Words and music at Writersfest

In anticipation of this autumn's Writers' Festival M and I headed out to Southminster United Church for 'Vinyl Tap Storie s' with the legendary Randy Bachman. Known to me by reputation through songs such as 'You Ain't Seen Nothing Yet' but without having heard his Vinyl Tap radio programme, it was interesting to see and hear the man behind the hits.

Southminster United Church looked pretty much full as 7pm came and host Laurence Wall came onstage. The evening started by scene setting in 1960s Winnipeg and covered Bachman's early musical life with plenty of humourous 'on the road' stories. Most of the remaining time was spent discussing the origins of songs such as 'American Woman' and 'Taking Care of Business'. A very appreciative audience warmly applauded anecdotes and snippets of music. The 'B.B. King story' was one of my particular favourites, as well as the 'piano man' story related to 'Taking Care of Business'. The hour was over very quickly, but the book-buying and autograph queue looked to contain most of the crowd!

The 'festival proper' starts on 20th October with 'What My Grandma Means To Say' featuring JC Sulzenko, with New York Night later on. The musical speciality evening (for me, anyway) comes on Sunday 23rd in conjunction with Music and Beyond; Wendy Lesser and the Arthur-Leblanc Quartet perform music by Shostakovich in an evening entitled 'Music for Silenced Voices'. All in all a very interesting weekend to come.

Comments

Pigeon Funk

Notes on a very random purchase. Earlier today I acquired Venetian Snares 'Rossz Csillag Alatt Sz ü letett ' purely on the basis of the language and artwork. Its certainly something different - and most definitely not pop. After a bit of searching: Venetial Snares is, according to Wikipedia, the performing name of Aaron Funk, who seems to specialise in experimental tracks in odd time signatures. Article here . The sleeve notes for this album (whose title is Hungarian for 'Born under a bad star') poses the question: what if, for just a day, we could both be pigeons? Interessant. Apparently this concept (a day in the life of a Hungarian pigeon) is non-typical of Venetian Snares sound, but one could ask, does Mr Funk do 'typical'? On first listening, the sound of this CD mixes classical/traditional Hungarian sounds and breakbeats. but aside from that? Definitely a 'listen for yourself' artist; try the website , fan site or myspace .

Hidden Witness

Moving house completed - for now - and we are back in the Vale of Evesham. The wonders of Facebook unearthed a live gig and St Richard's Hospice fundraiser by slow-burning band Hidden Witness so off we went for an evening out in Worcester. I honestly can't remember the last time either of us did that.... cue pleasant surprise at our venue for the evening, Keystones Cafe Bar . Quite open and spacious in terms of standing room, reasonably large stage and a bar ensconced in the remaining medieval walls - much more atmosphere than many other small bars... A busy few weeks meant I hadn't had time to check out Hidden Witness' SoundCloud page so I had fresh ears and no expectation. The support band, The Miffs , were ok, with a few engaging covers, but sadly (for my ears) nothing memorable. After a short break - in which the background music made me feel both young and old simultaneously - Dan, Chris, Neil and Dan took the stage for an interesting set. A few ...

Mini update

I have finally sorted out my site links to reflect some new/renewed interests and my current location. We have something of a National Arts Centre bonanza shortly: I had already booked to see Angela Hewitt on 16th Feb but found a good ticket offer on LivingSocial.com to see Radu Lupu this coming Wednesday, 26th. In addition to all that, New Yorker music critic Alex Ross (his recent book, Listen To This , is excellent, as well as his previous tome, The Rest Is Noise ) is giving a talk there on 13th February. This is all followed in March by a complete about turn to the Bronson Centre to see Finnish band Apocalyptica . They have been somewhere on my radar for a while but I was spurred on to book tickets after a bout of nostalgia. M and I were regular visitors to Wolverhampton UK to see various bands at Civic Hall/Wulfrun Hall; a few months ago a mutual friend posted on that there Facebook thing about seeing said Apocalyptica at Wulfrun Hall. Nostalgia for the venue and renewed intere...

PrettyInScarlett

Search This Blog