentiful, good quality music, with plenty of places to slob about and catch up with friends and listen to free performances. I’ll definitely try to take more advantage of it if they do one again next year. Met up with a friend and chatted for hours. Saw the current exhibition at the gallery too.
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Djeli brought home an Airport Express this evening – so now, without any hassle at all, I am able to print to the laser printer again (which in spite of much technological wrestling, I haven’t been able to do since I upgraded to Leopard), but the best thing ever is Airtunes – we tested it with the AE connected to the digital radio speakers up here in the bedroom and it was just so simple! Plug it in, restart iTunes, give it a minute to find everything, then just PLAY. Brilliant. I can’t wait till we get it properly set up with the stereo downstairs. If we get an additional AE for upstairs, it looks like we’ll also be able to set the same music playing all over the house, which will be brilliant for spring cleaning days. YAY!
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Very cool – very interesting: http://www.philipglass.com/glassengine/.
Apologies for not having been updating this as often as I should – I’ve been travelling near-continuously for the past few weeks and now have parents to stay from Australia, which is – of course – a joyous thing, but not conducive to getting my own creative stuff done. Having the flu is interfering too, but both will pass and I’ll be back soon – promise!
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Djeli took me over the Severn to The Boat pub for their Irish music night – every Thursday all sorts of people turn up with their instruments and just play folk music. Deeply, deeply awesome. Last night we had 3 fiddles, 2 banjos, 2 mandolins, a guitar, 2 sets of uilleann pipes, 4 assorted accordions, ranging from a tiny squeezebox through to a full piano accordion, a bodhran and even a pair of bones (played like the spoons). We were given a lesson in bone-playing, and Djeli picked it up quite well but obviously I’m too much of a control freak.
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