Beethoven: Quartet in A minor for Strings, Op. 132, Movement III.

Sometime about 1991 my sister was living in a small flat
in Brum,  She had returned from Rome for the last days
and subsequent funeral of our mother, why she didn't
return to Italy I'll never know. By now she was as low
in spirit as any-one can be and I felt helpless, with no
idea of how to get her out of the dark place she was in.
   We were always the closest of all our family (9) and
closer still was our love of music, so, with my old
record player and a box set of the complete  Beethoven
string quartets I kept bashing on her front door until
she had to let me into her flat. She had a scowl on her
face that would have made the devil take a step back,
until she saw what I had brought her, I just said "the
answer's in there Sister" and left.
      After a week or so she started visiting again and
told me I had saved her life, but when I told her opus
132, the third movement, was my favourite she chided me
 saying it was the most vulgar/obvious/ simplest/ of all
the quartets but, stlll, today of all Beethovens works,
it leaves me in awe. I feel he has found peace, and being
Beethoven, it's a triumphant peace...


(bet the snides take it down...

 p.s.. no, I wasn't bashing the door with the record player...




    Link.. at peace

Ashes..

link..  Ashes 2019

Best cricket summer I've ever known..but it ain't over yet.
As always (in the TMS box) there's an Aussie saying they
were cheated, no mention of what Ben has just done, or
Lyon dropping the ball.   Cooky  doesn't know where to look
and Aggers is pissing himself laughing...

all because

   Link..  the end..

Frightened Rabbit - Die Like A Rich Boy (Acoustic)

KRO

10. Frightened Rabbit - Keep Yourself Warm - iTunes Festival 2012

KRO

MELANIE My Father (JUDY COLLINS)

Drawing timelapse: a bottle of Oddka - hyperrealistic art

Serena Ryder - Live In South Carolina (Part 1)

   link...  Serena

THE LONE BELLOW - "You Can Be All Kinds Of Emotional" (Live at Huck Finn...

  Link..  you can...

Lake Street Dive in the Studio: Rachael Price Sings "What I'm Doing Here...

   Link...  Rachael

But Hey

   Link... But Hey..



KRO

Buckets of Rain - Alice Banks (Bob Dylan cover)

Makes me smile.. don't know if she's split with her bloke..
but she doesn't smile much now.



Link.. smile

Rachmaninov: Rhapsody On A Theme Of Paganini, Op.43 - Variation 18. Anda...

Life is precious... and the bloke on the piano is one lucky guy..
Played this on my old record player for my ex-wife,
(she and I were seventeen )... she wasn't impressed.
From that day on I only shared my love of music
with my sister Valerie... well, you couldn't tell your
mates you liked 'girly' music could you?

Love the comments below..  "this guy was born part piano"& "rhapsody in jeans"


  Link.. Rachmaninov

KRO

Carmen - Les tringles des sistres tintaient

Opera..... rubbish innit.....





Link..  Carmen

The MET: Live in HD 2019 - Samson et Dalila: Printemps qui commence

We all live on this one planet, but in so many different worlds,
many of them less than good.   Elina? well she's from another universe,
a universe where there is only beauty. I first heard this piece of opera
many years ago, still have a version by Callas, and still, the last few
bars she sings (music not words) just well, just kills me.

Oh, and I'm sure Camille Saint- Saens is from the same universe as Elina



   Link..  Elina



KRO

Poem 19

Four Quartets  East Coker  (a fragment)  T S Eliot.

Home is where one starts from. As we grow older
The world becomes stranger, the pattern more complicated
Of dead and living. Not the intense moment
Isolated, with no before and after,
But a lifetime burning in every moment
And not the lifetime of one man only
But of old stones that cannot be deciphered.
There is a time for the evening under starlight,
A time for the evening under lamplight
(The evening with the photograph album).
Love is most nearly itself
When here and now cease to matter.
Old men should be explorers
Here and there does not matter
We must be still and still moving
Into another intensity
For a further union, a deeper communion
Through the dark cold and the empty desolation,
The wave cry, the wind cry, the vast waters
Of the petrel and the porpoise. In the end is my beginning.

KRO

Booker T.

World Champions..

Feckin yes yes yes yes,,,, bring on the Roos...
For anyone that doesn't get cricket, I'm truly sorry...for them.

KRO

Lisa Hannigan - "Just like Tom Thumb's blues"

Honey Blue

... she killed Eve... and Villanelle





Link.. Lyrics

Colder Glass

    Link ..  Colder Glass

West Side Story - Ending

   Link... West Side

The Verve - Bitter Sweet Symphony (Official Video)

.. good on ya  Ash, Bitter Sweet was always yours..

  you can stop walking now..



   Link...  Verve

1954 #1. Secret Love - Doris Day

Oh  Calam. ... 97, you almost made it.

There should be a Doris Day day...



  Link... Calam...

Yours ( poem 18)

Yours............  Leo Marks..

The life that I have
Is all that I have
And the life that I have
Is yours
The love that I have
Of the life that I have
Is yours and yours and yours

A sleep I shall have
A rest I shall have
Yet death will be but a pause
For the peace of my years
In the long green grass
Will be yours and yours and yours

Link... code     ( worth reading)

TIMELAPSE OF THE FUTURE: A Journey to the End of Time (4K)

Link... in my beginning is my end...

Lake Street Dive - "You Go Down Smooth" (Live at WFUV)

  Link... Smooth..

Just singing in the pub

   Link..  .. in the pub..

Chantel McGregor - Purple Rain @ Cambridge Rock Festival 2014

  Put a couple of tracks by this girl on my blog years ago,
thought she was wonderful also thought she would just
drift away into normal life. I checked her out again tonight...
 Wow, that was some drift.
She's fantastic and has done gig after gig, year on year.
Fantastic musician, fantastic lady..



Link... Chantel McGregor

Neighbor Song - Lake Street Dive

A while back I read that the White Rhino was now extinct,
well hey, don't worry, there's a pair of them living in the
flat above me.....



Link... White Rhinos

Poem 17

      STRANGE FRUIT......... Seamus Heaney

Here is the girl's head like an exhumed gourd.
Oval-faced, prune-skinned, prune-stones for teeth.
They unswaddled  the wet fern of her hair
And made an exhibition of it's coil,
Let the air at her leathery beauty.
Pash of tallow, perishable treasure:
Her broken nose is dark as a turf clod,
Her eyeholes black as pools in the old workings.
Diadorus Siculas confessed
His gradual ease among the likes of this:
Murdered, forgotten, nameless, terrible
Beheaded girl, outstaring axe
And beautification, outstaring
What had begun to feel like reverence.

Last flight

Very rare that I write about something in particular
but I'd been watching stuff from NASA, so I wrote about
our last flight, which will happen one day, sad.
This is the only copy I have of this and the levels are awful
but I love it so much(thanks to Mel) I had to post it here...



Link... Tibbet..

Tam Lin - Child 39

I so love this song, takes me back to the 60s and Fairport.

This version is so, so good (and live)  Thank you Alice. x





Link... Tam Lin

Possessed by Paul James- Hurricane

Song for Arthur...



Link..  Song for Arthur ...



KRO

Melanie H Dylan cover

Link...  Melanie H.



KRO

Redemption song cover

 Link...  Redemption

pickitup

Link..  What a guy...

Already said I can't record here where I 'live' now so I'm
digging out lots of old stuff, this is the first song I ever
recorded at Runway Farm. Like any song/music it
evokes so many memories of people and places.
   Lived and worked at Runway Farm from 2000,
where I started a whole new life, met so so many new
people, almost all of them thought I was 'OK' so
much so that even I began to believe in myself.
A few of these 'new' people I wouldn't want to
meet again, and a few I would love to see again,
but sadly they're gone from us.
    I finally stopped living at Runway and bought
a flat..60a.. where I lived for a dozen years or so,
but hey, it's all gone, Runway Farm, 60a, my
work, my very identity, all gone. For seventeen
years I had some great days, even begun to
believe in myself , but I'm low on energy now,
not sure I can begin another new life......
but hey... you never know.

KRO

Skins cover by Melanie H.

Link... Melanie H.

Song for Laydi

Link... Laydi..



KRO

Trudi

Link... Daylight thief..

Head phones please...    KRO

Poem 16

     The Walrus and the Carpenter............... Lewis Carroll

The sun was shining on the sea,

Shining with all his might:

He did his best to make

The billows smooth and bright-

And this was odd, because it was

The middle of the night.

The moon was shining sulkily,

Because she thought the sun

Had got no business to be there

After the day was done-

"It's very rude of him " she said

"To come and spoil the fun."

The sea was wet as wet could be,

The sands were dry as dry.

You could not see a cloud, because

No cloud was in the sky:

No birds were flying overhead-

There were no birds to fly.

The Walrus and the Carpenter

Were walking close at hand;

They wept like anything to see

Such quantities of sand:

If this were only cleared away,

They said, it would be grand!

If seven maids with seven mops

Swept it for half a year,

Do you suppose, the Walrus said,

That they could get it clear?

I doubt it said the Carpenter,

And shed a bitter tear.

"O Oysters, come and walk with us"

The Walrus did beseech.

A pleasant walk, a pleasant talk

Along the briny beach:

"We cannot do with more than four

To give a hand to each."

The eldest Oyster looked at him

But never a word he said:

The eldest Oyster winked his eye,

And shook his heavy head-

Meaning to say he did not choose

To leave the oyster-bed.

But four young Oysters hurried up

All eager for the treat:

Their coats were brushed, their faces washed

Their shoes were clean and neat-

And this was odd, because, you know,

They hadn't any feet.

Four other Oysters followed them

And yet another four;

And thick and fast they came at last,

And more, and more, and more-

All hopping through the frothy waves,

And scrambling to the shore.

The Walrus and the Carpenter

Walked on a mile or so,

And they rested on a rock

Conveniently low:

And all the little Oysters stood

And waited in a row.

"The time has come" the Walrus said,

"To talk of many things:

Of shoes-and ships-and sealing wax-

Of cabbages-and kings-

And why the sea is boiling hot-

And whether pigs have wings."

But wait a bit, the Oysters cried

Before we have our chat:

For some of us are out of breath

And all of us are fat.

"No hurry" said the Carpenter.

They thanked him much for that.

A loaf of bread, the Walrus said,

Is what we chiefly need:

Pepper and vinegar besides

Are very good indeed-

Now if you're ready Oysters dear

We can begin to feed.

But not on us the Oysters cried

Turning a little blue.

After such kindness that would be

A dismal thing to do.

The night is fine the Walrus said,.

Do you admire the view?

It was so kind of you to come!
And you are very nice!
The Carpenter said nothing but
Cut us another slice:
I wish you were not quite so deaf-
I've had to ask you twice.

It seems a shame the Walrus said,
To play them such a trick
After we've brought them out so far,
And made them trot so quick.
The Carpenter said nothing but
This butter's spread to thick.

I weep for you the Walrus said
I deeply sympathize.
With sobs and tears he sorted out
Those of the largest size,
Holding his pocket-handkerchief
before his streaming eyes.

O Oysters said the Carpenter,
You've had a pleasant run!
Shall we be trotting home again?
But answer came there none-
And this was scarcely odd, because
They'd eaten every one.

KRO

Van Morrison - Sweet Thing(HQ/HD video) lyrics.

.Astral Weeks ..



Link... click on 'show more' for lyrics
cool video, bet he takes it down.

Poem 15........ fleet foxes....drops in the river

Crown of leaves high in the window on a cold morning
Young today, old as a railroad tomorrow
Days are just drops in the river to be lost always
Only you, only you, you know.

Years ago birds of a feather would arrive nightly
Gone you know, held to another like clutched ivy
On the shore, speak to the ocean and receive silence
Only you, only you, you know.

You hesitate, so my memory's fade I'll hold to the first one
I wouldn't turn to another you say, on the long night we've made
Let it go.
Only you, only you, you know
Only you, only you, you know

You hesitate, so my memory's fade, I'll hold  to the first one
I wouldn't turn to another you say, on the long night we've made
Let it go, let it go.

Speak to me slow my dear
No ghost of course in here
Pleased, to be lonesome quiet and clear
All is alone in here.



Link...take me some where else.. it does

No fuss

Link....  Summer Row..

... Just a quiet night on Brum's Summer Row....

Poem 14

Macavity: The Mystery Cat .......................... T.S.Eliot

Macavity's a Mystery Cat: he's called the Hidden Paw--
For he's the master criminal who can defy the Law.
He's the bafflement of Scotland Yard, the Flying Squad's despair:
For when they reach the scene of the crime--Macavity's not there!

Macavity, Macavity, there's no-one like Macavity,
He's broken every human law, he breaks the law of gravity.
His powers of levitation would make a fakir stare,
And when you reach the scene of the crime--Macavity's not there!
You may seek him in the basement, you may look up in the air--
But I tell you once and once again, Macavity's not there!

Macavity's a ginger cat,he's very tall and thin;
You would know him if you saw him, for his eyes are sunken in.
His brow is deeply lined with thought, his head is slightly domed;
His coat is dusty from neglect, his whiskers are uncombed.
He sways his head from side to side, with movements like a snake;
And when you think he's half asleep, he's always wide awake.

Macavity, Macavity, there's no-one like Macavity,
For he's a fiend in feline shape, a monster of depravity.
You may meet him in a by-street, you may see him in the square-
But when a crimes discovered, then Macavity's not there!

He's outwardly respectable. (they say he cheats at cards.)
And his footprints are not found in any file of Scotland Yard's.
And when the larder's looted, or the jewel-case is rifled,
Or when the milk is missing, or another Peke's been stifled,
Or the greenhouse glass is broken, and the trellis past repair--
Ay, there's the wonder of the thing! Macavity's not there!

And when the Foreign Office find a Treaty's gone astray,
Or the Admiralty loose some plans and drawings by the way,
There may be a scrap of paper in the hall or on the stair--
But it's useless to investigate -- Macavity's not there!
And when the loss has been disclosed, the Secret Service say:
'It must have been Macavity!'-- but he's a mile away.
You'll be sure to find him resting, or a licking of his thumbs,
Or engaged in doing complicated long division sums.

Macavity Macavity, there's no-one like Macavity,
There never was a Cat of such deceitfulness and suavity.
He always has an alibi, and one or two to spare:
And what ever time the deed took place--MACAVITY  WASN'T THERE!
And they say that all the Cats whose wicked deeds are widely known
(I might mean Mongojerrie, I might mean Griddlebone)
Are nothing more than agents for the Cat who all the time
Just controls their operations : the Napoleon of Crime!

The Hands That Thieve - Streetlight Manifesto / Toh Kay cover

Link...real music from the wonderful Alice

Birmingham City Centre - UK Travel Vlog 2018

KRO

It ain't me J.

Link... It ain't me J

Poem 13..

4/11/2018

Wilfred Owen was killed this day exactly 100 years ago,
just seven days before the end of the "Great war" He was
twenty five years old.

         The Chances...               Wilfred Owen

I mind as 'ow the night afore that show
Us five got talkin',-we was in the know.
'Over the top to-morrer; boys, we're for it.
First wave we are, first ruddy wave; that's tore it!'
'Ah well,' says Jimmy,-an, 'e's seen some scrappin-
'There ain't no more nor five things as can 'appen:
Ye get knocked out; else wounded-bad or cushy;
Scuppered; or nowt except yer feelin' mushy

One of us got the knock-out, blown to chops.
T'other was  'urt, loosin' both 'is props.
An' one, to use the word of' 'ypocrities,
'Ad the misfortoon to be took by Fritz.
Now me, I wasn't scratched, praise god amighty,
(Though next time please I'll thank 'im for a blighty)
But poor young Jim, 'e's livin' an' 'e's not;
'E reconed 'e'd five chances, an' 'e 'ad;
'E's wounded, killed and pris'ner, all the lot,
The bloody lot all rolled in one. Jim's mad.

Quiet - Reneé Dominique (original / lyric video)

Link...  Quiet

Poem twelve..

           Phillip Le Barr... ..........................Spike Milligan..


   Phillip Le Barr
   Was knocked down by a car
   On the road to Mandalay,
   He was knocked down again
   By a dust cart in Spain
   And again in Zanzibar
   So,
   He traveled at night
   In the pale moonlight
   Away from the traffic's growl
   But terrible luck
   He was hit by a duck
   Driven by an owl