Not Everything in Black and White

16:29:18 o'clock GMT
Feeling Worried
Hearing Rickie Lee Jones, Rorschachs (Theme for the Pope)

Here is a poem for my sister, Jo, with reference to Luci, a character in my novel. The title is taken from the ink-blot tests used in optometry and psychology. It is also the title of a song by Rickie Lee Jones. While it is true that the ink-blots are coloured, I should point out that my sister’s drawing was, indeed, black and white

 

 

Rorschachs

 

 

 

This is the picture I see.

Just scraps really. Of – from –

childhood; scribbles, doodlings.

Of my sister’s first attempt

at a smiling angel,

which made mummy smile at least.

(now mummy keeps it in a tiny

silver frame, next to a smiling

grandson on the mantelpiece).

I think of Luci’s Roar, or her bloody,

gory sunsets, dripping tears.

Or a crucifix, draped in musical

notation, hung in the music-room.

Rorschachs of the mind;

the silent intellect, shaped, drawn.

You remember, Jo, the one you drew

in your teens, inspired by a line

in a pop-song: “And yesterday

I saw you standing by the river…”?

The perspectives were not quite true,

but I liked its skew-whiff charm.

The young boy could have been me,

I don’t know.

And so I took this image today,

walked down to the Waters again,

found a bridge that might have been

the one in your picture. Then

I looked up to the hills; (Blackford,

Pentlands, Calton, Salisbury Crags)

and thought back on my childhood.

How my fraternal love for you found

focus in your profound perspicacity,

far beyond any picture, any image.

Your angel will never quite forget.

And me? I can’t get my angel to smile.

Instead I picture your wise spirit

to give me strength at this time.

It says more than words.

 

 

As we know, not everything in black and white makes sense. If you have enjoyed reading this blog, and would like to know more about my photography, poetry and writing, not to mention Polish Dog Food, please e-mail me. I hope to be back in full colour soon.

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00:33:45 o'clock BST
Feeling Quiet
Hearing Jamieson Sutherland - if only!

When I started writing song-cycles, I didn’t think that I would be embarking on a twenty-year project. But this year I completed my 7th song cycle, I knew it would be the last of those I have written since beginning my composing thing at Trinity. Yet one of the prevailing themes has been the weaving of Penelope, who while waiting for her beloved Odysseus to return, wove his death-shroud by day, and un-wove it by night, just to keep her suitors at bay. So here, as a prelude to the following entries in this journal, is a poem about my experience of ‘weaving and waiting.’ I will be discussing the Seven Cycles in forthcoming updates. And maybe, this coming year will see some of them recorded, and even, published. Well, we live in hope!

 

Cornish Folk-Lure

 

- To the illegitimate Cornish

Who call this surrogate home their own:

 

These turbulent, mine-swept,

tin-ridden hills; granite thrust, battered by

 

sea-breeze and glacial stream;

addled with legend and lore,

 

pointing to a distant shore

of another sea-buried land.

 

You, who search the buried sands

at Lelant and Phillack, or a glance

of the gleaming spires of Lyonesse:

 

Do not befooled.

 

There is one who sits on a rock,

off the beautiful cove of Lemorna,

whose song echoes through Homer,

 

and sees the idiot-Odysseus ships

prang themselves on the rugged cliffs:

 

There to be plundered by pirates, or

make homes for the mergirls and boys

of the singer who drowned at Zennor.

 

(He too, lured by some forked tongue,

transpired with a tail the same shape.)

 

“Tie me to the mast, lest I be lured

by the siren-cry of a Cornish Bastard!

 

“Or, god forbid, my own voice charm

the undinal songs of folk-lore, not my my own.”

 

- There’s another, unwritten rule,

belonging to neither legend nor lore,

told to me by a shopkeeper in St Ives:

 

“You d’be Cornish’f you’re born here.”

 

But it’s true. You can’t belong to

a land you weren’t born into.

 

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22:56:36 o'clock BST
Hearing The Manchester Sound!

Manchester Reflections

 

It has to be said that, for all the horror it causes, war does a lot to a nation, a place, or our identity as a human race. There are two cities I have visited lately that have been changed by war.

 

Southampton was decimated by war in the 20th Century, and boy has it struggled to find an identity. I took some good pictures when I was there, in colour, and they were mainly garish shopping centres and strangely modern attempts at rejuvenation. Because this entry is only in black and white, I will not include these pictures.

 

The same could be said of Manchester, which I visited for the first time this summer. If terrorism is the 21st Century war, this place got in there first. Plenty of folk have said that the IRA did it a favour, since out of the bombing it has made itself into a new, vibrant city. Yet is has long been at the forefront of iconoclastic declaration, without even attempting iconic status. That, surely, has to be in its favour: a nothing that has produced more than something.

 

So I spent my four days recording a few reflections of architectural and social interest, concentrating on the buildings rather than the people or the history. Society says and forms so much of City-life and influences our conurbations. Manchester had the opportunity to re-build itself into a 21st Century, British Icon of a thriving, metropolitan Modern City. Instead, it boasts shopping centres, malls, concrete structures, and a tram-system that carries one thoughit’s concrete, glass-fronted streets, and teases the tourist with a Ferris wheel that can barely peek above the Arndale across to the real beauty of the place which is, outwith: the Pennines, the Peaks, and the Lakes.

 

Sure, I will visit the place again, if not for the shops that I can find as easily in Edinburgh, Glasgow, or Dundee. Rather, for the much-loved friends who have chosen to stay in this odd, bomb-fucked, bleak but truly photogenic city.

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19:15:46 o'clock BST
Feeling Sad
Hearing The SCO

Summer has ended, and as happens every year I regret that I did not do more during Festival in this beautiful, crazy city. This is the time of year when the place is replete with colour and culture, and pretty much the only time I use colour film in my camera.

 

To follow on from my last ranting entry, I have another poem from my Worcester Days. Somehow I have managed to live in places where the ethnicity has been pretty pale; in Worcester, Guildford, even Edinburgh there are seem to be very few black people (then again, I have lived in Camberwell!) So here is a poem about a busker who turned up on Worcester’s High Street for a very brief afternoon.

 

The Medium

 

There’s a black busker

standing by the bookshop

milking a rusty saxophone.

Passers-by stop and look,

                   marvel at his mellow tone.

Never seen the like before

but recognise the tunes         

floating golden in the air.

Where does his music come from?

Whistle-blowing crusties,

skinny dogs on bits of string,

overshadowed by his Midas Touch

ask, what alchemy can coax the sun

from this tatty piece of tin?

Shop-keepers contemplate as much.

His rich food fills their mouths

with unfamiliar phrases, such as

colour, soulful, melancholia.

His gifts of music they share;

momentarily putting by their

erstwhile xenophobia.

Not for long. A talent-

spotter takes their new-found,

skin-deep friend away

with his magical instrument.

White faces drift off, turn grey.

Bright skies reform with clouds.

 

 

In my Festival Photos there is a picture of a youth playing a similar-shaded saxophone on the High Street Fringe. He is white, of course. The other pictures seem to follow a theme of contrast from the grotesque world of adult life to the lurid joy of childhood. Unless, that is, one finds heavily made-up little girls as foul as I do. Festival is about celebration, colour, spark and frivolity. I’ve had a bit of that this summer. Fireworks. So much laughter, somuch spark. But it always ends the same way, as the noise, the smoke-filled sky, the happy faces drift off. So here is a poem about all that.

 

 

 

 

Festival Fireworks

 

 

for ‘The Soprano’ – whatever name she may choose

           

 

The floodlights of Meadowbank Stadium are still

in the rain-sodden sky, like stuck fireworks.

The weather worse than dreich,

I venture out in the soggy streets

 

to Sainsbury’s for toilet-roll and gin –

life’s essentials – and imagine the spectators

at the Castle Tattoo; the rhythm of dancers and drums,

as the best of Scottish beats down on both.

 

Had Meadowbank - once host to others games,

now given its stay of execution -

hosted the same military pomp,

would equal crowds have flocked,

 

or hogmanay’s Great Display

fallen to the axe for a gust of Dunedin’s wind?

History and tradition keep folk

afloat, even in this diluvian Festival.

 

Sometimes we long for fireworks.

Now, all I crave as the water soaks my shoes,

is a warm sofa, Bombay Sapphire, and a kiss,

a breath, a touch of your soft, soft face.

 

Or better, the ecstasy of your voice

igniting the wet, black sky.

 

           

 

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17:51:08 o'clock BST
Hearing Mozart, C minor Mass

Today, I am glad to be taking part in a concert (Mozart C Minor Mass, if you’re interested!) that has absolutely NO Elgar in it whatsoever. Glorious! It’s probably one of very few concerts in the land that has an Elgar-free programme, and I am glad. I’m doubly pleased not to be living in Worcester. My two years as a lay-clerk there firmly cemented an already fomenting opinion that Elgar-louts and Lager Louts were one and the same thing. So this poem, written around 1992 (hence the reference to the Westland Helicopter affair) sums up my thoughts.

Happy Birthday, Elgar. You English…

                   Elgar-Religion

 

Tourists and other visitors to this great city

come to gaze at Elgar’s land of Hope and Glory.

The Cathedral, who adopted this surrogate Anglican,

has depicted his music’s union with the poetry of Newman

(- they’d sooner saint Elgar than see him venerated):

The dying Gerontius ascending into heaven, accompanied

by Saint Cecilia and Bishop-Saints Wulstan and Oswald.

A window unstained by any catholic or apostolic mould,

installed in ’35, though enshrined with equal piety.

(In 1218 the church had been consecrated to Our Lady)

 

It’s not that I dislike all Elgar’s music. I do enjoy

Sea Pictures, the lush concerti, the Intro & Allegro.

But why does a distinguished Romantic, true Edwardian

composer merit the Nationalistic epithet, ‘Elgarian’?

Any anthropological fallacy might suggest he’d earned

a 20th Century voice by 1934: we’ve much to learn.

There’s nothing enigmatic in a sense of English Pride

provided foreigners, outsiders and the downcast are denied

a place in society’s wealthy, quasi-intellectual band.

Among the healthy educated the influential stand.

 

In 1981, Elgar’s statue was erected in the High Street.

Sadly for him, he can’t see through the cathedral, to

bless his beloved country from the Great West Window.

(With surreptitious smile and hands behind back,

he occasionally hides his McDonald’s milkshake carton

– stolen from the celebrated Wand of Worcester’s Youth)

Yet every year, the Elgar-worshippers process slowly

on his birthday, to place more flowers by his plaque.

 

You might call my jibe against this inane patriotism

an iconoclastic gripe if (you think) you like;

to disapprove of Elgar in Worcester just ain’t cricket

I know. But Brand Loyalty and Buying British

went out with The War, Westland and the Minors’ Strike.

What would Edwardian England think now of the Asian

influx, which lends at least some spice to this place?

Sure enough, the Crown of India Suite is as Indian

as 10 pints of lager and a Ruby Murray is English.

Oh, the British will gladly adopt the foreign,

only if they can shit them out the morning after.

Well I’ll go one better: Elgar makes me want to puke.

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15:13:36 o'clock BST
Feeling Angry
Hearing I'll tell you what I'm NOT listening to...

Reasons to hate Elgar

 

Scottish:               Because he’s English.

 

North-East:           he’s so middle-english.

 

South-London:        he’s so fucking English.

 

Liverpudlian:          His stupid moustache.

 

Roman Catholics:    He’s so Anglican.

 

Church of England: He’s a Catholic.

 

Methodists:            He smells of sherry.

 

Baptists:                His music’s too Romantic.

 

Romantics:             His music’s too Wagnerian.

 

Wagnerians:           His music’s too pompous.

 

Pomposians:            Bullshit.

 

East Anglians:        Benjamin Britten.

 

How many folk-singers…   None.

 

How many violas:    too many.

 

How many light bulbs:      elucidate?

 

How many scodas?  Sad.

 

 

 

Sense of Humour:

 

His running from Sansome Walk RC church to catch the cathedral organ voluntary, when just a boy in Worcester. Jolly funny, I should say.

 

His Statue at the end of Worcester High Street, pompous twat with hands behind his back, into which local kids frequently place empty MacDonalds milkshake cartons or vodka bottles.

 

The annual procession to the Elgar Windowin Worcester Cathedral, where the protestant pedants prostrate themselves and genuflect to the mocking gods of mediocre music set to suspect ecumenical theology.

 

The appointment of a former Cathedral Master of Music to curate the Elgar Museum, whose self-confessed interests were ‘cricket, Worcester and Elgar.’ Known locally as Wadda C.Hunt. Elgar, that is!

 

The way every bloody shop in Worcester plays the sodding Cello concerto. Every shop. Every hour of the day. 24-7. Sometimes in unison. Even if you consider this as one of his better works, it’s enough to make you vomit!

 

Comparisons with a few Great British composers.

 

Vaughan Williams: massive contribution to the survival of English Folk Song, hymnody, the Symphony and the quintessential English Voice.

Elgar: a sub-romantic setting of Ave Verum.

 

Tippett: a socially conscious musical style based on a deep conviction for inner peace and understanding of his art within the profound resources of the human condition, challenging our very being as poets and artists.

 

Elgar: a bunch of long-winded Oratorio obsessed with the after-life.

 

Howells: a significant contribution to choral music, hymns, psalm chants and plenty more besides, whose unique voice conjured the very essence of the buildings for which the music (especially the canticles) was written.

 

Elgar: hideous little ditties about Bavarian torrents in summer.

 

Britten: the most sensitive and apposite crafter of words and music since Purcell, whose music not only matched with perfect sentiment the poetry he set, but also delved into the human soul, challenging and questioning.

 

Elgar: strophic settings of liturgical texts, no matter what the words.

 

Parry and Stanford: responsible for the revival of British composers who, since Purcell, had been represented solely by (Gilbert &) Sullivan. Elgar: responsible for enlivening the musical quality of Savoy Operetta (with considerably inferior words). We are the Music Makers? Bollocks!!

 

I’ve run outof rant now. Maybe I’ve been offensive to some of you Elgar-louts out there, but what I’m trying to say is – whether you like his ‘music’ or not – the only English thing about Edward Elgar was his name.

 

Celebrate his anniversary-year if you really have to, but please don’t rank him among the Great British composers of our time. He did nothing to earn that title, since his music had little or no influence on what was the richest musical period of our Isles.

 

Why is Elgar so popular?

 

Because he wrote music for the masses, and not for God.

 

Either way, it’s hit music.

 

Sorry, I mean: shit music.

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13:39:39 o'clock BST
Hearing My own Voice

April 21st: Loved Locked Out – a new piece by Jamieson Sutherland. Sung by Karen Richmond and Ashley Turnell, accompanied by Duncan Ferguson. With performances from Catherine Backhouse and Nicola Long (clarinet) and other singers. 7 – 8.15pm St John’s Princes Street. Tickets, £6/4

 

Some time ago, I was visiting a friend in Deepest Surrey, in a tiny wee village that boasted quaint artefacts like a Georgian post-box, several K6 telephone boxes (including one in a private garden: I nearly had the dogs set on me when I took the picture) and a quirky wooden sign-post that pointed “THIS WAY” and (in the other direction) “THAT WAY.” My friend alerted me to the church which, apparently, had ‘some interesting art-work’ inside, so I stopped off on my way home to peek inside what looked like an elaborate pig farm from the outside. It turns out, the designer was that doyen of the Arts and Craft movement, Charles Harrison Townsend; only in retrospect did I appreciate the likeness to the Horniman Museum of my beloved South London, and the Whitechapel Art Gallery (of less-beloved East End).

 

One could be forgiven for passing over the simple, un-ornate, non-cruciform barrel which may have modelled itself on an Italian way-side Basilican Chapel, but felt somewhat out of place in Leafy Surrey. Stepping inside, I experienced the same “Wow” effect when one visits the Song School of St Mary’s Cathedral, or the Traquair Centre in Edinburgh’s Mansfield Place. Adorning the walls of this Art Nouveaux Air Raid tunnel were the most incredible murals, depicting scenes from the Gospels, in the pastel beauty of Pre-Raphaelite perfection. It would be obvious to assume they were also the work of Phoebe Anna Traquair, but a glance at the painting over the reredos pointed me to another great female artist of the late 19th century.

 

Anna Lea Merritt is best known for her painting (the first female artist to have work hung in the Tate) Love Locked Out - a classic Late Victorian piece, redolent of Holman Hunt’s Light of the World. Cupid attempting to open the door of the Mausoleum, hoping to conquer death - but, like the artist, whose husband died after only a few months of marriage, they are each bound to fail.

 

Of the many pictures I took of the murals, I chose five images, and started to plan a work to illustrate them musically. However, I didn’t want to find or write poems or words to match the Biblical story behind each image; that would be too obvious! Instead, I wanted to find a way of depicting an emotional reaction beyond the illustration. Given the many themes of death, alienation and angelic presence, I chose pieces of film-script – particularly films where ‘presences’ hover over the characters – and adapted each of the sections I decided to use so that I could set them as a song-cycle for voices and organ.

 

Co-incidentally, I hatched a plan to stage a short series of organ recitals as part of St John’s Creative Space programme (ok, it’s transparent, I know!) using music and images Finally, having put on so many events at St John’s, I am reaping a small reward. My song-cycle, Love Locked Out is the final of my series of seven cycles, begun when I was at Trinity, exploring themes of death and birth, love and loss, divorce and eternity (so, just a few simple themes!) It will be performed, along with another of these cycles, Winter Train Journey, for Soprano and Clarinet, plus a selection of part-songs and music, at St John’s, Princes St, Edinburgh.

(I would have illustrated this article with pictures, but aol won't let me, today!)

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15:07:11 o'clock BST
Feeling Chillin'
Hearing The sound of my own composin'

When I set up this Blog, my intention was to unashamedly advertise events that I am involved in. Evidently my shame got the better of me – or else I decided to rely on the Great Machine of St John’s Promotion Department. Nevertheless, the various musical, social, intellectual and – even – theological happenings have continued with some success, despite the lack of Black and White Blogging from me.

Yet, to add to an already over-filled music diary, I have added to the monthly series of Saturday Early Evening Chamber Concerts a short series of (predominantly) organ recitals, titled Icons of Sound. The true reason behind this series is so that I can get something back from the Creative Space programme that I tirelessly put together.

The 2nd of these Icons concerts will feature a new piece by ME, about which I may say more in future entries, but for now, here’s the advert.

MUSIC AT St. JOHN'S, PRINCES STREET

A short series of concerts featuring organ music and projected images.

SIMON NIEMINSKI plays Stations of the Cross,

by GILES SWAYNE

music based on Eric Gill’s sculptures in Westminster Cathedral, photographed by Jamieson Sutherland

Saturday March 31st, at 7pm - Tickets £6/4 on the door.

DUNCAN FERGUSON plays Love Locked Out,

by JAMIESON SUTHERLAND

music based on murals by Anna Lea Merritt, with words adapted from films scripts by the composer

Saturday April 21st, at 7pm - Tickets £6/4 on the door.

and also

SCOTTISH CHAMBER MUSIC PLAYERS – an hour of high quality music, from 5.30pm

April 7th, Performers: Alba Saxophone Quartet Tickets £6/4 on the door.

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00:06:09 o'clock GMT
Hearing Mein Herz Brennt
Filthy joke time: parental warning!

A Bishop (of course) goes to the Doctor, having troubles with his 'back passage' if you ken. Doctor says to him, “Where exactly is the pain located, your Lordship?

Quoth the holy one: “Oh, around the entrance, doctor” - to which the cheeky medic responds,

“Dear, dear Bishop – most of us consider that the EXIT!”

Thus, it is with such apologies that I craft this entry having completely neglected this rather retentive pastime of b-logging! Here's my excuse (look at the links before you dare absolve me).

So I get hooked into creating a blog, http://journals.aol.co.uk/jamiesonsuth/NotEverythinginBlackandWhite, but can't be bothered to keep it going. Next, to keep in touch with the Yoof, I get pushed onto Bebo http://jamiesonsutherland.bebo.com (I hate it, but it explains my absence here); then get dragged into the seedy world of facebook (don't even go there!).

BUT, more important than all this, with help from my friend and colleague, Hedge, we have constructed a website about the evil of Sex Trafficking. Official launch later this year, but please look and comment, and do something about it. greyribbon.blogspot.com . Next posting will be on the delights of Dancing Poles. Enjoy!

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