acoustic guitars in made up tunings. the quiet between quiets. overthinking/underthinking. tape hiss/memory's static.
I’ve been way busy of late recording stuff (don’t ask, don’t ask) and so haven’t been posting as regular as I was previously, for which I apologise. This last week, though, recording has stopped for rehearsing for a gig I’ve got next week I’m very excited about. I’m playing Leicester Central Lending Library with Her Name is Calla. A library!! It’s took me 25 years to get there but at last I’m playing a library!
I went to London for a couple of days with my family (to see the Dr Who Experience, which was great).
London is amazing, incredible, complicated, grimy, noisy, confusing, busy and many many other things. I’m not sure I could live there but I love going there all the same.
I love the snow. I love the snow for many diffrent reasons – personal, artistic, social – I just love the snow! So when I came out of the Corn Exchange in Cambridge this weekend after watching the City of London Sinfonia perform Ralph Vaughan Williams‘ Scott of the Antarctica I was very excited.
The photo above is of Kings College, Cambridge as the snow was falling down. The photo below is of locked bikes outside, the snow piling up agaisnt the wheels.
When we came outside everyone was moving about, pulled up collars and hoods, heads down, glimpsing up a few short seconds at a time, catching the snow in your face. Voices were raised some in dread and some (most) in giddy excitement. Through pub windows you could see people huddle into seats glad to be inside, talking about outside. The journey home was a bit hairy in the snow but, that’s the thing about snow – it changes everything. Each step you take, how you drive, how you see things. It is a leveller.
The following morning we saw this all the more clearly. Dad’s are playing with their children. The light has a new quality to it. Everything sounds different. There are fewer cars. Amongst the new soundscape birds can be heard, more excited voices, the crunchy sound of the snow beneath your feet. Everything you do is new but it’s only there for a short time and then it’s slush and then it’s gone. A memory.
I love the snow.
This week I got back to working on the last project I started in 2011 – checking what work I’d done and working out where to go next. This lead to a couple of discoveries, some positive and some not so.
The bulk of the recording I’ve done so far is bang on track and I’m really happy with it, I’ve still a lot more to do though. Part if which lead me to put a shout out on Twitter to find somewhere to record ‘a song’ – the shout came good and an offer to record some singing and guitaring should hopefully spur the next phase on.
In the course of going through the work I’d done though, I again discovered how unattached I feel when working with digital files. It doesn’t matter how you title each file, I find it really hard to go beyond looking at a screen and a waveform and actually listen to the recording. With tape and minidisc I seem to identify the object with the particular experience and then zone out to what it’s playing. With digital – it’s a screen, it’s work.
There must be a knack to doing it – a separation perhaps? – but I’ve no idea how it’s done!
We went for a walk. Last out the door, I patted the dog and set out across the fields.
As soon as we went passed the last house and into the first field you could feel the wind. Pushing at us, passing all around us, pressing clothes to bodies. Dipping our heads down ( in defence? Respect?) And the noise, roaring across the ears. I pull my wooly hat down lower over my ears, a gesture only.
As we went into the next field, I could hear the voices of children playing football in Fleckney, carried by the roar, in the roar, over distant hedges, other fields, finding me here. But we keep walking and the sound is gone.
A couple of fridays ago I did an phone interview with Adrian Arratoon for Different Class Radio. It’s now up live on their website for a month, so you can go and listen to me talk about my jazz and stamps and stuff. According a friend who listened to it, I sound like I have a beard. He meant it as a compliment.
Go listen!
YOU AND THE NIGHT AND THE MUSIC
[As titles for radio shows go, I am so behind this one]
Nearly a year ago to the day I posted about my New Years Improvements, my own attempt to get myself organised (inspired by the ever fantastic Christine Bougie). Whilst not immediately successful in it’s implementation, it did make me examine how I organise my time – which was both distressing and rewarding – which definitely helped me accomplish some tasks I never seem to finish, like, er, recording stuff!
The publication of Woody Guthrie’s resolutions list (I read about it courtesy of the awesome Brain Pickings site), which I saw sometime in December, made me ponder about the whole idea again. His list seems so humble and yet so inspiring. These little things that make such a big difference, sometimes even just thinking about them….
Learn people better…..Read lots good books…Keep hoping machine running
I had a look at a few of the people who’s blogs I follow to see what they’re upto this year and felt the same ways about theirs too – please go to Crafty Fox and to There are always flowers for more inspiration.
As for me, I’m not going to be as bold as to print out what I would like to achieve this year. There’ll be ore streamlining, for sure, but it will all be to live and experience more.
Well, here’s the last post of 2011 and the last of the Stamps of the Week. Happy New Year everybody. x
Yesterday I took a slow stroll with some friends and our children to the top of Beacon Hill in North Leicestershire. Sheltered by some rocks for tea and biscuits then went to look out over Leicestershire from the trig point. The wind was incredible – I put my hood up to cover my ears somewhat but still the roar was there and constantly pushing, touching everything. It felt fantastic.
peter wyeth 