A Lark Ascending

Are you using the right site, bvy? The old one is still up (with a co.uk suffix). This one is on a totally new site.

I've been reading it since the late 70s - the biggest change I've noticed in recent years is that the writers are as likely to have become interested in classical music as a result of listening to Emerson, Lake and Palmer as from the what they heard in the music room at Eton or at Mummy's soirees. When I first started reading it there was an assumption that you already knew certain things - it had a rather gentlemen's clubby atmosphere. Today its writers seems very aware that the person reading the magazine might be right at the start of an interest in music, with a very limited background. Some can still be snooty at times but thankfully most seem more concerned to share an enthusiasm for music rather than show off how hard it is to impress them. Its changes reflect the social changes of the last half-century in Britain where interest in classical music has broadened beyond the social and intellectual elites who once saw it as their exclusive domain. ********** I seem to recall the jazz reviews were there in the late 70s, disappeared in the 80s, came back again for a short time (can't recall when), then vanished for good.

It wouldn't initially accept my user name as two words (a space might be not accepted). As one word it was happy! Might be worth trying.

The UK classical magazine 'Gramophone' has a new site which it claims has every word written since 1923! A quick registration and you are in. Should be a mind-boggling resource! http://www.gramophone.net/

If we're all more or less forced to buy online by the disappearance of the CD shop the question for the producers will be 'why bother to put it on a physical product at all if you can remove all the storeage, distributions costs just by streaming it (music and packaging)?'. As long as they know there is a large body of consumers who will not accept downloading they'll stick with the CD. But a tipping point will come where enough of even the more traditional recording buyers (e.g me!) start to accept downloading. At that point the physical CDs will start to disappear (apart from some vanity labels (a bit like those who continue to put out vinyl for a niche market)). I think it will happen very quickly - like the LP/CD changeover in the late 80s (which followed an initial period of suspicion). And as with LP there will be a small body of collectors who will continue to feel that the new format is inferior to the old. But I suspect the bulk of people who want to buy music (not just kids and people with cloth ears) will adapt. For me the disappearance of the Fopps, Zavvis etc is of interest because I grew up and lived most of my life buying from record shops. On the rare occasions I visit a big town or city these days I find it strange to not have a place to browse for recordings. But I'm happy to forsake that for the greater flexibility of downloading. I know I'm in a minority on a board like this with that outlook. We'll just have to see how things play out.

I'm likely to see in the New Year with a lot of lesser known Sibelius. Andrew Barnett's bio has really piqued my interest to explore beyond the symphonies/violin concerto/tone poems/Kullervo that I've known for years. Fortunately this has been extensively recorded on Bis and Bis are on e-music!

I always found Fopp a bit random - you could find complete surprises, could rely on a wide range of Blue Notes and Fantasy stuff at cheap prices. Yet full price was more expensive than the main shops. But it wasn't the sort of place you could go into expecting to find certain core recordings/performers represented. The little I saw of Zavvi in its short life was pitiful. They seemed to have classical, folk, blues, jazz etc all jumbled up as 'specialist' music. The choice was limited to things that had made some sort of splash via awards etc. That just leaves HMV which has gone the same way as Zavvi. There were dire warnings about them last Xmas. I wouldn't be surprised to see them go in the current cull, wiping out CD sales from not just middling but major towns in Britain (apart from the supermarkets and ahandful of independents). I don't think it was the deciding factor but I wonder if 'diversification' has been a contributory cause of these collapses. Instead of concentrating on what they know, these stores have tried to get involved in DVD, mobile phones, books, tea shirts etc - one-stop entertainment shops - in search of bigger profits. That has taken away their distinctiveness and put them in direct competition with all the other stores who have 'diversified'. They were bound to lose out to the supermarkets.

Risorganissimento 'The Revival'

It seems a middling British chain is going under on a daily basis at the moment. The Woolworths collapse (a big chain) has an interesting implication for physical CDs. For some time Woolies and WH Smiths have been the only places you'd find CDs in the centre of a middling market town like Worksop. Only a small selection of popular recordings but at least a place for young buyers to start. With Woolies gone that just leaves Smiths. Soon, if you want the latest Abba Compilation or debut CD by a TV talent show winner, you're going to have to head out to the supermarkets on the periphery. The end of the CD may be much nearer than even I've predicted.

I remember when that Tower had a big rack full of the whole series of Jazz 625 VHSs. I should have bought the lot, instead of just the 4 or 5 I did pick up ! I recall - and it can't be more than ten years ago - spending a good hour rooting through a rack on the wall in Ray's (in its Shaftesbury Avenue days) devoted exclusively to Classics CDs. A real experience - would they have the ones I was looking for?

'Organissimoans' could have so many meanings!!!! Have a jolly Xmas and a topping New Year, y'all.

Finished a couple of 'location' thrillers at the weekend. Both great fun: The first one part of Donna Leon's marvellous Brunetti series set in and around Venice; the second in Provence. Just starting: I found his last one ('Depths') unreadable - gave up after 70 pages. The first chapter of this one is much more engaging. Hoping for something with the narrative drive, multiple sub-plots and character depth of the Wallander series.

I love going to live events but their joys can be overstated - for every vital, totally engaging performance there are many that just go through the motions. Or where you are just not properly alert - too tired, drunk one too many beers, just listless. All of which effects home listening - but you don't have that thought 'Gosh, why did I come all this way?' Two places I really enjoy recorded music: a) Driving - I'm probably quite wrong here but music and driving seem to use different bits of the brain. I can get really tuned into a CD whilst driving (unlike reading (or typing!) and listening to music where one or the other gets tuned out). b) Solo walking - ipod, walkperson or whatever. A nice wander in the country with appropriate music can be quite magical. Maria Schneider's 'Concert in the Garden' has never sounded better than when I listened to it in the gardens of Cordoba and Seville a few years back. But I do like live music too. I've not done a jazz one since the end of May. Must try harder!

I know you're right that live jazz has something that recorded jazz doesn't. But it's not an option for everyone. I live a good distance from the closest places that play jazz (and they are 95% home grown concerts), most of which happen on week nights where my job (and sheer exhaustion) prevents me from making the drive. For international musicians you're talking 90 minutes plus each way. So most of my live listening tends to be in intense bursts at festivals or where a concert a bit further afield coincides with a Saturday or a holiday. Every September I look at the regular Nottingham/Sheffield programmes (both about 45 minutes drive away - public transport doesn't happen to my little country town late at night) and mark half a dozen I'm definitely going to attend. This autumn I made none! As regards classical music, I prefer to listen at home rather than the concert hall.

Albums (or downloads!!!!), concerts, tours, festivals, books, projects... In the near future: Julian Arguelles has two CDs slated for early 2009. Enrico Rava's January ECM with Stefano Bollani, Larry Grenadier and Paul Motion. The first full CD by a great young English folk collaboration - Mawkin/Causley. And there must be a new English Acoustic Collective this year! Been waiting for ages! A bit nervous about... Bath and Cheltenham this year. With UK festivals seizing up all over in the current economic climate, a bit worried that the fist might drift a bit further into world music in order to draw off a wider base, the latter may have to cut back on the more off the wall stuff.

Answer as you please...as a listener, musician, impresario, record label owner... I find every year has its own shapes and enthusiasms. The thing that strikes me about my listening this year is how little newly issued music I went for. Partly a result of not getting to many concerts. Also a bit of weariness at some of the people I've really enjoyed on the UK scene in recent years going a bit too much for the youth/punk/electronica/indie market. Earlier in the year a period of immersion in Ellington led into a wonderful investigation of pre-bop jazz which I've only previously toyed with. The 'That Devilin' Tune' series really helped there; also led me into some of the byways of the bop years and ultimately into the 'cool' 50s (with help from the Gioia book). An autumn wallow in classic jazz guitar also proved a delight; and, more tentatively, I've enjoyed exploring some of the more 'out' jazz of Braxton and the like (though it will never be centre ground for me). Folk music reappeared at various points in the year, mainly thanks to the amazing burgeoning of young performers willing to play without recourse to added effects (drum machines, rock beats etc). Some marvellous English releases this year. But the big revival was classical music - something I fell into in the late 70s alongside jazz and folk, focused on almost completely in the 80s and then allowed to be an occasional visitor as jazz retook centre stage. The revival of the Lyrita label spearheaded a lot of English listening. But starting last Xmas I found myself drawn to baroque and early music in a way I'd never experienced before. Messiaen made big inroads in August, a lot of Russian as the year ended. Having been scared off contemporary classical in the early 90s by a combination of the obscure and unapproachable of hardline modernism and the saccharine nature of some of the more melodious new classical music, an article in Gramophone in May got me exploring again. It was great to find composers who I could both understand and relate to - Lindberg, Adams, Sallinen, Takemitsu, Higdon - and some modern classics that I'd never been interested in before (Glass, Reich). So all in all, another rich and rewarding year. Where did 2008 take you?

Although I was a quick convert to CD and am very happy with the move to downloads, I do miss the old LP sleeves and agree with those above that they were part of the experience and enjoyment...not essential, but something that added an extra layer of pleasure. Many's the time I sat on a bus returning from town, lost in the glories of the packaging! I certainly remember gazing into the record shop in Newquay, Cornwall, at the start of the 70s, longing for these mysterious, unattainable (on my pocket money!) discs. And those sleeves still have an iconic status that can transport me back 35 years when I see them. Two examples of how influential they could be: a) When I started buying classical records many of them used famous paintings as the artwork. Got me interested in the history of painting and visiting galleries (nothing else in my upbringing or education would have brought me there!). b) In 1972 I bought Fairport Convention's 'Liege and Lief'. Inside the gatefold were some curious images and texts about British customs like Pace-egging and Mummers' Plays. That sleeve got my attention and made me curious about a world that was as foreign to me as the cottonfields of Mississippi. So sleeves didn't just enhance the music you were listening to; they could take you to quite other areas of experience. I'd prefer Mosaics with original art but can see why they don't do it. As has been said before, it's not too hard to find it online these days. A quick copy, paste and print and you can create your own alternative sleeve for the black and white boxes.

I love jazz vocals and they come in many forms. Most of the above are favourites but here are three very different takes: Betty Carter - to my mind, the ultimate 'jazz' singer. She does vocally what the instrumentalists do intrumentally. Andy Bey - blokes don't seem to handle jazz vocal as well as women (to my taste, anyway); Andy is an exception. Norma Winstone - jazz vocals exported, reshaped and turned into something very different. My favourite.

The typical English bathime:

Rained all day. Cold too. Mid-week it was crisp and crystal blue - had to watch it from a classroom window. If only this government would get the weather syncronised correctly.

Just a bowl of cheapo Sainsbury's muesli for me in the week (breakfast has to be polished off in 3 minutes!); with toast and honey or marmalade at weekends. When I'm away I always indulge in full English heart-attack fry-up...or even better, a full Irish (black and white pudding, soda bread!).

Some a/t have interested me (the other version of Flamenco Sketches on KofB, for example). Most don't get more than one play. I can imagine they are useful if you are 'studying' the music (either academically or as an enthusiast for a particular performer or period) but I only listen for pleasure so they are not a great deal of use to me. I'm quite happy to have them there as others value them but, as others have said, prefer them at the end of the disc. I tend to make CD-Rs of discs (like some Mosaics) where they are scattered in the main body of the music, filleting the released material. I can see the intellectual logic of arranging them chronologically but it makes for awkward listening for the general listener.

These are good too: http://www.jimcrowhistory.org/history/history.htm http://afroamhistory.about.com/od/jimcrowl...tionjimcrow.htm

Yes, I think they did, but being of an older generation than Bev ("if you owned a jazz record you automatically owned a folk record"), I never went in there! I think I'm younger than that generation! I owned rock records, never had a duffle coat and knew Aldermaston as an actor who played a teacher in a comedy series on TV.

It's 9.00 p.m. MG. The BBC will be out to dinner!