Dutch trip #1

Two pairs of concerts in the Netherlands, the second in June, started yesterday in Meppel & continue today near Leiden... more specifically: Chateauhotel en restaurant De Havixhorst & Kasteel de Wittenburg.

A (very wise) business here has four centres and they provide entertainment for each every year... and we are the chosen act this year.

Lovely audience last night and excellent food... all splendid.

We were introduced, and interviewed live by Lut Van der Eycken - a presenter on Belgian classical radio channel, Klara

Hoorah for Holland - good to be back...

Keswick - Funny Side

Last weekend we had a (really short) sojourn in very north England.
Keswick was the destination for our first ever Funny Side of the Street - and splendid it was too.  All the new stuff seemed to work and people even laughed.... well, what can you do?
Some were especially touched by Steve's rendition of Tim Minchin's Not Perfect - and no, we have not recorded it ... yet!
As Mike said (& Richard wrote) we had on stage a mass murderer, a spotty adolescent, a hairy nun & a cross-dressing lumberjack ...and that was just the performers!  I was certainly finding it difficult not to laugh at times.... especially in the Hee Bee Gee Bees' Meaningless Songs & Barry Cryer's Peace & Quiet...

Wonderfully accompanied by Chris Hatt, as ever, and he, in turn, was accompanied by Sian and the three cherubs... how glorious...

Steve and I went home though the early night (Steve drove) and were in London by three; allowing me to go on holiday to Cornwall the next day... hence the lateness of this missive...

New things

Lots of new things on offer...

We have been busy preparing new songs for our show On the Funny Side of the Street - lots of new stuff for us; the show is a selection of funny UK material... from Monty Python (not just Lumberjack...), Hee Bee Gee Bees, Instant Sunshine, Barrys Cryer & Took, Tim Minchin (yes OK, he is Australian, but he has lived here for years), Flanders & Swann, Coward and Stilgoe - we have been finding it hard to not collapse laughing in rehearsal!

We are preparing also, a few new songs for publishing by Edition Peters - we'll say as soon as we know more...

We are three-quarters through a new CD with pianist Malcolm Martineau - working title, Songs of Love and War... if only the venue of recording (Champs Hill), MM, we & the producer were available on the same day (ever), we'd be able to finish it soon... as soon as we know etc...

Also another digital CD release - Hear no Evil... from 1984 - will happen in late April.

More news on all this soon,
Have a Happy Easter...

550th event at Middle Temple

In the auspicious surroundings of Middle Temple Hall, last night we helped celebrate
The Worshipful Company of Tallow Chandlers' 550th birthday - this was just their small event for 320 people!  (Their big party is in October)

Brass fanfares and music rang around the Hall, and the food was also glorious.

The throng were especially delighted when we made (slightly negative) reference in a song to their rival Livery Company, The Wax Chandlers - these ancient enmities are terribly important still it seems!  They are sure that this rivalry is the origin of the phrase to be at sixes and sevens, as they vied for sixth place in the Livery Company list, and eventually agreed to alternate these positions; my wiki research suggests many other ideas... but perhaps they know best!

They were all in excellent voice for the National Anthem and sung grace, and the Company does lots of fine charitable work:
Good old Edward IV for setting them up!

Great posters of our time #1

Not great quality - apologies - but can you spot the deliferate mistale (© Terry Jones & Michael Palin)?
How do you translate mélange?

Then again, our bland is pretty wonderful...

Trinity Examiners

Splendid evening in a Birmingham hotel...
Entertaining a large group of Trinity Examiners, who are in the middle of a conference.
Never have we had such an attentive audience... we were expecting a written report at the end... very much hoping a positive one!
Their singing in Lambeth was especially good; although I did naughtily tell them that we tended to get a better response in Germany...
We thought it rather likely, as this was a meeting of musicians, and lo, two of us met old friends here... one of whom said she would help us get to The Czech Republic; she and I toured Czechoslovakia 22 years ago!
Hoorah!

World Première... in Croydon

Just went to a World Première of an opera written over a hundred years ago.

Croydon [great town] composer Samuel Coleridge-Taylor is being celebrated in that fine London borough as he died 100 years ago this year.
My old friend Jonathan Butcher (conductor) has resurrected the piece with Surrey Opera (as the first part of year-long SC-T fest) - two more nights at the Ashcroft Theatre if you are game! - 7.30pm on Friday and Saturday... splendid...
An old Cantabile friend, Chris Cowell, helped re-write the libretto of the show... it was the weak libretto which was probably the reason that the thing was never put on when it was written.

Should the idea of a faux Norse saga, Thelma, stir your loins... get to Croydon now!