Duke's Auctioneers fined over Alfred Wallis fakes, BBC Dorset
Tuesday, 31 October 2017
Alfred Wallis, Fake Artworks
Duke's Auctioneers fined over Alfred Wallis fakes, BBC Dorset
The Durotriges Project
From Bournemouth University, The Durotriges Project
"Of all the Iron Age tribes identified from pre-Roman Britain, the Durotriges are the most culturally distinct. Roughly occupying an area that equates with modern Dorset, together with significant parts of southern Wiltshire and south eastern Somerset, the pottery, coinage, settlements and burial practices of the Durotriges clearly marks them out from their contemporary tribal neighbours the Atrebates, Belgae, Dumnonii and Dobunni".
Ptolemy's Δουρóτριγες and Δοúνιον.
Thomas Hardy Funeral, Stinsford, Dorset (1928); BRITISH PATHÉ FILM SEQUENCE; and a "Tweet"
A VIDEO FROM BRITISH PATHÉ. "Heart of Thomas Hardy laid up to rest among his Wessex folk in Stinsford - his beloved 'Mellstock' of the novels. Dorset".
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QWHQTyxGcY0
"The heart of Thomas Hardy flew out of Stinsford churchyard....
There, in the heart of the nimbus, twittered the heart of Hardy..."
From The Heart of Thomas Hardy, by John Betjeman
Monday, 30 October 2017
The Fiddler, Thomas Hardy; Thomas Hardy's Violin
The Fiddler
The fiddler knows what's brewing
To the lilt of his lyric wiles:
The fiddler knows what rueing
Will come of this night's smiles!
He sees couples join them for dancing,
And afterwards joining for life,
He sees them pay high for their prancing
By a welter of wedded strife.
He twangs: ‘Music hails from the devil,
Though vaunted to come from heaven,
For it makes people do at a revel
What multiplies sins by seven.
‘There's many a heart now mangled,
And waiting its time to go,
Whose tendrils were first entangled
By my sweet viol and bow!’
To the lilt of his lyric wiles:
The fiddler knows what rueing
Will come of this night's smiles!
He sees couples join them for dancing,
And afterwards joining for life,
He sees them pay high for their prancing
By a welter of wedded strife.
He twangs: ‘Music hails from the devil,
Though vaunted to come from heaven,
For it makes people do at a revel
What multiplies sins by seven.
‘There's many a heart now mangled,
And waiting its time to go,
Whose tendrils were first entangled
By my sweet viol and bow!’
Thomas Hardy
The Casterbridge Band
Oyster Girl
Oyster Girl (2)
Bob the Fiddler, William Barnes
To my Father's Violin, Thomas Hardy
Oyster Girl
Oyster Girl (2)
Bob the Fiddler, William Barnes
To my Father's Violin, Thomas Hardy
At The Railway Station, Upway
'There is not much that I can do,
For I've no money that's quite my own!'
Spoke up the pitying child--
A little boy with a violin
At the station before the train came in,--
'But I can play my fiddle to you,
And a nice one 'tis, and good in tone!'
The man in the handcuffs smiled;
The constable looked, and he smiled, too,
As the fiddle began to twang;
And the man in the handcuffs suddenly sang
With grimful glee:
'This life so free
Is the thing for me!'
And the constable smiled, and said no word,
As if unconscious of what he heard;
And so they went on till the train came in--
The convict, and boy with the violin.
For I've no money that's quite my own!'
Spoke up the pitying child--
A little boy with a violin
At the station before the train came in,--
'But I can play my fiddle to you,
And a nice one 'tis, and good in tone!'
The man in the handcuffs smiled;
The constable looked, and he smiled, too,
As the fiddle began to twang;
And the man in the handcuffs suddenly sang
With grimful glee:
'This life so free
Is the thing for me!'
And the constable smiled, and said no word,
As if unconscious of what he heard;
And so they went on till the train came in--
The convict, and boy with the violin.
Thomas Hardy
(From double cassette)
LP Track List
Thomas Hardy's Musical Heritage, Dorset Magazine
A Thomas Hardy Song Manuscript, The Telegraph, 18 March, 2013
UK: Waste Recycling - What Happens to Our Waste? BBC Radio 4
Where Does Our Waste Go? BBC Radio 4 - "Where do the contents of our bins end up? Tom Heap lifts the lid on the recycling industry to find out what happens to our waste beyond the kerbside collection".
"What does 'recycling' mean? Are bottles and tins and plastic packaging recycled when they're collected from our homes? They might well be taken to the local MRF (Materials Recovery Facility) and separated out into different waste streams, but what happens then? Embarking on a road journey along the recycling chain, Tom Heap tracks his own domestic recycling refuse to find out how much - or how little - of it is actually recycled".
Corfu, Greece: Hydrocarbon exploration west of Corfu; Ionian Sea; Oil and Gas Exploration
Signing ceremony for hydrocarbon exploration west of Corfu to take place on Tuesday, eKathimerini
Greece and the three companies have already signed a lease agreement to search for oil and gas in a sea area west of Corfu".
Greece Signs Lease for Oil and Gas Exploration in the Ionian Sea, Greek Reporter
It's not very long since the tanker Agia Zoni II sank off Salamína island, with an environmentally catastrophic oil-spill around Athens’ Argo-Saronic gulf...
A poem I wrote at Easter, 1967, after the wreck of an oil-tanker between Cornwall and the Isles of Scilly in March 1967. The oil reached the island of Guernsey a week later.
A poem I wrote at Easter, 1967, after the wreck of an oil-tanker between Cornwall and the Isles of Scilly in March 1967. The oil reached the island of Guernsey a week later.
At The Time Of The Wreck Of The SS Torrey Canyon
the easter-bordered year
is closed
the door is
slammed
CONGRATULATIONS
are
telegrammed
we
won the race
we
played the game
forget the oil-slicks moving in
Reading Greece: Richard Pine on Greek-Irish Encounters; Greek Writers; The Eye of the Xenos
From Greek News Agenda
"Not only do non-Greeks want to read the 'great' or 'classic' novels that they already know about (Kazantzakis, in particular) but they are now discovering what a huge wealth of literature exists. And if you look for example at the novels of Konstantinos Theotokis (recently translated by my friend Mark Davies, including Slaves In Their Chains) or the stories of Alexandros Papadiamandis, you realise that although they were written a century ago they are still vibrant indicators of modern Greece and of all societies emerging from the mysteries of the past into the mysteries of tomorrow".
The Eye of the Xenos, Richard Pine, eKathimerini, 8 February, 2018
Sunday, 29 October 2017
Italy and "Amoral Familism" (Family Centrism)
A concept that keeps recurring: "amoral familism".
How an Idyllic Italian Village Was Crippled by Family-Centrism -A Watershed Study Connects Nepotism to Poverty, Distrust, and Neglect of the Public Good, Zocalo
Any enduring truth in this 1950s political/social science theory, or relevance today?
It's mentioned in the essay on Italy by Giovanni Levi, in Histories of Nations, How Their Identities Were Forged (2012):
"The concept of 'amoral familism' has often been used to describe the strong attachment to the family, the over-protective role of the mother and the near-absence of the father. But these features are the consequence of a perverse tendency to take refuge in familial solidarity, clientelism, and informal and fragmentary institutions in the face of dysfunctional political and religious institutions".
It's mentioned in the essay on Italy by Giovanni Levi, in Histories of Nations, How Their Identities Were Forged (2012):
"The concept of 'amoral familism' has often been used to describe the strong attachment to the family, the over-protective role of the mother and the near-absence of the father. But these features are the consequence of a perverse tendency to take refuge in familial solidarity, clientelism, and informal and fragmentary institutions in the face of dysfunctional political and religious institutions".
On Edward C. Banfield and his thought (Contemporary Thinkers)
Edward C. Banfield, An Online Resource
William Barnes Society on Twitter
The William Barnes Society is doing a great job on its Website, on Facebook and on Twitter!
Congratulations to Mark North and Marion Tait.
Saturday, 28 October 2017
Perceptions of Maiden Castle
Bill Brandt, Maiden Castle, Thomas Hardy's Wessex, Lilliput, May 1946
British Movietone, Maiden Castle Site, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jdO-4TDc8DM
William Barnes, from Dorset Folk and Dorset:
British Movietone, Maiden Castle Site, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jdO-4TDc8DM
William Barnes, from Dorset Folk and Dorset:
Arthur Mee:
“Here are 100 acres as thrilling as any piece of English
earth, the home of thousands of people thousands of years ago, with a story
unfolding itself in dramatic chapters which must move the mind of an Englishman
with a sense of mystery almost too deep for words”.
Frederick Treves:
“Maiden
Castle
Thomas Hardy:
“Acoustic perceptions multiply to-night. We can almost hear
the stream of years that have borne these deeds away from us. Strange
articulations seem to float on the air from that point, the gateway, where the
animation in past times must frequently have concentrated itself at hours of
coming and going, and general excitement. There arises an ineradicable fancy
that they are human voices; if so, they must be the lingering air-borne
vibrations of conversations uttered at least fifteen hundred years ago.”
John Cowper Powys
“It is hard to believe that objects of frantic invocation,
however weird and monstrous, do not release, when freed from their long
imprisonment, something of the magnetic potency that the minds of their far-off
worshippers communicated to them as they prayed”.
Hardy and Barnes on Maiden Castle
See also, William Barnes, Earthworks of the Britons. from Notes on Ancient Britain and the Britons (from page 90)
A British Earthwork (An Archaeologist Speaks), William Barnes
(First Stanza)
The grassy downs of Dorset,
Rising o’er our homes of peace,
E’er teem with life and riches
In the sheep and precious fleece;
And charm the thoughtful roamer
When, like us, he climbs to scan
Their high-cast mounds of war – the works
Of Britain’s early man,
Whose speech, although here lingers yet
His mighty works of hand,
Has ceased a thousand years to sound
In air of this green land,
And startled may it be to hear
The words of British kin —
Rising o’er our homes of peace,
E’er teem with life and riches
In the sheep and precious fleece;
And charm the thoughtful roamer
When, like us, he climbs to scan
Their high-cast mounds of war – the works
Of Britain’s early man,
Whose speech, although here lingers yet
His mighty works of hand,
Has ceased a thousand years to sound
In air of this green land,
And startled may it be to hear
The words of British kin —
An gwaliow war an meneth
An caer war an bryn...
(“The ramparts on the mountain, the stronghold on the hill”)
An caer war an bryn...
(“The ramparts on the mountain, the stronghold on the hill”)
Paul Nash, Maiden Castle, 1943
Paul Nash, Maiden Castle, Photograph (No, 23)
Paul Nash, Tate negative
Another Tate negative
Ronald Jesty print
Walter Tyndale (includes Maiden Castle) - ninth illustration
Thomas Hardy, from Ancient Earthworks at Casterbridge:
Friday, 27 October 2017
UK: Britain's soil to become infertile within 40 years; Plans to grow more food
From The Telegraph, Britain's soil to become infertile within 40 years due to intensive farming, warns Gove
I thought that Britain was planning to grow far more of its own food after Brexit...
Chris Grayling: farmers can grow more food if there is no Brexit deal, The Guardian
From the Andrew Marr Show, The Independent
Grayling's claims that UK can grow more food dismissed as 'tripe' - Farmers’ leaders are incredulous about comments that UK can meet demand if Britain leaves EU with no deal, The Guardian
Thursday, 26 October 2017
John Free, An Early Dorset Dialect Poem, 1757; Letter to an Absent Vicar
"I do fear you've zet your aim on
Naught in the world but vilthy mammon".
Not all vicars were as reliable, dedicated or diligent as The Rev. William Barnes!
Deportee: Interpretations of a Woodie Guthrie Song Lyric
I was chatting to Neil Harris at Dorchester market yesterday, and we talked briefly about the songs of Woodie Guthrie (as one does). Later, I thought about the closure of Portland's IRC (Immigration Removal Centre) - and some past incidents there that have been reported over the last three or four years.
'Extraordinary' number of detainees sent to mental health hospitals from the Verne, inquest hears, Dorset Echo
Home Office letter tells EU citizen to ‘go home or go elsewhere’, The Observer (update)
It made me go back to Woodie Guthrie's poem, Plane Wreck at Los Gatos (Deportee).
Here are various interpretations of the poem/song-lyric, as set to the melody by Martin Hoffman, on YouTube:
Cisco Houston
Arlo Guthrie and Hoyt Axton
Arlo Guthrie with Emmylou Harris
Bruce Springsteen (1981)
Bruce Springsteen (1986)
Pete Seeger
The Byrds
Dolly Parton
The Highwaymen
Song Facts
More about the genesis of the song
NB
Professor Will Kaufman at the Bridport Arts Centre, 28 October, 2017, 8pm:
THE LONG ROAD TO PEEKSHILLBruce Springsteen (1986)
Pete Seeger
The Byrds
Dolly Parton
The Highwaymen
Song Facts
More about the genesis of the song
NB
Professor Will Kaufman at the Bridport Arts Centre, 28 October, 2017, 8pm:
"The story of Woody Guthrie’s transformation from a youthful Oklahoma racist to the anti-racist champion who risked his life holding the line against American fascism during the notorious Peekskill riots of 1949".
See also, Billy Bragg (Burton Bradstock resident), Mermaid Avenue
I am going to hear Billy Bragg at the sold-out Bridport Literary Festival event on Sunday night, on "Roots, Radicals and Rockers: How Skiffle Changed the World".
(Update: a great evening!)
Woodie Guthrie and Skiffle:
Rye Whisky, Woodie Guthrie
Worried Man Blues
Hard Travellin'
Dead or Alive
The Grand Coulee Dam
So long it's been good to know you
Lonnie Donegan, Hard Travellin'
Lonnie Donegan - So Long 'Medley' (Rare Stereo Mix - 1958)
Lonnie Donegan and Woodie Guthrie songs
Wednesday, 25 October 2017
Fats Domino
Fats Domino, New Orleans rock'n'roll pioneer, dies aged 89, The Guardian
Fats Domino: Rock and roll legend dies aged 89, BBC
Some of his greatest recordings:
Fats Domino, Blueberry Hill
Fats Domino, My Blue Heaven
Fats Domino, Blue Monday
Fats Domino, I'm Walking
Fats Domino, Walkin' to New Orleans
Fats Domino, My Girl Josephine
Fats Domino, I Can't Go On (Rosalie)
Fats Domino, Red Sails in the Sunset
Fats Domino and his Orchestra, Jambalaya
Fats Domino, Jambalaya (original single)
Elvis Presley/ Fats Domino - Blueberry Hill/ Love Me
Dorchester, Dorset: Further archaeological exploration work in Fairfield long stay car park
From Meghan Hindley, Dorset Echo
"Archaeology, the future of the market, parking, environmentally sustainable development and ensuring a strong retail offer are considered the most important features of a new master-plan, according to residents".
I'm glad to see that the importance of archaeology has been prioritised.
HM Government's Pre-Referendum Booklet
For those who didn't bin the booklet as soon as it came through letter-boxes in June 2016, here is a reminder of some of the pages, and some of the reasons the British Government gave for urging everyone to vote "Remain":
The Government made it very clear in the booklet that the UK would not have full access to the Single Market - "less access to the Single Market...including for services, 80% of the UK economy", if the vote was to be to leave the EU.
Did anyone read the warnings?
A view from the New Statesman - How Brexit has made Britain the new sick man of Europe
Learning Greek Through Rebetika Songs (The Nifi)
From The Nifi blog, Linda Fagioli- Katsiotas:
Linda in Margariti and Vitsa:
Tuesday, 24 October 2017
VOA Issues in the News, Moderator David Rennie
Listen here, October 20, 2017, VOA
Prominent Washington correspondents discuss topics making headlines around the world . Join moderator David Rennie of The Economist, along with our panelists, Thomas DeFrank of the National Journal and Dan Raviv of i24 News
Dorset's Convicts in the Australian Colonies; Transportation
I shall certainly be buying the November 2017 issue of Dorset Life, if only for the three-page article by John Wright (read today in the County Library, but apparently not available in W.H.Smith or other retailers for a couple more days).
Many years ago, when living in Australia, I became very interested in the grave-stones of two Wessex convicts in Port Arthur's Island of the Dead, Tasmania (Van Diemen's Land), Edward Spicer, from Poole, Dorset, who died, aged 47, on 19 January 1854, and Australia's first novelist, the convicted Somerset forger Henry Savery.
Edward Spicer
Affliction sore
Long time I bore
Physicians were in vain
Till God did please
That Death should ease
Me from my pain.
The first two stones we're shown
When we've been transported
To the Island
of the Dead -
They stand alone on the lower ground -
Commemorate two convicts
Who had creative flair.
From Poole in Dorset ,
Edward Spicer,
Who penned his moving epitaph,
Soon to disappear,
By erosion of the sandstone face;
Henry Savery,
A Somerset
man,
Inveterate forger -
Remembered by a modern stone,
A forgery itself,
As befits the maker
Of Australia 's first novel;
He cut his own throat,
And died of a "stroke".
They are part of a long tradition,
Death in custody, dishonourable graves;
From Rottnest
Island
To Tasman
Peninsula
The story's much the same.
The stones of soldiers, officers, guards
(Those on higher ground, along with wives and
children),
Face North, not East:
Face not the rising sun, but Home.
The convicts' headstones do not mark their graves.
The convicts' headstones do not mark their graves.
But somewhere hereabouts, a few paces more or
less,
Two sons of Somerset
and Dorset share
A common plot
Of broadly
Of broadly
British
Earth.
Related:
William Barnes' poem on free (economic) migration from Dorset to Van Diemen's Land
Earth.
Related:
William Barnes' poem on free (economic) migration from Dorset to Van Diemen's Land
On Long Novels; John Cowper Powys; Maiden Castle; Dorchester.
Dorset County Museum display case
Originally published in an abridged version in 1936, I doubt that JCP's Maiden Castle has won many devoted fans.
It starts well, in this unabridged version (The Overlook Press, 2001). Here's the first page:
For me, it's largely downhill from then on in, apart from the descriptions of the ascent to Maiden Castle itself (Chapter 6) and of the mighty, cold, mysterious and wayward wind that arises to buffet the walkers around what the Powys Society describes as "the looming fortress of Maiden Castle" (the Overlook Press book cover blurb puts it like this" "It is the looming fortress of Maiden Castle that exerts the otherworldly force that irrevocably determines the course of their lives").
"The wind seemed to be dividing him in half just now like a sharp sword".
There are certainly passages of powerful nature-writing, in places, and some evocative descriptions of Dorchester, Maumbury Rings, and Maiden Castle itself. See, for instance, Chapter 8, Midsummer's Eve, page 378:
I have to confess that it is a novel that I shall never be able to get into or to read right through. I have tried several times, as with James Joyce's Ulysses.
Perhaps that's why Maiden Castle was first published in an abridged form. Even then, it is for me a novel for occasional sampling, for random dipping into. Some more early extracts:
"He had decided to come to Dorchester for several reasons,
but as he pondered over his motives now, he tried to idealise them into a
longing to solve, if he only might, on the spot where his own dead lay, the
ultimate meaning of death itself….‘ “Dorchester ”
means’, he thought, ‘the town of water”.’
And then he thought, ‘How queer that sorrow and sacrifice in men and women
should draw water from behind the eye-sockets of their skulls!’
…And there came over him, as the sun of this pet day once
more shone into his room, the old dark Homeric conception of death, with that
terrifying multitude of the spirits of the dead surrounding us in their pitiful
half-life and liable, on this day of their Cimmerian remembrance, when the minds
of the living turn so desperately towards them, to rise thronging up, ‘ethnea
myria nekrōn, the myriad tribes of the dead, with a terrible cry!
…The caretaker was one who understood the needs of the
living as well as the needs of the dead. He suddenly stopped short. ‘Do ‘ee see
thik ‘ooman, sir, down there?’ he said. ‘’Tis she’s young ‘un her have got down
there, and a fine lad a’ were – I knowed ’un, to pass the time o’ day to, afore
a’ fell sick. ’A used to come by here to school; and a’ used to ask I about
they circuses – I do mind o’ he whenever I do hear ‘un.’"
I may try to read it once again - but generally, long and complex novels such as this hold little appeal for me. Life's too short - and one could be walking through the beautiful Dorset countryside, or up on Maiden Castle!
John Cowper Powys, Maiden Castle
Mapping the Wessex Novel, Landscape, History and the Parochial in British Literature, 1870-1940, Andrew Radford, Bloomsbury, 2010 (pages 105-115 can be read online).
Walter Lassally, Cinematographer; Crete
My favourite cinematographer, unforgettable black and white films. Walter Lassally has died, aged 90:
Oscar-winning cinematographer Walter Lassally dies on Crete, eKathimerini
Obituary, Telegraph
From Greek Reporter
Walter Lassally in Sydney,
supporting a UK-Australia film student exchange
supporting a UK-Australia film student exchange
The great film director Michael Cacoyannis once told me,
in the course of a long interview, why he had chosen Walter Lassally
as cinematographer and cameraman for Zorba the Greek.
"I had seen some of the documentaries he had made..."
See also, a fascinating book by Walter Lassally:
Voula Papaioannou, Greek Photographer; Βούλα Παπαϊωάννου, 1898 – 1990
Βούλα Παπαϊωάννου, from The Story of Photography blog
Βούλα Παπαϊωάννου: η φωτογράφος του ’40 και της κατοχής, Simantron
A striking Voula Papaionnou photo which appeared on Facebook today
Benaki Museum collection - 476 outstanding photographs. A brilliant photographer, a selection:
Fisherman on the Lake of Ioannina. Epirus, Greece, circa 1950 Voula Th. Papaioannou
Lake. Ioannina, circa 1950 Voula Th. Papaioannou
Lake. Ioannina, circa 1950 Voula Th. Papaioannou
Itinerant peddler. Athens, 1940-1941 Voula Th. Papaioannou
Goats. Cyclades, circa 1935 Voula Th. Papaioannou
Bear trainer. 1945-1955 Voula Th. Papaioannou
Wounded of the Albanian front in a hospital courtyard of the Greek Red Cross. Athens, 1940 Voula Th. Papaioannou
Blind girl playing violin. Athens, circa 1942 Voula Th. Papaioannou
Funeral portrait of Kostis Palamas. Athens, 27 February 1943 Voula Th. Papaioannou
New Shoes. Athens, circa 1945 Voula Th. Papaioannou
Old women carrying firelighters. 1945-1947 Voula Th. Papaioannou
Girls at "Saint Andrew" queen's relief fund. Attica, 1949 Voula Th. Papaioannou
Greece: Life in the Village; Classic Photographs from the Past
Exceptional colour photographs
Life in the Village, as it was
See also, Facebook pages, https://www.facebook.com/ZoiStoHorio/
Monday, 23 October 2017
Comparing Canyons: Vikos Gorge, Grand Canyon
From Vikos Gorge...
...to Grand Canyon
Which is deeper, the Grand Canyon or the Vikos Gorge?
My daughter will report back!
Purse Caundle, Dorset; Song of The Blackmore Vale; Local History; Bishop's Caundle
Bishop's Caundle, William Barnes
"In Caundle, vor a day at leäst,
You woudden vind a scowlèn feäce
Or dumpy heart in all the pleäce"
When Dorset Went to Waterloo, Dorset Life, June 2015, by David Callaghan
A fascinating history of Purse Caundle, Dorset, by Ronald D. Knight, from May, 2010:
PURSE CAUNDLE HISTORY - CHAPTER 9: MODERN PURSE CAUNDLE FROM 1901
Whatever your views on fox-hunting, this song is a valuable document of local history, quoted by Ronald. D. Knight
December, 1930
"Sometime around this period the following hunting song was written by a John Budden, with music by Ashworth Hope, published by Leonard, Gould and Bottler, 47 Poland Street, London W.1. It was dedicated to Lieut-Col. F. J. B. Wingfield Digby D.S.O., M.F.H., Master of the Blackmore Vale Hunt".
THE SONG OF THE BLACKMORE VALE
1.
There be doughty men in Dorset,
There be boys of bone and brawn,
Who work and smile and sing all day
In the land where they were born.
CHORUS: 'Tis the old, old song of the Huntsman's horn,
As away down the vale they run;
There's a splash and a thud, and a roll in the mud,
And fine old Dorset fun,
Then there comes a crash! of the old Blackthorn,
The rend of the rasping rail,
Oh! the sound of the hound and the huntsman's horn,
The Song of the Blackmore Vale.
2.
When a man goes out from Dorset,
Out to the far, far west,
He longs for his lanes and pasture land,
And the songs that he loves the best.
There's the song of the kine in the cow-yard,
And the song of the nightingale,
But the song that dwells with a Dorset lad,
Be the Song of the Blackmore Vale.
CHORUS: 'Tis the old, old song of the Huntsman's horn, etc:
3.
A man comes back to Dorset,
Back from the lands afar.
No need to yearn for the old milk churn
And the song of the swingle bar
Now shall he bide in Dorset,
Or once again set sail?
When there comes the sound of the huntsman's horn
Away in the Blackmore Vale
CHORUS: 'Tis the old, old song of the Huntsman's horn, etc:
Sunday, 22 October 2017
Concert at St. Peter's Church, West Knighton, Dorset; Wind Serenade; Artsreach, Principal Winds Quintet, Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra
It was a wild, windy and rainy evening, but the small church was packed; much of the music had a festive character, played by an ensemble of five of the principal wind-players (and horn) of the Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra. It proved to be an inspiring venue, not least for the stunning Norman arch which held my gaze as much as the roof beams, whilst listening to the music.
I particularly enjoyed Ferenc Farkas's Early Hungarian Dances, and Claude Debussy's Syrinx.
Flavours of Hungary and Ancient Greece in a Dorset village!
Artsreach, the BSO and the local organisers, are to be congratulated on bringing such small-scale concerts to the villages and rural communities of Dorset.
Most of all, thanks to Anna Pyne, Edward Kay, Kevin Banks, Tammy Thorn and Edward Lockwood, the five outstanding musicians.
"Debussy’s Syrinx for solo flute was composed as incidental music for the final act of Gabriel Mourey’s dramatic poem Psyché and will be performed by BSO Principal Flute, Anna Pyne. This beautiful and intricate melody was written as the last music the mythical Pan played before his death and despite being the briefest of pieces, it has become an iconic work in the solo flute repertoire. It is also notable for being the first solo piece composed for the modern flute, using the Böhm system of keys and construction" - BSO Press Release.
"In 1893 the Church again underwent a restoration, this time under the direction of Thomas Hardy, who was working simultaneously as an architect and novelist. Hardy approached the work with great care and he was responsible for replacing the gallery at the west end of the nave, new tracery in two windows in the north wall of the nave and a completely new window in the tower. Whilst engaged in this work, he was also writing his last published novel, ‘Jude the Obscure’, whose hero is a stonemason" - Dorset OPC.
More information, about recent restoration work.
The Young
Glass-Stainer
"These Gothic windows, how they wear me out
With cusp and foil, and nothing straight or square,
Crude colours, leaden borders roundabout,
And fitting in Peter here, and Matthew there!
"What a vocation! Here do I draw now
The abnormal, loving the Hellenic norm;
Martha I paint, and dream of Hera's brow,
Mary, and think of Aphrodite's form."
Nov. 1893. Thomas Hardy
Quoted by Furse Swann in the leaflet
Thomas Hardy and West Knighton Church
