Dinu Lipatti at One Hundred
To London to see ten seconds of cinema: the only footage we have (so far) of Dinu Lipatti, unearthed last year from a private library. Ten delightful seconds filmed in … Continue reading
In Search of Dinu Lipatti
The Romanian pianist DINU LIPATTI died in 1950 at the tragically early age of 33. He succumbed to complication arising from Hodgkins’ lymphoma. Yet for all its brevity and intensity, his … Continue reading
McCartney’s Maybe I’m Amazed
Here is the finest of Paul McCartney’s songs, the highlight of the album released to announce formally the break-up of the Beatles, the eponymous McCartney, the song of course being Maybe I’m Amazed; … Continue reading
Louis Armstrong: “The Beginning & End of Music in America.”
LOUIS ARMSTRONG transformed jazz in the 1920s and gave it a direction and purpose. He remains one of its most important figures, changing the nature of soloist and ensemble. He … Continue reading
Joe Harriott: Fire in His Soul
JOE HARRIOTT is no longer a forgotten father figure of modern European jazz. An excellent new biography of this seeringly brilliant and individual saxophonist has been published… Since his death in … Continue reading
“Son, You Hot!” Hampton Hawes & the Fire Inside
HAMPTON HAWES (1928-1977) was one of the greatest jazz bebop pianists. But at the summit of his career, celebrated as New Star of the Year by Down Beat magazine in 1956, … Continue reading
An Homily to Keith Jarrett
WHAT KEITH JARRETT plays on any concert evening is spellbinding. It needs to be, to stand above his histrionic and hissy fit, hypochondria, grunts, Gurdjieff philosophy and Garbarek past (very … Continue reading
Under an English Heaven: Michael Garrick’s Jazz Praises
MICHAEL GARRICK’s Jazz Praises, composed in the 1960s, is a unique creation. Critic Derek Jewell endorsed it enthusiastically in The Sunday Times and it was broadcast on both television and radio. It … Continue reading
From Straight Lines we Make Curves: an Appreciation of Michael Garrick
ENGLISH JAZZ PIANIST and composer Michael Garrick, a pioneer in mixing jazz with poetry recitations and large-scale choral works, died in November 2011. For the non-cognoscente his compositions could be … Continue reading
Ion D. Sîrbu & the Small Bearded Priest
JUNE 2019 was the centenary of the birth of the Romanian dramatist and novelist Ion D. Sîrbu. His is a name not known to the English speaking world, in part … Continue reading
A Straight Line to Joy: Reading Jazz
THEE ARE ONLY A FEW writers who are able to write well and with authority on all aspects of jazz. Philip Larkin pleaded for a “belle-lettriste of jazz, a Newman … Continue reading
Ungaretti’s Typewriter
AN ADDITION TO THE shop landscape: Ungaretti’s Typewriter. Customers (all two of them) are invited to type upon it any random thought, flow of consciousness dribble, abstract or recited prose … Continue reading
Chic Cadence & Latticed Lampshades
TO READ A SENTENCE of David Foster Wallace is to discover a man on the precipice. His writing ganders chaotically like a studded skein of geese with a literary lilt … Continue reading
Anna Kavan: Addicted & Addictive
ANNA KAVAN was born Helen Emily Woods in 1901 in Cannes, France, and was raised and educated in Europe and California. Her wealthy English parents were cold and displayed scant … Continue reading
The Discordant Who? Atzmon & Debate
A FEW YEARS AGO Gilad Atzmon’s book The Wandering Who? was taken off the virtual shelves of the Guardian book website. My first reaction was to be amused that the … Continue reading
Harry Worth Meets Little & Little
I WAS ASKED recently what were the funniest books, recently published, that I’ve read. I don’t read much modern fiction and suppose I am too old to find too many … Continue reading
Harriet Backer’s Chez Moi
I saw this painting in a lovely art gallery in Tromsø: Chez Moi by Harriet Backer, painted in 1887. Throughout her life, Backer (1845-1932) painted pianists at play. Harriet Backer … Continue reading
Bobby Fischer: Opportunistic Nutter
The great chess players of the past are fascinating characters. Even if long dead and with an afterlife only of algebraic notation, they can impose themselves upon our imagination still. … Continue reading
Lennon & McCartney, She’s Leaving Home
SHE’S LEAVING HOME, a sublime yet sorrowful song, is one of the more unusual in the Beatles’ catalogue. Like Eleanor Rigby from the earlier Revolver LP it did not include any band instrumental … Continue reading
Matchbox Stories from Book Ex Machina
IN STOCK is the tiniest literary magazine in the world: Matchbox Stories from Book Ex Machina, an original publishing initiative from a writer and photographer in Cyprus. Each issue is a … Continue reading
Onanism Fleshed Out: Evie & Guy
I SO OFTEN go on and on about Dan Holloway’s onanistic novel Evie and Guy, and am pleased to have heard that Dan has prepared a second edition. It is … Continue reading
The Bodleian Library and ZZ Top
THE BODLEIAN LIBRARY was refurnished by 1613, and the Old Schools Quadrangle extension was already under serious planning – to be measured in cubits rather than feet and inches, and based … Continue reading
Christopher Wren in Oxford
MOST ARCHITECTURAL ROADS led to Sir Christopher Wren in the late seventeenth century; he hovers everywhere as a sombre cloud, if not actually raining then casting a shadow. In Oxford his influence pops … Continue reading
Oxford-thoughts, From Abroad
A HUGE PART OF OXFORD has entered the twenty-first century if not grudgingly, then with mock enthusiasm. That part is the University, for everything about the University’s observance rests on … Continue reading
Malcolm Saville’s Yard Broom
MALCOLM SAVILLE was born in Hastings in 1901 and educated there. His first job was as a clerk with the Oxford University Press, and the rest of his working life … Continue reading
Hans Fallada at Brookfield Farm
HANS FALLADA was published by Melville House only in 2009, Penguin thereafter (translated by Michael Hofmann). He is a recent invention in the English-speaking world, and a surprising commercial success. … Continue reading
Heathcote Williams, The Local Polemic
PAINTED FLUORESCENT OVER TWO WALLS of the loo of the Albion Beatnik Bookstore, Oxford, was Heathcote Williams’ poem ‘Books’. This poem was written perhaps ten years ago or more. Heathcote … Continue reading
Agatha Christie’s Tax Return
THE ORIENT EXPRESS stops during the night, blocked by snowdrifts; next morning the mysterious Mr. Ratchett is found stabbed in his berth and untrodden snow shows that the killer is … Continue reading
Gerald Kersh’s Flaccid Over-ripeness
ONE OF THE GREAT chroniclers of London’s metropolitan life was the versatile Gerald Kersh (1911-1968), although he came to settle in Barbados (where his house burnt down), then Canada, and … Continue reading
Edmund Crispin at the Bar of the Randolph
EDMUND CRISPIN’s The Moving Toyshop is one of the classic Oxford novels. Crispin was the pseudonym of Robert Bruce Montgomery, a composer of vocal and choral music which included An Oxford … Continue reading
Dornford Yates: A Snob with Violence
IT IS WONDERFUL to judge a book by its cover, to date a book by its cover also. Here is a nostalgic-looking second-hand edition of Blind Corner by Dornford Yates, an … Continue reading
Barbara Pym and the Church Pew
YOU HAVE TO BE bonkers not to love Barbara Pym’s novels. Her acme was a 1950s suburban or neo-rural setting where The Archers doesn’t quite meet James Bond, because you don’t get … Continue reading
Arthur Machen’s Quest for Ecstasy
ARTHUR MACHEN’S LITERARY REPUTATION in his lifetime was considerable. As recognition of this he was awarded a Civil List Pension for the last fifteen years of his life, and in … Continue reading
Nathanael West’s Disease
MISS LONELYHEARTS is Nathanael West’s second novel, published in 1933. Many critics consider it to be his best; West’s close friend, F Scott Fitzgerald, considered it to be “quite extraordinary.” … Continue reading
Girl With Dove: Sally Bayley
I HAVE READ RECENTLY Girl With Dove: A Life Built By Books by Sally Bayley, a childhood autobiography. Waterstone’s marketing tag for the book is that it is a “very eccentric … Continue reading
A One-Night Stand with Erroll Garner
MY EYES ARE THROWN to the heavens with wonderment at the playing of Erroll Garner. When I hear him play it is as though the myriad threads of jazz history, … Continue reading
Best Opening Lines for a Novel
ALWAYS INTERESTED IN the opening lines of novels, I posted some time ago the first two listed below – Anthony Burgess’ Earthly Powers and Dodie Smith’s I Capture the Castle – … Continue reading
Michelangeli: Angel’s Slippers
A FOND KEEPSAKE OF MINE is a cutting from the front page of the Times in 1977. A small note of the comeback concert by Arturo Benedetti Michelangelo at the … Continue reading
Siciliano, Spirituality and Saccharin
AN EARLY TWENTIETH CENTURY VOGUE for transcribing Bach chorales or instrumentals for the piano was that meeting point of nostalgia and aspiration. Perhaps their inspiration was a reaction to the … Continue reading
A Love Affair with Libraries
MY FIRST MEMORY OF BOOKS involves libraries. I am sure of it. I may have been given books to throw out of my cot and I may have had books … Continue reading
Birthday Card: Gig Review
BIRTHDAY CARD, the ‘melancholy pop’ band from Aylesbury, launched their first single, Shy Away, with new label NHAC just before Christmas. The gig was at the label’s home, the iconic Notting … Continue reading
