End of the year gigs...

At the Forge...




...the Camden Forge

Blogging requires time, and photos to hand. I didn't have much of either in November and December! So here I am in the snows of January with my memories of the end of 2011.

There was the gig at the Camden Forge with some Flying Aces. Earlier that day I'd rescued a sick fox at the back of a pub in Hanwell.

A week later, or was it the next day? The Lovely Parlour Trio and I were on BBC Radio London's Saturday Breakfast Show, performing live. Jon Butterfield played their wonderful trusty studio upright, Matt Redman treated us to his guitar, and Nick Ball played spoons and washboard, a first for the studio. We did Button Up Your Overcoat and The Honeysuckle and the Bee. Listeners phoned in to say how good it was to hear something that wasn't anything to do with "X Factor Crap". I only quote. Joanne Good and Simon Lederman are the most fun, generous, fabulous people possible.

Photo by David Rowley. Ellen Smith, Patricia Hammond, Zita Syme.

Then I joined Ellen Smith, BEAUTIFUL harpist and Zita Syme, BEAUTIFUL soprano, to adorn the library of the Reform Club. We all wore red, and processed in singing the Hodie from Britten's Ceremony of Carols. Ellen can sing, too. I found a fabulous book on the shelves there: Ronald Firbank's "The New Rhythum" and other pieces. 

A random quote: 

"'He looks ever so much more like Narcissus than Apollo,' said Wildred, and seating himself on the river bank he recited to the first moonbeam that touched the lake, a poem of Verlaine." 

Then went to Switzerland to sing Rossini in a church at the top of an icy hill. It was recorded and photographed, but I have neither...yet.

Hugely looked forward to Ragtime Parlour's return engagement when I got back, and we tried out "Moonlight Bay", as it was written in 1912. A nice, neat century ago. Some dandy footage was taken, but if anyone knows how to edit MTS files, and intercut them with MP4 files, and overlay a WAV recording, please let me know! Then maybe those who weren't there can see how much fun we all had.

But as to the voice and harp combination, here's one Ellen Smith and I did a year ago. I'm wearing my pioneer grandma's pearls.