Author Archive

Flight T3 4386

Monday, March 2nd, 2009

“This is a further and final invitation for passengers Davies and Burton to proceed to gate sixty eight for flight T3 4386 Eastern Airways to the Isle of Man”.  I didn’t know who passenger Burton was, but passenger Davies was definitely, and inescapably me.  Pushing aside the immediate feeling of unfairness, I hastily polished off my well-earned glass of wine, gathered my belongings, and hurried off in the direction of the departure gates.

 

It had taken me three and a half hours to get to this point, and had started with the mid-morning decision to leave work at midday, a little earlier than planned.  A warning bell had been clanging all morning after Classic FM’s traffic and travel news at 8.30am.  The usual place.  The right turn at St Fagan’s.  After her usual introductory banter about bagels, or her evening out yesterday, Jay-Louise Knight had announced that there were serious problems on the M5 somewhere. I couldn’t remember where.  I decided to err on the side of caution and set off very early for Birmingham airport.  So when I hit traffic in a very unusual place I was initially quite confident.  I had plenty of time.  But an hour later and scarcely two miles further on, I was showing signs of stress, and was wondering whether my ticket was flexible enough for a free transfer to the evening flight.  But I needn’t have worried.  Although there were further threatening ‘Queue Caution’ signs, none of these came to pass and I arrived at Long Stay Car Park 1 with enough time and in a calm state of mind.

 

The screens in the main departure lounge had showed I had twenty minutes before boarding, and I had decided to relax with a glass of wine and look forward to the weekend ahead.  “This is a further and final invitation for passengers Davies and Burton to proceed to gate sixty eight for flight T3 4386 Eastern Airways to the Isle of Man”.  It certainly hadn’t been twenty minutes, and I definitely hadn’t heard a first call.  By the time I got to gate sixty eight, Passenger Burton had got there before me, and I was the last to step aboard the bus, taking in my stride the faintly accusatory glances from the eight other passengers.

 

As we soared over the Irish Sea I looked down on the water glinting in the sun, and found myself smiling.  A weekend at home in Peel ahead of me.

A view from the stage

Friday, January 30th, 2009

It’s always an interesting moment seeing the CPO programme list for the next year.There will always be some pieces I like balanced by some I’d rather not have to bother with.This year was no different, and scanning the e-mail I took an involuntarily sharp intake of breath when I saw ‘Tchaikovsky Symphony #5’. What a treat – fantastic.I won’t say which pieces prompted a groan!

Tchaikovsky symphonies are packed full of delights and challenges for your average first violinist (and I am a very average first violinist).  Lovely tunes, fast passages, grunty bits for effect, subtleties that need a great deal of skill and refinement, and sections which, quite frankly, it doesn’t matter what you play because you’re being drowned out by the brass anyway.  They like doing that.

Sitting waiting to start playing there won’t be much going through my mind, but the sense of anticipation will be powerful, boosted by doubts about all the personal little tricky corners which, in rehearsals, I haven’t quite managed to get to the bottom of.  At least this time we don’t play at the start – I can sit and compose myself a bit more until we join in with the rest of the strings.

Once we get going the audience fades from my consciousness, and it’s just the music.  It sounds clichéd but it’s true.  There is so much to concentrate on that awareness of anything else would be wasteful.  Am I playing exactly with everyone else ?  Are the notes right ?  Am I counting the rests properly?  Will I get that high note right this time?  Am I playing loudly enough – am I playing too loudly? Is my bow going in the right direction?   And they’re just the basic technical details.  Am I managing to deliver what passes for music, let alone Michael’s interpretation of it?  That’s the key question, and the one that time after time, brings us all back for more.

We move through the music, pumping adrenalin just as much in the really quiet bits as in the loud fast sections.  We get to relax and swing with the tunes.  Some sections are more difficult than others and need more focus and wide-eyed, unblinking concentration.  My favourite part ?  The horn solo in the second movement.  From my vantage point in a large section of violins I always think it must be a high-pressure moment for the horn player, and am silently urging him to relax, do his best, and enjoy it.

After all the false summits of the last movement, and past the bit where the brass drowns out the strings, we reach the end flourish.  The baton stops.  A short pause.  Then, we hope, the applause.  The audience’s appreciation is the icing on the cake.  If you’ve enjoyed it half as much as me, you’ll have had a great evening.

Tree Forty Four

Tuesday, January 6th, 2009

Spheres of silver, or gold, or red, or blue,
Or one of those with glittery powder sprinkled on and glued.
Glimmering and glinting with reflected light
From Christmas tree lights all bright and sparkly and white.

Old favourite angel, looking down
At silver snow slopes of tinsel cosily draping round
The rich, deep green, bowing branches.

Ragged, ripped ends of chocolate-coin foil, all spent,
Mountains of scrunched-up wrapping paper rent
Asunder all too soon in one long-awaited, ecstatic moment

Dumped, decaying, municipal-machine-mulched,
Tree Forty Four, short-lived, for sure
Ends up in the butchers shop on the floor.

Inside the hornpipe

Tuesday, December 16th, 2008

It starts off slow

We smile because we know

For now we’re safe.  The show though

Will soon start to go with a little more flow.

 

Back to the beginning

The tune starts going

More quickly. People start looking

Some even start clapping

In time and stamping.

 

We’re still smiling,

But back again to the beginning

It’s now about trying

To keep going

As people keep clapping, and stamping

And singing and pushing and speeding

And shouting.

 

And with one big flourish it’s over

We’ve done it again, it’s always a winner.

Christmas presents

Wednesday, December 10th, 2008

What do they want for Christmas ?

Every year the same

Thinking about gifts for others

A book, some socks, a game ?

 

It’s better to think of others

Than always to think of me

But getting it right at Christmas

Is never a certainty.

 

Have they already got one ?

Perhaps they’ve got two or three

Will they want chocolate golf balls ?

I wouldn’t if it were me.

 

Whatever you give at Christmas

And when the excitement mounts

Remember to think of others

It’s really the thought that counts.

Weekend away

Monday, December 8th, 2008

Friday morning.  I got up earlier than I would have done on a normal weekday, and didn’t mind.  Packing the car up mostly with things that I wouldn’t need, but nevertheless wanted to take, I remembered that I ought to check the oil.  It’s not something that I often do, but the last service was back in March, nine months ago, and I didn’t want to be stuck in the middle of nowhere at the side of a busy road waiting for assistance.  Assistance, I might add, for which I would have to pay extra, not having renewed my membership last time it lapsed.

 

It was still dark as I grappled with the bonnet release catch to get at the engine.  Getting the dipstick out was easy; it was getting it back in which was problematic.  After some minutes of trying I headed back into the house to find a torch.  I keep one in the airing cupboard upstairs because it’s always too dark to find anything in there.  There was enough oil.  There always is.  It was time to go.

 

My leaving-the-house routine is always the same when I go away for more than a day.  It starts upstairs always with the same questions. Are all the windows shut, and are all the taps off ?  The fact that it’s winter and I know the windows haven’t been opened in the first place is irrelevant.  Then there’s the decision about the central heating.  Off or timed.  The downstairs routine involves checking the oven about three times, and wondering whether to leave lights on, to make it look like someone’s in.  This time I decided to switch the central heating and the lights off.  It’s actually the same decision every time, but I still have to make it. 

 

Before I left the house, I rushed back upstairs to make sure I’d switched the alarm off properly.  I’ve gone off before and left it on snooze.  It makes an awful racket, and I didn’t want to annoy the artists next door.  I closed the font door behind me, locked it, and rattled the handle a couple of times just to check the door really was locked.  It was still dark, so the usual mental chime to clear the fallen leaves from the garden didn’t happen.  It would, though, on my return.  I drove away casting the usual backwards glance to check the padlock on the gates.  Lincoln Christmas Market weekend.  Messiah CD.  Tradition.

Bath Christmas Market

Tuesday, December 2nd, 2008

Crisp, crunch, cold. Twinkly lights.

Sugar-dusted waffles, warm spices.

Hats, gloves, scarves, thick woolly tights

This year’s Christmas delights 

 

Goldfish bowl horses yellow red green

Up down round up down round

Cameras flashing, laughing, keen,

Go again if you pay your pound.

 

One-legged fire-wheels, cap on ground,

Tall, double-green, Christmas tree.

Elbows, toes, lost, found,

Bath Christmas market memory

Tea Ern ?

Tuesday, December 2nd, 2008

Terry’s on the urn; it’s his turn.

Tea for two ?

More like two hundred and twenty two.

 

It’s Tref’s turn too; he’s volunteered to do

The washing up

Of two hundred and twenty two teacups.

 

Sue’s out in the hall, collecting back all

Of Terry’s teacups

For Tref, in turn, to wash up.