One year to this very day, 5th July, I woke up to find myself unemployed, unaffiliated, and absolutely delighted about it. Last Independence Day (talk about appropriate), I celebrated my last day of working at the Royal College of Music, and stepped out into the unknown to try my hand
Among the most difficult questions I currently have to answer is a question which, from the perspective of general social acceptability, is supposed to be very easy. Most people can manage it in a sentence, many in a couple of words – heck, in some cases, just a single descriptor
For lovers of musical blogs around the internet, the title of this week’s post will probably be ringing a bell already. It is taken from a series of articles on the site On An Overgrown Path written by Bob Shingleton, who has recently been part of an exchange with Joyce
In the immortal words of Dr. Frasier Crane, ‘I’m listening’. Not to the mildly psychotic residents of Seattle, I hasten to add, but to a great many recordings – for most of the last week, I have been preparing for a slot on Radio 3’s ‘Building a Library’, to be
Categorization. We humans love it. We have constructed endless words – nay, entire vocabularies – to classify groups of everything from mildew and tree moss to stamp collectors and bee keepers. Categories allow us to track general trends, whether they be historical (for example, popular opinions via certain newspaper columns)
Last week, at the end of a very jolly study day on women musicians, a very enthusiastic course participant came over to me to thank me for the session. He had been in attendance throughout the year’s worth of weekly sessions and focus events, and spent a little time reviewing
Isn’t it amazing how quickly life moves on? Only last week, the General Election was a few days behind us and it was hard to think about anything else. Now, seven days later, my head is full of thoughts about marking the work of the lovely students of Middlesex University;
Since, for many people in Britain, 7th May currently has only the negative association of The Day We Voted In the Tories, I thought on this sunny, windswept Sunday that it was time we all focused, not on the blue (ha ha) associations of the date, but on something much
Anyone who has ever organised an event will know that, however carefully and lovingly you plan it, someone will complain about something. You might have booked one of the greatest living artists to give a concert; or found the ideal combination of teachers for a course; even taken the time
Money. In a world of billionaires (over 2,000, apparently), hedge funds, celebrity living, overpriced footballers and a widening gap between rich and poor in the UK, artists are pretty rubbish at talking about money. I don’t mean the people who run the Arts Council, or dish out Lottery funding –
