White noise

About five years ago, I visited a prison just off the A1 Road in Rutland and spent a few hours talking to some of the inmates about their lives and music. One of the inmates was a saxophonist and had sheets and sheets of manuscript attached to the walls of his tiny cell, so that he could imagine playing, even when he wasn’t allowed to make any noise.  Many of the people I met were serving life sentences. We talked about freedom and I asked whether there was anything that frightened them about the big wide world. One of them said something very interesting; “I’ve heard that when you’re on a bus all you can hear these days is the sound of mobile phones ringing.” This man had gone to jail in the early 90s, long before mobile phones were widely used, and what he said struck a very distinct chord. We’ve all had time to very slowly get used to the change, but the sonic landscape these days is very different to how it was 20 years ago.

As I sat in the cafe today, I became aware of the weirdest assortment of noises coming from mobile devices. Someone had the sound of a woman screaming in pain every time she received a text. There were hooters, weird triangle clangs, duck quacks, warped beeps and farting noises. At one point I thought I must be listening to one of those dreadful comedy radio stations where there’s a crazy sound effect every five seconds to wake listeners up who've zoned out because someone's spoken on a single subject for more than a minute.

It suddenly struck me that the average 21^st centuryer is forced to filter out so much unnecessary noise that it’s not surprising city dwellers try to zone out when they’re in public places. Pointless announcements about buffet services on trains, the titter-titter of iPod speakers, the silly four note melody you hear every time you switch a computer on, the “mind the gap”s, the “please remember to take your bags with you when you leave”s. Sometimes I long for simpler times so that I can compose again without all these constant interruptions!

LA Shitness

I went to the gym this afternoon and was astonished to find, yet again, that they’d removed the free weighing scales from the changing rooms.  It's fairly unusual, I'd say, for a gym not to offer its members a chance to weigh themselves after a workout. A member of LA Fitness staff in his black company T-shirt was floating around. One of the other gym-bunnies asked if there was a reason why the scales had been removed. The response was as predictable as it was irritating; “head office policy.” It’s something we hear all the time at the LA Fitness in Highgate. If in doubt, blame a faceless, be-suited moron in a tower block in a town just outside the M25. Never one to shy away from showing solidarity to those who dare to speak out, I went over and asked a question which was burning in my mind; “why do they disappear and reappear regularly if it’s company policy not to have them at all?” The man in black replied, “oh, that was a member of staff here who didn’t know the rules.” This didn’t surprise me. The turnaround in staff at the gym is almost comic. Staff members obviously work in the most horrific circumstances and get no support from their seniors.  

“What happens if I want to weigh myself?” asked a third gym goer. “There’s a brand new machine on the main gym floor” came the reply. “But it costs 50p every time you want to weigh yourself” said the gym-goer. There followed an incredulous silence as the penny dropped for us all. That’s why they got rid of the free scales in the changing room! Of course the situation is made even worse by the new weighing machine’s position on the gym floor. Most people prefer to weigh themselves, naked, and in the comfort and relative privacy of a same-sex environment. The following question just tumbled out of my mind:

“Would you mind if I went onto the gym floor, took off all my clothes and weighed myself? I always weigh myself naked because clothes get heavier and lighter depending on how much I’ve sweated and how cold it is.”

The LA Fitness staff member looked at me like I’d just asked him on a date, and said sternly; “that would obviously not be appropriate...” I softened, “well, look, if you could just lobby your manager to lobby LA Fitness head office to have the scales returned, that would great. They’re an important part of my people’s work-outs.” The response was, once again, as predictable as it was irritating; “that’s not my job. I’m just fitness staff here.” And there it was; the impenetrable vicious cycle created by a man who simply doesn’t care about his job, the company he works for, or the interests of his customers. Congratulations LA Fitness. You’ve created the perfect example of broken window syndrome!

I went upstairs to the main reception and asked another member of staff if I could talk to the manager and he tootled off to look for him...

Imagine my surprise when the manager revealed himself as the disinterested staff member I’d been talking to in the changing rooms, who was now wearing a little white badge which said “deputy manager!” There was nothing to do but burst out laughing. “You told me less than five minutes ago that it wasn’t your job to speak to the manager... but you appear to actually BE the manager.” “I said no such thing,” said the deputy manager.  And there we were again, riding the Becketian cycle of genuine lack of interest. I had no other option than to walk away...

As I passed through the barriers, I could hear a woman kicking up merry hell because the staff wouldn’t let her look at the gym before she signed up to become a member; “surely I’ve a right to know what kind of place it is?” She said. I shouted over my shoulder, “it’s the kind of place which charges its member 50p every time they want to weigh themselves!”

40 to 20

I’ve been working on the Pepys Motet all day, from early in the morning, when Nathan got up to do his jury service, to about ten minutes ago when my eyes started to go a bit weird. Those who haven’t followed this blog from its conception may not know that it’s called the Pepys Motet, because I wanted to write an online diary which would track the progress of what remains the most ambitious and insane musical project I’ve ever attempted. At the beginning of 2010, exactly 350 years after Pepys started to write his diary, I began to write this blog, and at the same time, a 40-part motet based on passages from the diary.

The idea of the piece was that each of the 40 chosen singers would sing their own, unique line and just like Thomas Tallis’ famous Spem In Alium, there would be no doubling. It took me the best part of 9 months to write and the work was eventually recorded with eight choirs of five singers, representing a host of different musical styles from gospel through opera to folk. A number of choirs came from institutions associated with Pepys, including Magdalene College, Cambridge and the Navy; yes, we actually worked with five young officers from the Royal Navy! It was bonkers. I rehearsed them in Dartmouth in Devon after driving through the night in the worst storm imaginable.

The recording sessions were close to hell on earth. The work was desperately ambitious, some singers were hugely under-prepared and I nearly went mad on several occasions, behaving like a terrible Hitler character and going into complete meltdown at least twice. If you read this blog from September and October, 2010, you’ll start to get an indication of what was going on. The entire project nearly fell apart on several occasions. It’s the closest I’ve ever come in my career to throwing in the towel. We only managed to record 5 of the 6 movements and what we did record was patchy. There were moments where the piece feels epic and incredibly filmic, but other sequences where it doesn’t hang together quite as well as it could have done...

We performed three of the movements live in November 2010, at St Olave’s Church, the church where Pepys worshipped and is buried. The actual performance was the first time that all 40 singers had been in one space at the same time and the evening was a triumph. The Navy boys turned up in full uniform, the Magdalene college choir came in their gowns, and each of the choirs dressed appropriately for their voice type. The last movement was performed with the singers in a circle around the audience; surround sound. I look back on the night with a little sadness, however, as one of our 40 singers, Sam, a young counter-tenor from the early music choir, overdosed last year. Even if we’d wanted to get together to repeat the magical performance, we’d never be able to with its original cast.

It’s my ambition for this year to try and record the piece properly, and I want the Rebel Chorus to pick up the reins. So at the moment I’m condensing the piece from a 40-voice behemoth to a (only slightly) more manageable work for 20 soloists; a process which feels a bit like trying to bottle air! I’ll get there eventually...

Older than Methuselah

I sat in the cafe this morning next to a couple of old ladies who seemed to be older than Methuselah himself. They struggled through the door, spent ages trying to read, and interpret the menu, and ended up sharing a soup because they thought the portion sizes might prove to be too big for them. They were like tiny little dignified sparrows.  Frankly, I was just thrilled that they were still going out for lunch together. My biggest fear in life is being separated from friends because of old age. The idea of being sent to a retirement home and not having kids to ferry me to other homes to see my friends is horrific. The fact that these two women could barely walk but still had the desire to go out for lunch gave me a great deal of hope. They were fascinating women as well. I assume one of them was an Austrian Jewess who’d come to Britain to escape persecution, because she talked about studying in Vienna before the war. She was also a vegetarian, which made her all the more interesting.

Meanwhile, a silly woman sitting opposite was complaining that her coffee was too cold, and then that there weren’t enough nuts in her porridge. “I’m not paying for this”, she said, her lips taking on the shape of lemons, “I could make this for 20p at home.” Yes, love, you probably could, but you’re not experiencing the wonderful ambience of a cafe when you’re at home are you? A cafe has to pay for its overheads, to support writers like me when we sit in there for hours with just one cup of tea. I think she irritated me mostly because she’d as good as finished her porridge before complaining. For all I know, she'd already eaten all of the nuts.  I’m aware that she also irritated me because she reminded me a little of myself. I can be a stroppy complaining bastard sometimes and I think it’s one of my least attractive traits. When someone holds a mirror up like that it can be quite difficult viewing.

From our window, during the winter months when the trees are bare, we can see all the way to Alexandra Palace. The sunset was extraordinary this evening, and the yellow bricks of the building were glowing like gold. I popped to the shops a few minutes later, and the sky was electric blue. Perhaps because we've had a rise in temperature today, quite a number of birds were chirping. The air felt fresh and somehow optimistic. I often get a sense of optimism at this time of year. I can't really explain why because the winter is obviously far from over.

I came home and watched Songs of Praise, and instantly felt incredibly angry. It struck me that we always think it's hugely amusing when people appear on the telly to talk about angels or ghost-hunting and yet no-one seems to think it's odd in the least when people cram themselves into a church to talk and sing about something which there's just as little proof for! It's absolutely insane.

350 years ago Pepys was still searching for a wife for his unfortunate brother, Tom. There was another setback when the latest girl on the list claimed she couldn’t  fancy him due to his speech impediment, which feels quite hard line, and gives us an indication as to why poor Tom ended up hanging out with servants and using prostitutes. Pepys was sad but philosophical; “there the business must die, and we must look out for another.”

Pepys’ other brother, John, was at university in Cambridge, and the news wasn’t looking good on that front either; “I have news this day from Cambridge that my brother hath had his bachelor's cap put on; but that which troubles me is, that he hath the pain of the stone, and makes bloody water with great pain, it beginning just as mine did. I pray God help him.” Pepys survived an operation for the removal of a bladder stone in the late 1650s. The odds were stacked right against John, and Pepys knew it.

Desperately dull

The cold continues, both in my head and outside on the streets of Highgate. I was coughing up all sorts of rubbish this morning. I didn’t know it was possible to blow something solid out of a nose!

We went to the cafe to do some work this morning. I’m still working on the first movement of the Pepys Motet, and it’s driving me insane. It changes tempo and tonal centre so many times that I’ve lost all ability to understand it using the basic laws of music! I realise now that I’m usually very aware of the underlying chords in the music I write, which makes the process of orchestration a little easier. The original Pepys Motet was written with a great deal more fluidity, however, so there are mini-modulations, and really crazy chords all over the place.  I carry on chipping away at it because I refuse to be defeated by anything in life.

We went to the gym after lunch, and then to the dentist where I was fitted for a new gum guard, which will stop me from grinding my teeth whilst I sleep and hopefully stop my shoulders from hurting during the day.

This really is the ultimate in boring blogs isn’t it? I’m racking my brains to think if there’s anything else more interesting to say. There’s nothing in the news, nothing on the telly. There was a bus crash on the A1 outside our house this morning, but we didn’t see it, and it was more of a shunt than a full on crash. The back windows of the bus were smashed, so we assume that another bus simply didn’t stop fast enough.

Tonight’s all about awful Saturday night telly. I was hoping something more interesting than Splash and Take Me Out would be on, but it’s nice to see how the other half live! Nathan has gone off to Crewe to do some singing. Crewe is a town I have very little concept of. Is it nice?

Smile, open our eyes, love and go on

Today I went to Poole in Dorset with Philippa, Silver, Kate and Miguel. Under any other circumstance it would have been a wonderful adventure with a lovely set of friends. Unfortunately we were attending the funeral of our friend Sally's husband. 

There are no real words to describe how horrific it is to witness a vibrant 32-year old man with a young child losing his fight against cancer, or to watch his mother fighting back the tears, or to see a room filled with young people grappling to make sense of a situation. Life can be so intolerably cruel. 

Sally was dignified and brave. I suppose she had no other choice than to be strong for her daughter, but she exuded a sort of majesty which took my breath away. She delivered a beautiful eulogy before playing the song that her husband, Ben, had asked to be played at his daughter's wedding. I think we were all suddenly struck by a single tragic thought; the little toddler in Sally's arms is destined to grow up hitting all those important milestones without a father. It was too much for us all, and as the song played, many wept bitter tears. 

The service was non-religious, which meant the focus was on Ben himself. We heard from family members, old pals, work colleagues. He was incredibly well-loved. 

For obviously reasons my Requiem has at the front of my mind all day.  On the way down to Poole, the train took us, rather slowly, past Brookwood Cemetery, home to the beloved Yasi, whose gravestone inscription, "and we laughed and laughed and laughed" features so prominently and proudly in my composition. As we stood around Ben's grave this afternoon,  a poem was read which ended with a line which also features in the requiem; "smile, open our eyes, love and go on." 

A wonderful sentiment.

Poor Sally.

Overdone

I've over-done it! I knew last night I was coming down with a cold and today has been so ridiculously busy - and long - that my head is now spinning. My throat hurts. My lips are dry. My nose is all blocked. I can't string a sentence together. It's basically all over for the day. Blanket and hot toddy time! 

A quick summing up of the day: Woke up at shit o'clock, so unaccustomed to early starts that I began to wonder if the sun was ever going to come up. 

I went to Borough for an osteopath appointment and stopped at the cafe in Highgate Station en route. They always play classical music and happened to be playing The Swan by Saint Saens. I used to play that piece on the 'cello all the time, particularly to my Grandmother, who would always request it and sit dabbing her eyes. Maybe it was the early start, or the cold, or the memory of my childhood, or the smiley, kind face of the man behind the counter, but I suddenly found myself openly weeping and having to hide my eyes whilst I walked down the station steps. 

The osteopath prodded, poked, clicked, massaged and advised. 

I returned home, worked on the Pepys Motet, made a vegetable soup, went to the gym, rowed with a horrid bloke who refused to move his illegally parked car, returned home, collected my bag and then ran to White City to attend a residents' association meeting to spread the word about our latest project. 

Non-stop... I'm shattered. Sleep now...