The wandering organist

A trip to London one hot July afternoon, to play for that high art form, the service of Choral Evensong, with Wyndcliffe Voices and Philip Drew. St John, Holland Road was the destination, invited by the church's organist, Paul Joslin. I had visited the church about 30 years ago and knew it as the last stone-vaulted building to be built in London. Built from 1885 to 1910 the website is worth a look, and explains some interesting little oddities, like the floor-level. Walking in, the immediate impression is "wow". We arrived after another service had finished and incense was still lingering. In the history of this church, that was nothing new! An estate agent's blurb about a flat for sale next door: " Holland Road is close to the green open spaces of Holland Park and the Shepherd's Bush's Westfield shopping centre " which made me smile. The organ has no case, and is almost unphotographable, being 50' above floor-level. The origina...

A friend of mine chooses the ties he wears on Sundays by the liturgical colour of the day - predominantly green in the Sundays of Trinity, gold for Easter and Christmas, red for Martyrs - and, nowadays, Whitsunday - and so on. Whilst I have a large number of ties, they don't seem to have a predominating colour, being mostly musical notation or instruments (Christmasses became a little predictable a while back!). And then, about three years ago, I spotted a multi-pack of socks in Marks and Spencer and my problem was solved - liturgically appropriate socks. Unfortunately, the green pair has had rather more wear than the others and has gone into holes, so here is a tribute to the set before they start, one by one, to go through. I had thought to take pictures of them actually being worn, but it was an unusual day, quite summery and warm.

Yesterday was a sad day - the funeral of John S Smith, past President of the Organ Club and long-standing secretary of my local Organists' Association, Brighton & Hove. A fount of information on matters organic who will be missed. A true old-fashioned gentleman. It was also sad as I said goodbye to the last remaining part of my graduation present from my parents, the Dual 505 turntable (which was connected to a NAD3020 and Acoustic Research AR18s). It just stopped working. Bearing in mind it was 35 years old and was one of the old-fashioned sort that had an extra lead to connect to the amp, and that it had been quite well used before the advent of CDs, I actually had to put my hands over my ears as it went into the skip at the local tip. And lastly, I got so fed up with not being able to find music I wanted to hear from my CD collection, I indexed them all. It was started by not being able to find the Holst St Paul's Suite which, even when they were finally put into co...