A tree is for life not just for Christmas.
David Hollington / The Rowley Gallery
The Holly & The Ivy
Our Christmas card this year at The Rowley Gallery is from a wood engraving by Howard Phipps.
I can see holly in there and ivy too so here are a couple of complementary musical offerings as well…
The first is Anonymous 4, the second is Bruce Kernow, and below are a few of the Christmas cards that were sent to us…
Continue reading “The Holly & The Ivy”
Mavis, Susan & Derek
Probably one of the best gigs of the year for me was the Tedeschi Trucks Bands at the Royal Albert Hall. I’ve known Derek Trucks’s music for the past ten years; he ranges from John Coltrane, Rahsaan Roland Kirk and Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan to Bob Dylan, Delaney & Bonnie and Curtis Mayfield. But recently his band has joined forces with his wife’s, Susan Tedeschi’s band and so it was this mighty eleven piece that we saw back in October. Continue reading “Mavis, Susan & Derek”
The Great Beauty
This is a trailer for my favourite film of 2013, La Grande Bellezza (The Great Beauty), a kind of modern day equivalent to Federico Fellini’s La Dolce Vita, full of gorgeous and spectacular images together with a sublime soundtrack featuring music by David Lang, Arvo Pärt, John Tavener and many more. Continue reading “The Great Beauty”
Spem In Alium
The Forty Part Motet is a sound installation by Janet Cardiff, a 40 track recording of Spem In Alium by Thomas Tallis presented at The Cloisters in Upper Manhattan by The Metropolitan Museum of Art. I heard about it from David Byrne:
In Cardiff’s piece, the singers—all 40 of them—are recorded, each on their own mic and track. In the installation, each individual voice is played back through their own speaker. The speakers are roughly arranged in a circle at head height. One assumes this is how they were positioned during the recording. The nature of the Tallis composition is that various groups of voices come and go, sing or remain silent for a bit: if you are standing by a speaker you might hear nothing for a while then suddenly a person’s voice booms out, with absolute clarity, as if they’re right next to you. So, depending on where you’re standing in the room, you hear a completely different balance of voices. Unless you’re in the center of the installation, you will hear some voices way louder than others.
There’s a moving review in the New York Times.
By Your Grace
This recording was made at Grace Cathedral, San Francisco in 1971 by Paul Beaver & Bernie Krause with baritone saxophonist Gerry Mulligan. It was an exploration of the cathedral’s long reverb acoustics. Mulligan wanders through the space discovering constantly changing sound perspectives.
Bernie Krause is still recording but nowadays concentrating on capturing and archiving the sounds of the natural world and finding that wild sounds are increasingly silenced by the deafening noise of mankind.
California Dreaming
My first full day in California was a little inclement, in fact it poured with rain morning to evening only allowing a little light relief to get this shot of the iconic bridge. However it’s hard to be despondent in one of the most beautiful and stunningly situated cities on Earth. The following day the sun came out and didn’t stop blazing down for the following three weeks, as further pictures will testify. Continue reading “California Dreaming”
Woldgate Woods
David Hockney made these videos of four seasons in Woldgate Woods by driving slowly down the lane with nine cameras on the car roof. They are now on display in A Bigger Exhibition at the de Young Museum in San Francisco. Continue reading “Woldgate Woods”
Nine Cows
Nine new arrivals at Advent, come to gather round the manger looking for a new byre. See more by Jelly Green at The Rowley Gallery.
A Tenuous Link
These tiny cows are the missing link between Susie Freeman and Jelly Green. I can imagine them displayed in knitted pockets (Captive Friesians) or portrayed with bright and lively brushstrokes (Captivating Herd). I borrowed the photo from Eva the Weaver.