Music - Sounds of my Life

 

“If music be the food of love, play on;”  from Twelfth Night, William Shakespeare.

“Music was my first love and it will be my last…”  John Miles.

Throughout my life music has always been there, in various forms, and always been important. I grew up with my mother’s radio, or maybe I should call it ‘the wireless’ and I think we listened to ‘The Light Programme’. I still have my mother’s records, the singles and LPs that we spent many hours singing and dancing to in my childhood and our pubs always had the sounds of the jukebox filtering upstairs, or someone belting out a tune on a piano. My love of piano music remains. I don’t play very much now as poor sight comes between me and the sheet music, but it’s nice to have the occasional plonk about when there’s no one to hear. A familiar song or piece of music can transport me to times past in a second and fill me with joy and remind me of how far I’ve come.

 I love lots of music, not just symphonic or progressive rock. Live music is the best but I won’t bore you with all of the concerts I’ve been to. Music soothes the soul, calms the spirit, or makes us want to dance, so what I might listen to depends on what suits at any given time. Rolling Stones, Oasis, The Smiths, Mozart, Chopin, Prokofiev (especially Troika), gospel choirs, Gregory Porter, Simply Red and many more are amongst my favourites. When they were living with us, I enjoyed listening to my son playing guitar or bass; and my daughter’s wonderful singing, both of them talented. They entertain their own families now.

If you know me personally, or through my blogs, you might have noticed me mention that the music of The Moody Blues is the main soundtrack to my life. This month I have had their album ‘December’ permanently on the CD player. The track ‘December Snow’ has a wonderful piano solo in the middle and I really wish I could play that myself. I’ve lost count of how many MBs concerts I’ve attended over the years, many tours, many cities, each one a breath-taking experience. Those days are gone, the band is depleted and I’m glad I was able to be there at the time. I look forward to seeing John Lodge again, on his solo tour next year.

Here’s an old poem of mine, an attempt at capturing the essence of a magical Moody Blues concert,

The Concert.

 

The lights are lowered, silence fills the arena

As the minstrels move through darkness on to the stage.

This is the moment, breathless anticipation,

Travelling eternity road has been an age.

 

Then a flute’s haunting melody rises above

Twin guitar riffs to take lead of the symphony.

Slow, bass drum, and applause reaches a crescendo,

Orchestral rock and voices singing harmony.

 

On the threshold of ecstasy, keeping the faith,

We’ve made this pilgrimage so many times before,

To be rewarded with autographs and handshakes

After waiting patiently outside the stage door.

 

PMW  2010

 

 Very best wishes for 2025. May your dreams come true.

Thanks for reading, Pam x

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Radio - Solid State Binatone

 As a young child I was a little housewife.  Wearing an apron to keep my dress clean, I played with the toy sink unit that I could have real water in to wash my tea set. I often got wet but I didn’t mind. I had an iron and ironing board, a cooker that my dad made for me and a dolls bed, also made by Dad, for all my babies. I had lots of babies and spent my days caring for them while listening to Mrs Dale’s Diary, Womans’ Hour, The Navy Lark and everything else that came out of the huge, wooden wireless that we called The Radio. Sometimes my mum had music programmes on, like The Billy Cotton Band Show. This was where I developed my love for piano, hearing Russ Conway. Years later, living in Blackpool, my mum took me to a variety show that Russ was in. The surprise was wonderfully overwhelming. I longed to play the piano like him. A decade of lessons and lots, well, perhaps not lots, of practice – I can play, but not like him. I grew up with whatever was on the radio, Light Programme, Home Service, even the Shipping Forecast. If the radio wasn’t on, it was because my mum was playing her records. I was familiar with those, too.

A little older and I remember being really unhappy at school. Sometimes we would have family friends and extended family over on a Sunday afternoon. I wished those carefree afternoons could last forever. I would dread them leaving, knowing I was a step closer to going to bed and school in the morning. It was the same if we went visiting anyone. Travelling home in the car with Sing Something Simple on the radio gave me that awful sinking feeling. It still does, but these days I can give a nostalgic smile.

My 13th birthday, November, 1968. School wasn’t any better but I was coping. My mum had been in hospital and we were happy she was home. She was sitting up in bed, smiling and wishing me a happy birthday. She passed me my wrapped present and said, “We didn’t know what to get you, so it’s just chocolates for now.” I thanked her, more than happy with chocolates, just glad to have my mum home. She laughed as I unwrapped the gift to reveal a box containing a pocket transistor radio, with an ear-piece and a cover. It was a Solid State Binatone something or other, very like the photo. I was thrilled. Tony Blackburn became my morning hero, brightening my day, making me laugh. In later days, with my mum up and about we listened to the Top Twenty together, usually in the kitchen making tea. I would set the table and butter bread. We sang along to Lily the Pink, Blackberry Way, Bend It, Ob-La Di Ob La Da, I’m the Urban Spaceman. I’m sure these songs weren’t all in the same pop chart, but these are the ones that come to mind. Happy times. I don’t know what happened to that little transistor, but I wish I still had it.

Radio is still my main day time choice rather than a silent house. I got fed up with Radio 2 when the powers that be decided to stop playing music from the ‘50s and ‘60s. I only listen to Johnnie Walker’s Sounds of the Seventies. When Ken Bruce moved to Greatest Hits Radio, so did I

My Haiku, just to capture a moment or two,

Setting the table
List’ning to the Top Twenty,
Just Mummy and me.

Buttering the bread,
Laughing at Lily the Pink.
Cold meat and salad.

Sing Something Simple,
The end to Sunday tea-time.
Thoughts of dreadful school.

PMW 2024

Thanks for reading, Pam x

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Solitaire - Alone

My mother loved her diamond solitaire ring and wore it all the time. It was a gift from my father, bought in Hatton Gardens on one of their trips to London. She was delighted with it and I watched it twinkling like a rainbow on her finger. It would have been dwarfed by Elizabeth Taylor’s diamond, but it was large enough to be the status symbol it was intended to be. Sadly, within the year, Mum became ill again and succumbed to the cancer she had battled off and on for three years. The ring was eventually passed on to my sister. It sparkles on her hand and looks lovely. I chose pieces of my mother’s jewellery for what they mean to me, yet I rarely wear them. There will always be the pain of loss and how life changed.

Singer Andy Williams cover of Neil Sedaka’s song, ‘Solitaire’. I can’t remember exactly when I first heard it, but for some reason I associate it with moving into the small bedroom – I think I’d swapped rooms with my sister – and sorting my belongings into the fitted furniture.  I listened to music all the time, records or radio and I really liked this song. For a week it was Radio Luxembourg’s powerplay, every hour, every show. To hear it now throws me right back to that moment in time and being seventeen.

‘Solitaire’ is a card game to play solo. I learnt it as ‘Patience’ but it’s the same thing. Cards are set out in a row of seven, first one face up, others face down. The next row, miss the first card, place a card face up on the second card then place cards face down along the rest of the row. Repeat until the last pile has six cards facing down and one facing up. Remaining cards will come into play as needed. The object of the game is to place cards in sequence, King at the top, Ace at the bottom, and alternating red and black. If a face-up card is moved on to another, the face down card can be turned over. Only a King can move into a space at the top. The remaining pile of cards can be turned one by one as needed. Completion would be four columns going from King to Ace in alternate colours. I’ve never introduced myself to a points system, I’ve just taken it as far as I can then either started again or made it work out –no, it’s not cheating when you’re playing by yourself.

I found this poem by John Updike,

Black queen on the red king,
the seven on the black
eight, eight goes on the nine, bring
the nine on over, place
jack on the queen. There is space
now for that black king who,
six or so cards back,
was buried in the pack.
Five on six, where's seven?
Under the ten. The ace
must be under the two.
Four, nine on ten, three, through.
It's after eleven.

 John Updike 1932 - 2009

Thanks for reading, Pam x

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Tapestry - Heavenly Stitches

 

‘Just another stitch in life’s rich tapestry’

I don’t know where the original quote came from but I used to say it a lot. I’ve heard variations of it on television programmes and read it in books but where it started eludes me. My dad heard me say it and loved it so much that he made it his own and drove me mad with it at least once a day. That was long ago. I used to say it at work back in those old days, 1970s, so I probably picked it up from a colleague. More recently I’ve heard ‘a dropped stitch in life’s tapestry’ when something has gone pear-shaped or not according to plan. I might try it out. There’s usually plenty of scope.

Somewhere in the attic, probably buried beneath other unfinished projects and my children’s  old school books, is my three-quarters completed tapestry of The Last Supper. No small starter kit for me. It was straight in for the epic masterpiece. The intention was to gift the finished work to the church I belonged to at the time, Raikes Parade Methodist. The church closed in 2003 and I think I’d already ‘rested’ the tapestry in favour of having a go at cross-stitch.  I’ve had one on the go for years. Not in the attic, well, not yet, anyway. It’s in the foot-stool where I keep needlework projects. Untouched for a while but not given up on. I struggle to see what I’m doing but I was given special magnifiers for Christmas which I hope will solve the problem. It might give me the incentive to dig out The Last Supper which was becoming quite a work of art.

A better work of art was my sister’s tiger, a large, beautiful tapestry that took her hours to do. I remember helping with the intricate embroidery details on the eyes. It’s so long ago that I could still see what I was doing. The finished tapestry was on the landing wall at the top of her stairs and looked stunning. I’ll have to ask her about it.

My young, impressionable music head was – and still is – dominated by The Moody Blues, but there was always a little space for other things. My fondness for female singers has always been limited to my daughter and not many others. One of the ‘not many’ is Carole King and her album which I love as much now as I did in the early ‘70s, Tapestry. I was spellbound by her soulful, almost mournful voice, and captured by her way with words. ‘You’ve Got A Friend’ spoke to me when I was down and troubled, nearly most of the time in those days.

I hope my dad's tapestry continues in Heaven, as I try not to drop too many stitches.

Carole King’s lyrics, poetry to me,

Tapestry

My life has been a tapestry
Of rich and royal hue
An everlasting vision
Of the ever-changing view
A wond'rous woven magic
In bits of blue and gold
A tapestry to feel and see
Impossible to hold

Once amid the soft silver
Sadness in the sky
There came a man of fortune
A drifter passing by
He wore a torn and tattered cloth
Around his leathered hide
And a coat of many colors
Yellow, green, on either side

He moved with some uncertainty
As if he didn't know
Just what he was there for
Or where he ought to go
Once he reached for something
Golden hanging from a tree
And his hand came down empty

Soon within my tapestry
Along the rutted road
He sat down on a river rock
And turned into a toad
It seemed that he had fallen
Into someone's wicked spell
And I wept to see him suffer
Though I didn't know him well

As I watched in sorrow
There suddenly appeared
A figure gray and ghostly
Beneath a flowing beard
In times of deepest darkness
I've seen him dressed in black
Now my tapestry's unraveling
He's come to take me back
He's come to take me back

by Carole King

Thanks for reading, Pam x

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Are Songs Poetry? - Yes

 Are songs poetry?

 That’s a broad question and something that my late friend and poet Christo Heyworth had an ongoing gentle debate with. It was concerning the songs of the Moody Blues, both Christo and I being ‘experts’ on their work. I was ‘yes’ because I find the lyrics to most of their songs poetic, depending on the writer, and all of their albums contain a poem by the late Graeme Edge, drummer and a founder member of the band. Graeme’s poems were performed or recorded as the spoken word set to music and often by Mike Pinder. Graeme’s poems which became actual songs include ‘I’ll Be Level With You’ from the Octave album. I showed Christo my prized copy of one of Graeme’s poetry books. As for songs being poetry, he was a definite ‘no’. I couldn’t persuade him otherwise, but we had some great conversations about it at poetry evenings. We discussed other things too, like the paintings of L.S.Lowry and Christo’s visits to poetry events in Much Wenlock, Shropshire. Christo was always excellent company with lots of interesting topics to share. I wonder what he might have thought of my other poetic song choices.

The lyrics of The Smiths, Morrissey, Oasis, Liam and Noel Gallagher, I can read as poetry. Their creative use of language appeals to me and really makes me listen. Liam’s ‘Paper Crown’ and Morrissey’s ‘Every Day is Like Sunday’ are just two examples of what would be a very long list. I was about sixteen when I first saw Raymond ‘Gilbert’ O’Sullivan on Top of the Pops singing ‘Nothing Rhymed’. There he was, an odd looking bloke with an over-sized cap, sounding a bit like George Formby. He captured my attention with the poetry of his words.

Not all songs can work as poems but poems can work as songs, and I don’t just mean The Song of Hiawatha by Longfellow – I can still recite the part I had to learn by heart in the first year of high school, but I’ll spare you that. I will complain that schools don’t include learning poetry by heart or even reading a whole book, from what I can gather. Anyway, that aside, Robert Burns wrote ballads and sang them, ‘My Love is Like a Red, Red Rose’ and ‘Auld Lang Syne’, two that come to mind.

Radio DJ and musician, Mike Read, wrote music to accompany some of John Betjeman’s poems. Quote from Wikipedia, “…Thirty of these songs were recorded by artists including Cliff Richard, David Essex, Gene Pitney and Marc Almond for the 2006 various artists’ album Words/Music, and subsequently re-released in 2008 as a double CD titled Sound of Poetry. Read’s production of the musical ‘Betjeman’ based on the above has occasionally been staged for charities, including the Royal Marsden Hospital and Children with Leukaemia.”  One of my favourites is David Essex singing Myfanwy.

With an apologetic nod to Christo, though I'm sure he wouldn't mind and would even expect it, I'll finish where I started with the Moody Blues. This time, John Lodge with 'my song', and to me, a poem.

  

One More Time to Live  -  John Lodge

Look out of my window
See the world passing by
See the look in her eye

One more time to live and I have made it mine
Leave the wise to write for they write worldly rhymes

And he who wants to fight begins the end of time...
For I have riches more than these
For I have riches more than these

Desolation
Creation
Tell me someone why there's only confusion
Evolution

Tell me someone that this is all an illusion
Pollution
Tell me someone
Saturation

Tell me someone
Population
Annihilation
Revolution

Tell me someone why this talk of revolution
Confusion
Tell me someone when we're changing evolution
Illusion

Tell me someone
Conclusion
Tell me someone
Starvation

Degradation
Humiliation
Contemplation
Changes in my life

Inspiration
Elation
Changes in my life
Salvation

Changes in my life
Communication
Compassion
Solution

Look out on the hedgerow
As the world rushes by
Hear the birds sign a sigh

One more tree will fall how strong the growing vine
Turn the earth to sand and still permit no crime
How one thought will live provide the others die
For I have riches more than these
For I have riches more than these

(From the album Every Good Boy Deserves Favour, 1971)

Thanks for reading, Pam x

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Flamboyant - Acceptance

 

When thinking about the word ‘flamboyant’, certain people come to mind, Laurence Llewelyn-Bowen, Oscar Wilde, Freddie Mercury, Mick Jagger and many more. They exude confidence, they can walk into a room full of people and immediately ‘own’ it without demand or arrogance. I think it is something they are born with rather than worked on. I haven’t seen the Rolling Stones live – it’s not too late, still doing it – but I’ve watched enough TV documentaries covering concerts to see that Mick Jagger takes command of every inch of a stage, every move a performance. Charisma. Maybe Flamboyant and Charismatic go hand in hand. I wouldn’t describe myself as either, but there was a time, a long time ago, when someone said I wore flamboyant clothes. They were not being friendly and the remark upset me.

At fifteen, I was uprooted from all that was mine, familiar and secure. Another pub in another town was to become home. School and friends left behind. I kicked up a fuss, but I wasn’t old enough to be listened to, apparently. Since the passing away of my mother and the swift remarriage that followed, the family dynamics were different and I’ve said before that I no longer fitted in. Throw into this toxic mix a good helping of normal, teenage angst and I’m sure you’ll still hear the screams.

Halfway through the fourth year, modern day Year 10, I started my new school – not following the same ‘O’ Level curriculum, so I had lots of catching up to do, or not. Forever the rebel, of course it was NOT. I soon discovered that I was going to find it difficult to adjust. A couple of the girls were friendly and helpful, happy to welcome the new girl and I was glad for that, but we were worlds apart in our interests. Before this major move, I’d enjoyed ice-skating on beat nights at least once a week. No ice rink here, but there was a disco dance at the town hall, on alternate Friday nights. I was invited to go.

I wore a long, summer skirt with a cheese-cloth blouse tied in a knot at the front and a pair of sandals that were getting worn out, but I wasn’t going to wear my school shoes. Instinct told me there would not be any secret cider drinking. Oh the joys I’d had to leave behind! I met my new friends, one greeting me with, “Do you always wear flamboyant clothes?” as she looked me up and down. Immediately I’d failed the ‘come out with us’ test and I didn’t dare ask what she meant, but my attire was a million miles away from their two-tone pencil skirts and checked shirts. Inside was worse. I quite like soul music these days. Years of being drip-fed Tamla Motown by various juke-boxes means that I know the words and I have favourites, but back then, it was like being forced to listen to something totally against my music religion. I liked the Rolling Stones, Fleetwood Mac (before the girls came), Yes, and my beloved Moody Blues. Some boys in baggy jeans and boots were in a line, bouncing out a tricky dance to Dave and Ansel Collins ‘Double Barrel’. Mods, Skinheads, whatever they were was the opposite to me, but as weeks passed into a month and the girls asked me to join them again, I tried to make an effort. After all, when in Rome…

I didn’t go completely mad, not quite. I earned extra pocket money by waitressing in the pub restaurant a few nights a week. It was train fare and skating money for trips back home. I used some to buy a Ben Sherman shirt and some cheap, straight-leg jeans from the market. My flared, embroidered ones wouldn’t blend in for the town hall dance. With nail scissors, I fashioned myself a feather-cut. Not my best move, but not too shabby. Frowned upon at home, but that was just because it was me and I was used to conflict. On the plus side, I mastered the ‘Double Barrel’ skippy moves at the dance. I can probably still do it, but I’m sure you don’t need proof.

At the Whit Week half term, I was packed off to family in London. A wonderful treat. I travelled alone on the train, met by my aunt at Euston, happy to be spending time with her and my younger cousins in Roehampton. Nothing was mentioned about my appearance, be it flamboyant or otherwise. I was wearing my normal, comfortable clothes with beads and sandals. By this time, I’d had a few more snips at my hair, which was also an unattractive  yellowy blonde. The things girls do! Within days, my aunt took me to the hair salon where my colour was toned down and my home-made cutting restyled into a proper shape. Next, a new dress and sandals, and me, spoilt again by my aunt. If my dad had asked for her intervention, she was tactful enough not to tell me so. The best news came towards the end of my stay. We were moving back home.

(If ever I'm back on a stage doing open-mic, I'll try to command it like Jagger. Just joking.)

My Haiku poem,

Flamboyant

I can’t fit in here,
I’m a fish out of water
And they stare at me

While they are dancing
To Dave and Ansel Collins,
That fast, skippy thing.

I learnt to do it,
Not that I was one of them,
More like “when in Rome”

Amused by my clothes,
They thought I was flamboyant,
Cheese-cloth shirts and jeans.

To try to blend in
I bought a Ben Sherman shirt,
It was a mistake.

I snipped at my hair
Attempting a feather-cut.
What a disaster!

Half-term in London,
Back to floaty tops and beads
And leather sandals.

With thanks to Auntie,
A cotton-print maxi dress
And a hairdresser.

PMW 2022

Thanks for reading, Pam x

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Misty - Play Misty for Me

There’s something mesmerising about watching Ailsa Craig emerging from the mist. The island isn’t moving at all, but the constantly changing cloud gives the illusion of her creeping forwards. Trips to this bit of Scotland always include a visit to Ballentrae and further along, Girvan. I could stay on this stretch of the Ayrshire coast all day, in all weathers. In fog, in misty rain, in low cloud, I’m comforted to know Ailsa Craig is there, exactly where she belongs.  Eventually I’ll witness how she looks in the perfect sunset of a clear day. I don’t mind waiting, fortunately.

Music has always figured in my life. I grew up with the beat of a juke box resonating from the pub downstairs, the radio, or wireless as it used to be when we listened to the Light Programme, and my mum’s records. We would set them up together, six or eight, I can’t remember exactly, but they sat at the top, held in place until it was time to drop on to the turntable. I knew all these 45s. Before I could read I could recognise each record and decide which order we would play them from Billy Fury, Anthony Newley, Cliff Richard and many more. Tommy Steele’s Little White Bull would be put back on for Singing Time on the flip side. A favourite was Misty, Johnny Mathis.

Years pass. My mum passed, too. I have my own place, my own records and with some reluctance, I learnt to play piano in my childhood and in a strange way, an hour or two playing Chopin or Mozart can bring comfort. There’s a film out called ‘Play Misty for Me’ with Clint Eastwood. I loved it and wished my mum could have seen it, for the song and to see how well Rowdy Yates was doing.

Many more years pass. We’re into CDs – not moved into MP3s or whatever – anyway, the radio is always on keeping music in the air. There’s a box of records in the attic. I still have my mum’s 45s. Some are older than me, or pretty close, and Misty will be in there. Cherished.

Look at me
I’m as helpless as a kitten up a tree
And I feel like I’m clinging to a cloud
I can’t understand,
I get misty, just holding your hand.

Walk my way,
And a thousand violins begin to play
Or it might be the sound of your hello
That music I hear,
I get misty the moment you’re near.

You can say that you’re leading me on
But it’s just what I want you to do,
Don’t you notice how hopelessly I’m lost
That’s why I’m following you.

On my own,
Would I wander through this wonderland alone
Never knowing my right foot from my left,
My hat from my glove,
I’m too misty, and too much in love.

Lyrics by Johnny Burke
Music by Errol Garner

Thanks for reading, Pam x

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Claims - What Did You Do, Radio 2?

I got a bit mad recently. Not red and raging, just a niggle that exploded and set me off looking for answers Victor Meldrew style.

It started off with Radio 2’s Pick of the Pops on Saturday afternoons. It fits just nicely between having lunch and watching the football – Blackpool FC on iFollow, home and away – and it is fun to guess what might be in the chosen Top Ten. I don’t claim to be a pop music buff but I grew up with a jukebox filtering through from the pub downstairs and a mum who liked her records so I was drip-fed the hits of the time. Over a few Saturdays, I grew disappointed that the ‘early hit-lists’ were from the ‘80s. I became more dismayed upon looking up pre-arranged schedules to discover only music charts from the ‘80s onwards were included. Anything after about 1985 is lost on me, unless it is something specific which attracted me. Horrified, I emailed BBC Radio 2, which claims to be the most listened to music radio station in the UK, politely asking if the chosen years were random or hand-picked and also making them aware that I am familiar with Sounds of the Seventies, Johnnie Walker and Sounds of the Sixties, Tony Blackburn, before they point me in that direction.

My email failed to warrant a reply, but, around that time someone had aired a complaint to Points of View along the same lines, and the reply from the Beeb explained that the BBC Radio 2 playlist covered forty years, from 1980. A similar announcement was made in the papers and said pre 1980 recordings would still be occasionally included, but would not be part of the main play-list. This was for everything, not just Pick of the Pops. Well, cheers, thanks for that. I switched from Radio 1 to Radio 2 for a reason, and now it seems they are one and the same. I’m not ready for Radio 3 all the time and Radio 4, though excellent, isn’t good for a morning sing in the shower.  I’m sure Zoe Ball is lovely, but I haven’t latched on to her taste in music.

I think I will have to explore Greatest Hits Radio, Absolute Radio or something similar for the bathroom radio. Wait a minute, Pick of the Pops on Saturday, 7th May, features 1969, yippee, lucky me. If anything can calm me down, the hits from '69 can.

My Haiku poem

Where is the music?
Where have all the good songs gone?
Eliminated.

Taken, just like that.
BBC Radio 2
Made the decision,

All pre ‘80s out,
Off the regular play-list.
Claims lack of int’rest.

PMW 2021

Thanks for reading and if you're venturing into the outdoors, please take care, Pam x

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Playing in the Band - Let's Rock

I wish I had a talent for music. A proper talent, not just the piano grades that my father’s expense and my reluctance to learn got me. That piano teacher was a horrid man. I spent years trying to wriggle out of going to his gloomy, unwelcoming house. I feigned illness on Saturday mornings, or stayed quiet and hoped my twelve o’clock lesson would be forgotten about but my ploys never worked and I would have to endure a miserable hour with the creep. And for all that, I still can’t play Fur Elise at the correct speed or Chopin’s lovely waltzes without constantly checking my finger positions. No confidence and certainly no natural talent, unlike some others in the family.

My son plays by ear. I was trying to get to grips with a Mozart piece on the piano in my usual slow, clumpy way. He just comes along and plays it, as easily as you like, because he knows the tune. I used to love hearing his electric guitar or bass coming down from his attic room. One day, he was belting out the intro to the Moody Blues ‘Story in Your Eyes’ and I nearly burst into tears at how perfect it was. His college was doing an entertainments evening and we, his parents, were invited to attend. We knew he was taking part, but didn’t know what he would be doing. I was unwell, full of a cold and full of appropriate medication to get me through the evening. I was not going to miss this event. He took to the stage. He was on bass, playing with a band. I recognised something he’d been practising at home.  They were excellent, well-rehearsed and ‘gelled’ together. I was relaxed into ‘Proud Mum’ mode when the scene changed and the spotlight was now on my son. The voice, I realised, was his, rocking 'Johnny B Goode' like a professional and making the stage his own. He was amazing. I don’t think I’d heard him sing since he was about seven. Here was a twenty-ish year old rock star making me tear-up like his first nativity. The things you miss when they grow up leave home and have kids. I think he’s still musical.

Our daughter is or was blessed with a wonderful, powerful singing voice. She reduced me to tears with a soulful rendition of Katie Melua’s ‘Closest Thing to Crazy’ in the car one day, just out of the blue. She had the same effect on her music teacher. She sang at home, so I heard her all the time and helped her to choose songs suited to the strength of her voice. Seeing and hearing her on stage held no surprises for me. I was ‘Proud Mum’ always, with lots of support. I’m sure I glowed with pride when others told me how her performance had blown them away. My response was always to say thank you and that everyone taking part was brilliant. She went on to do performing arts at college. These days, that fabulous voice is used for calling her children in from the garden or shouting for them to wait when they run ahead of her. I must ask her if she does much singing these days. What I’d give for her voice and a band to accompany me!

My wish came true, except it was my voice and I wouldn’t describe myself as a singer. I had a posh party for my sixtieth birthday a few years ago. As it was the ‘party to end all parties’ it was held at one of Blackpool’s finest hotels, I had live music from a local band and a nephew who is a professional musician. I wasn’t expecting to join the band on stage, but with some gentle persuasion (dragged up, no choice) and a compulsory funny hat, I found myself making a guest appearance. I think I was trying to sing ‘Rock the Casbah’ with the help of The Rattlers. I hope they were playing the same song. Someone somewhere has a video that I’ve never seen. Destroy it, please.

My own poem,

The Ballad of a Lady Jazz Singer

Jazz tempo piano and a bluesy guitar

It’s two a.m. in the Ritzy Bar.

Lorna sips gin through a long, curly straw

As she sits and waits, one eye on the door.

He said he’d be along to see her set

But he’d promised before – never made it yet.

Perched on a bar stool, cigarette in hand,

Minutes away from her spot with the band,

She leans a bit further back in her seat

And her red stiletto taps out the beat.

She’s laughing and swaying, about to begin,

Adrenaline rush, or too much pink gin.

She’s out of her mind, but not really crazy.

Her vision is soft-focus, smoky and hazy.

Tight black dress, short, strapless and low,

Only put on for this kind of show.

She clutches the mic stand, there’s a hint of a smile

Then she bangs out a song in her Joplin-esque style.

Heat and smoke hit hard on her throat

But she stays on key and keeps the right note.

Much clapping and cheering, the Ritzy’s alive

Lorna kept singing ‘til quarter to five

Then staggered out happy in the dawning new day

With her new bass playing lover leading the way.

 Pamela Winning  2014

Thanks for reading, keep safe and well, Pam x

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Blues - Don't Stop the Music

 

 

 

 

In my life, music soothes everything.  There’s a song for every occasion. Putting all the Christmas stuff away includes taking The Moody Blues ‘December’ album off the CD player. I will miss singing along to their version of In the Bleak Mid-Winter.  I got strange looks in church some years ago when it sounded like I’d made up my own descant.

Back to work, reasonably accepting that this is ‘my lot’ for a while longer, and hopefully just a little while.  I will do the best I can as we all do. We smile, we’re helpful, we care and not everyone appreciates us, but that’s life.  The other day was enough for me to remark that the season of goodwill was well and truly over and the chill of the waiting room was a result of the frostiness of the occupants. I’m speaking my mind, after all, being quiet hasn’t got me anywhere.

For those still carrying the winter blues, take a chill pill, put some music on and turn the volume up.

I’ve been listening to Tom Walker’s ‘What A Time To Be Alive’, a welcome Christmas gift. He’s more ‘indie pop/folk’ than ‘blues’, and younger than most musicians I listen to. My introduction to him was when he supported my favourite Moody Blues member, John Lodge on a solo tour a few years ago. You can be forgiven for thinking that I don’t move far from my favourite band, though my record and CD collection is eclectic.

It would seem that The Moody Blues have stopped touring as a band. No official announcement and so far, no farewell concerts, but it doesn’t matter. I’ve been fortunate to travel all over the country to many concerts on umpteen UK tours and have lots of good memories, some which have been shared on here from time to time. It is decades since I watched and listened in awe to a schoolboy rock band practising ‘Nights In White Satin’ at youth club, or sang along to ‘Question’ on the juke box in our empty pub. It has been an eventful journey of wonderful music. Long may it continue with the soloists.

Aside from the Moody Blues, I like the Rolling Stones ‘Let It Bleed’ album for its great bluesy tracks. And just for the record, Tommy Steele’s ‘Singing the Blues’ is the best cover.

With a blog theme of ‘Blues’, how could I resist the Moodies? And if you know me, you’ll understand and possibly yawn. Sorry.

I wrote this poem after a night at the London O2. We were moved from ground floor seating to higher up, which I didn’t want but it turned out to be a good experience in watching the arena fill up and observing other fans having a great night.

 

 

The Concert.

 

The lights are lowered, silence fills the arena

As the minstrels move through darkness on to the stage.

This is the moment, breathless anticipation,

Travelling eternity road has been an age.

 

Then a flute’s haunting melody rises above

Twin guitar riffs to take lead of the symphony.

Slow, bass drum, and applause reaches a crescendo,

Orchestral rock and voices singing harmony.

 

On the threshold of ecstasy, keeping the faith,

We’ve made this pilgrimage so many times before,

To be rewarded with autographs and handshakes

After waiting patiently outside the stage door.

 

PMW

 

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Music - Saved by the Music

“If music be the food of love, play on…” Twelfth Night, William Shakespeare.

 

Lots of us have an ‘Our Song’ or a piece of music which is meaningful and special, above and beyond all others. I find it uplifting when something significant comes on the radio and transports me back in time. If that particular time was happy, it’s nice to re-live that fond memory. If it belongs to a dark time, it’s good to reflect on how we coped and what changed. Challenges and experiences make us who we are.

I love music. I grew up with Sing Something Simple on Sundays long before the contents of the pub juke-box became important to me. My mother listened to the wireless Light Programme or played records, so I was effectively drip-fed her favourites. Tommy Steele’s Little White Bull, Acker Bilk’s Stranger on the Shore, Anthony Newley, Billy Fury, Neil Sedaka, Dusty Springfield, Joe Loss and his Orchestra, Elvis, and of course Russ Conway, amongst others. This was before The Beatles. She was young and trendy, my mum. I still have her record collection and just looking at them brings back childhood memories. There are lots of Russ Conway, singles and a couple of LPs. I don’t know if they were called albums in the 1950s. I think I’ve mentioned before that Russ Conway was responsible for me longing to learn to play the piano. I wanted to lift the lid on the old upright in the concert room and make music come out of it, not the out of tune honky tonk sound that someone knocked out of it on a Saturday night. What a blessing a juke-box was in later years.

I had years of classical training but I do not have musical talent. Occasionally I play on our electric piano, a cast off from a very talented nephew with a music degree. Our son can play piano, keyboard, guitar and bass, all perfectly well by ear. He’s amazing at that. Our daughter has a beautiful singing voice.

The first album I bought was The Rolling Stones, Through the Past, Darkly. The second was The Moody Blues, A Question of Balance followed quickly by In Search of the Lost Chord as I discovered there was MBs stuff I needed to catch up with.

The pub juke-box and The Moody Blues was and is the soundtrack to my life, as it constantly grows. No juke-box now, but the radio is always on, or a CD, YouTube or MP3. Music will always surround me, in any form.

When I was fortunate to meet Moody Blues bassist, singer, song-writer, John Lodge, I took the opportunity to tell him how glad I was that he had included ‘Saved by the Music’ in his solo tour. It is a song that means so much.

Hymns have their place amongst my favourites. As a child I was more than happy to sing in church. As an adult, I enjoyed teaching my Sunday School class new songs or hymns. It was a small group but they were enthusiastic and we had lots of fun.

 

When I started to write this poem, it seemed to grow legs and run off taking with it all the thoughts that were buzzing round my head. As a result, it is more personal than I intended, but what it is, is me.

 

 

My Music

 Music, my music, my loud surround sound,

I smiled and sang as my nemesis frowned.

Her eyes swept my room, not an inch unexplored,

But for now, my feelings were carefully stored.

I’m with The Moodies In Search of the Lost Chord.

 

I made that room spotlessly clean and sparkly

While the Stones carried on, Through the Past, Darkly;

Then busied myself with the next task to hand

And wasted no effort to understand

Her jealous resentment or what might be planned.

 

I’d given up wond’ring what she even means

As I sewed fabric flowers on my old jeans.

And Stevie belted out For Once in my Life

And I join in fully, like he knows my strife.

We could have slashed the atmosphere with a knife.

 

All I was saying was Give Peace a Chance.

I’m off at the weekend to spend time in France,

Away from that border-line aggression

When she hits the drinks in rapid succession

Attempting to cover her sick obsession.

 

Music, my music, my means of survival

And sanity, with her hasty arrival.

Bad mem’ries and nightmares, too much have amassed,

But those times are now long since gone, in the past,

And I’m Saved by the Music, myself, at last.

 

PMW 2019

Thanks for reading, Pam x

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Windmills - Rhyming in my Mind

I was washing glasses in our pub, hidden away in the ‘still room’ on my regular Friday night and Saturday night stint during the busy Illuminations, singing along to the music that drifted in.

There was a song on the jukebox in the front bar, a haunting melody that forced me to listen and beautiful, poetic lyrics that reached out to me. Any meaning in those words was lost on me, but being an impressionable hippy-ish rock-chick in my mid-teens, I’m proud to say that I learnt it off by heart. It is still up there with my favourites, sung by Noel Harrison.

 

The Windmills of Your Mind

 

Round like a circle in a spiral, like a wheel within a wheel
Never ending or beginning on an ever spinning reel
Like a snowball down a mountain, or a carnival balloon
Like a carousel that's turning running rings around the moon
Like a clock whose hands are sweeping past the minutes of its face
And the world is like an apple whirling silently in space
Like the circles that you find in the windmills of your mind.

 

Like a tunnel that you follow to a tunnel of its own
Down a hollow to a cavern where the sun has never shone
Like a door that keeps revolving in a half forgotten dream
Or the ripples from a pebble someone tosses in a stream
Like a clock whose hands are sweeping past the minutes of its face
And the world is like an apple whirling silently in space
Like the circles that you find in the windmills of your mind.

 

Keys that jingle in your pocket, words that jangle in your head
Why did summer go so quickly, was it something that you said?
Lovers walking along a shore and leave their footprints in the sand
Is the sound of distant drumming just the fingers of your hand?
Pictures hanging in a hallway and the fragment of a song
Half remembered names and faces, but to whom do they belong?
When you knew that it was over you were suddenly aware
That the autumn leaves were turning to the color of her hair!

Like a circle in a spiral, like a wheel within a wheel
Never ending or beginning on an ever spinning reel
As the images unwind, like the circles that you find
In the windmills of your mind.

 

Songwriters: Marilyn Bergman / Michel Legrand / Alan Bergman

 

It was the theme song to The Thomas Crown Affair, a major film at that time, and I wonder if the lyrics might make more sense to me if I actually saw the film, or the more recent remake? It will be something else to do in my retirement.

There’s always fun to be found in doing new things. I’ve lived in Blackpool since 1965, a long time in South Shore, but never travelled on a train from Blackpool South until this year. That rail adventure with my friend took us to Lytham for lunch and a pleasant stroll along the front to the fabulous, white windmill which holds centre stage on the green. Another first. The closest I’d previously been to Lytham Windmill was the main road.

I found this poem,

 

The Windmill

 

 

Behold! a giant am I!
Aloft here in my tower,
With my granite jaws I devour
The maize, and the wheat, and the rye,
And grind them into flour.

I look down over the farms;
In the fields of grain I see
The harvest that is to be,
And I fling to the air my arms,
For I know it is all for me.

I hear the sound of flails
Far off, from the threshing-floors
In barns, with their open doors,
And the wind, the wind in my sails,
Louder and louder roars.

I stand here in my place,
With my foot on the rock below,
And whichever way it may blow,
I meet it face to face,
As a brave man meets his foe.

And while we wrestle and strive,
My master, the miller, stands
And feeds me with his hands;
For he knows who makes him thrive,
Who makes him lord of lands.

On Sundays I take my rest;
Church-going bells begin
Their low, melodious din;
I cross my arms on my breast,
And all is peace within. 

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (1807 - 1882)

 

Thanks for reading, Pam x

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What If - Everything Vanishes

 

A Happy New Year to you.

One thing after another has prevented me from being an active blogger in recent weeks. I’m very happy to be back.

I over-think things. I worry. My head is full of the crazy imaginings of ‘worst case scenarios’ and if the thoughts were visible it might look like a flow chart of What Ifs. Actually no, because flow charts are organised and logical, and my mind is not.

The cruel What Ifs are currently busy. Recent health issues made me give in and reluctantly visit the doctor. Tests, then more tests and a hospital referral to reassure me, only it doesn’t  reassure, the prospect is something I find scary and full of What Ifs. These particular What Ifs, dormant during my busy day, line up and take turns to confront me when they are magnified by my tiredness.

A saying from childhood keeps coming back to me, ‘If ifs and ands were pots and pans there’d be no work for tinker’s hands’. I don’t know what it really means, feel free to enlighten me, but I think it’s telling me not to worry about things I can’t control.

Our fourth grandchild, a girl, is days away from being born. She could decide to arrive any time and we are excited to meet her. Our daughter and her partner want me to be there at the birth, as I was for their boys, and I hope I can be. This is another set of What Ifs, dearie me, but these are nice ones.

Here are a few of my worrying thoughts.

 

What if I lose the desire to write?

What if I don’t have the power to fight?

What if the words start refusing to rhyme?

What if I find I’m running out of time?

What if I go off Italian food?

What if my mood is forever subdued?

What if I can’t have Tia Maria?

What if I can’t feel my loved ones are near?

What if I can’t hear the music I choose?

What if there’s no Mozart or Moody Blues?

What if I forget all that I have known?

What if I forget all that I was shown?

 

  

Thanks for reading, Pam x

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Red Letter Day - Manchester 2004

I can’t possibly write on the theme ‘Red Letter Day’ without mentioning The Moody Blues. Sorry if you’ve heard it all before and if you know me you will have had chapter and verse for years – I’ll try to keep it brief.

I’ve lost count of how many concerts I’ve attended and which towns and cities I’ve stayed in ‘on tour’. I loved being on my home turf at the Manchester Apollo, 2004, waiting outside after the show, as close to their tour bus as possible. This ritual has rewarded me many times with waves, smiles, autographs and photos, usually in the nano-second it takes for a band member to emerge from the stage door and climb onto the huge, state-of-the-art motor home style of transport and disappear behind the one-way windows. I stepped inside once. Invited, of course, not gate-crashing. I was allowed up the steps into the front, next to the driver from where I could pass my concert programme to the guys for signing. They were on the other side of a low partition.  Breathless with excitement, I was so incredibly happy to be there. The previous eight or nine months I had spent in treatment for cancer. My personal goal was to recover sufficiently in time for this concert, which had been booked long before my diagnosis and it was great to have achieved it. I stood trembling with joy, hardly looking my best and feeling a bit vulnerable with newly growing hair. I was braving it without my usual bandanna. I’d taken to wearing red lipstick and dangly ear-rings like it was my feminine fashion statement. We all smiled. I said ‘Thanks for the music’ in a shaky voice and stepped down to the pavement, my treasured possession of a signed programme held close. It was over in seconds and meant the world to me.

There have been many concerts over the years. Every UK tour means at least three dates and for those further than Manchester we book a hotel. We’ve had holidays in London wrapped round concerts at the O2 and the Royal Albert Hall. I’ve collected more autographs, photographs and had longer chats with band members and their musicians, but most of all I have happy memories of what they bring to the stage and the music which is the sound-track to my life.

 

The Dream

 

When the white eagle of the North

Is flying overhead

And the browns, reds and golds of autumn

Lie in the gutter, dead

 

Remember then, the summer birds

With wings of fire flaying

Come to witness spring’s new hope

Born of leaves decaying

 

As new life will come from death

Love will come at leisure

Love of love, love of life

And giving without measure

 

Gives in return a wondrous yearn

Of a promise almost seen

Live hand-in-hand

And together we’ll stand

 

On the threshold of a dream

 

                  Graeme Edge

Thanks for reading, Pam x

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The Great Masters

The Great Masters - Art or Music?

I chose music.

As a child I hated going to piano lessons. It was my dread for years between the ages of ten to fourteen, when I convinced my father that I really needed to concentrate on my ‘O’ levels and leave classical music out for a while. The problem was the teacher. A horrid, fat man with a tobacco stained moustache who taught his pupils in a small, stuffy, upstairs room in his unwelcoming house. Looking back, he reminds me of a Stephen King character, from Needful Things, I think. The air was always thick with his constant cigar smoke. I didn’t like his podgy fingers putting mine on the right keys and I didn’t like him leaning over me to scribble instructions on my music with his thick pencil. I never read them and got told off every week for ignoring his notes. I was constantly in trouble for not practising enough and not doing my theory homework. I managed to get a few grades, somehow.

Russ Conway started it. I loved hearing him on the radio playing favourites like Side Saddle and China Tea. There was always a piano in our pubs and I wanted to play like Russ. I was delighted when at age seven my hands could just about span an octave, which meant I was ready to learn. At first it was good and I soon played short melodies and nursery rhyme tunes. By the time I was ten, I’d had enough, but wasn’t allowed to leave. I would try anything to get out of going. At this time my lesson was on a Saturday morning and I wouldn’t mention it, in the hope that both my parents would forget and no one would take me. It never happened. Pleas to pack it in were dismissed as I was told I would regret it if I didn’t carry on. They weren’t sitting at an upright piano in that smelly, foggy room for an hour. I was running out of excuses for not doing the music prep as set out. The teacher and I had a mutual dislike of each other. Escape finally came when I entered fourth year at school and the focus was on GCE exams and in some subjects, CSE projects. I rejoiced in being free from the dreadful man and played the piano even more for my own enjoyment.

Fast forward about three years. I began lessons again. I found a music teacher I could get on with. My piano world became filled with the music of the great masters, Chopin, Beethoven and my favourite, Mozart. I liked to play contemporary composers, too, Scott Joplin and George Gershwin.

I still have a piano, although I don’t play it very often. I’ve always encouraged my children and will do the same with my grandchildren. I’m thankful for the music skills that piano lessons gave me. Even those hours with the horrid man weren’t entirely wasted. I am well taught but certainly not musically talented. I just wish I could play Russ Conway stuff – it still eludes me.

And appropriately, just days away from Mozart's birthday, I found this poem, written by the very talented Garrison Keillor.

 

Birthday Poem for Mozart

 When Mozart was three, he began to play the clavier;

      When he was five, he began to compose;
      When he was ten, already launched on his career,
      He began to worry about his hair and clothes.
     “Am I cool?” he wondered. “Is this the wig I should be wearing
      Or should I have gotten the brunette?
      Are these kneebritches baggy? Why is everyone staring?
      I wonder if they’ll like my new quartet.”
     Even a genius is full of doubts
      About his looks and the future and whether the third movement should’ve been rhythm,
      And though the audience stands and claps and shouts
      Bravo, he wonders if anyone would like to go have a drink with him?

He and his wife Constanza were not so astute

      When it came to money. No, not them.
      So after he’d finished writing The Magic Flute
      He had to get busy on the Requiem.
      He had to pay for their extravagances
      So his work was never done.
      Serenades and German Dances
      And the Piano Concerto No. 21
      To pay for clothes and wine and gelati
      And the expense of yet one more infant he
      Composed the Exsultate Jubilate
      And the Jupiter Symphony.
      Had he and Mrs. Mozart avoided going in debt
      And been cautious and frugal,
      He might’ve written on small motet
      And maybe a concerto for bugle.

 Thank you, Mozart, for being so prolific

      And by the way your hair looks terrific.  
    
                                           Garrison Keillor    


Thanks for reading, Pam xhday Poem for Mozart

When Mozart was three, he began to play the clavier;
When he was five, he began to compose;
When he was ten, already launched on his career,
He began to worry about his hair and clothes.
“Am I cool?” he wondered. “Is this the wig I should be wearing
Or should I have gotten the brunette?
Are these kneebritches baggy? Why is everyone staring?
I wonder if they’ll like my new quartet.”
Even a genius is full of doubts
About his looks and the future and whether the third movement should’ve been rhythm,
And though the audience stands and claps and shouts
Bravo, he wonders if anyone would like to go have a drink with him? He and his wife Constanza were not so astute
When it came to money. No, not them.
So after he’d finished writing The Magic Flute
He had to get busy on the Requiem.
He had to pay for their extravagances
So his work was never done.
Serenades and German Dances
And the Piano Concerto No. 21
To pay for clothes and wine and gelati
And the expense of yet one more infant he
Composed the Exsultate Jubilate
And the Jupiter Symphony.
Had he and Mrs. Mozart avoided going in debt
And been cautious and frugal,
He might’ve written on small motet
And maybe a concerto for bugle. Thank you, Mozart, for being so prolific
And by the way you

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