A pub which shows the Six Nations

It’s around this time of year that I start to anticipate the Six Nations. But instead of looking it up and finding out, I merely begin to wonder about when it will start, and contenting myself with thinking: oh goodee, The Six Nations, soon. As often as not, I only get the date of when it kicks off fixed in my brain when I walk past a pub in The Cut (which is the continuation of Lower Marsh (which I frequently frequent)), where they show these games on their TVs and where they are in the habit of having signs outside saying when the Six Nations will be starting (and continuing and ending).

So it was today, when I found myself in The Cut:

The pub is called the Windmill.

I do not know what is going to happen in the Six Nations, whether England or Wales or Ireland or Scotland or France will win it. This is because nobody knows. It is the most wonderfully unpredictable competition. I do know that Italy will not win it. Everybody knows that.

Originally posted at Brian Micklethwait’s Old Blog

The London skyline ten years ago

Ten years ago yesterday, to be exact about it:

Memo to self: go back to the same spot and take the same photo again, some time soon.

Originally posted at Brian Micklethwait’s Old Blog

A brightly lit building in front of a dark sky

Remember a while back, when I showed you this photo:

I took that photo back on January 5th. As soon as I started working on it, I got sidetracked into realising that my camera was not misbehaving after all, i.e. not turning everything yellow. Phew.

But the reason I started work on that photo was that it is an illustration of that special sort of weather that happens when there are both dark clouds, and holes in those clouds, through which light comes ripping through, sometimes lighting up buildings that stand in front of dark clouds. The above blue roof was not the first of such brightly-lit-thing-against-a-dark-background that I saw and photoed that day, and I felt sure that it would not be the last.

And boy was I not wrong? As in: I definitely was not wrong. Because, soon after photoing yesterday’s flaming tuba player, under Blackheath Bridge and its railway station, I climbed up into Blackheath Bridge and its railway station, and through the windows on the downstream side, I found myself staring in amazement at this:

I seldom photo St Paul’s Cathedral. I understand why people admire Ancient Architecture, but I find Modern Architecture more intriguing to think about. But I couldn’t resist that. That is not your usual St Paul’s Cathedral photo. To me it looks not so much like a photo as like a collage, where I have stuck a cut-out of St Paul’s Cathedral onto a dark background, but chose paper that was too light for the Cathedral, to make sure it showed up clearly.

I knew that this effect would not last, and sure enough, it did not:

That being a photo I took of St Paul’s Cathedral less than a minute later.

Here is a cropped version of the special effects photo above, to make the contrast even clearer:

I know, lots of reflections in the glass windows of Blackfriars Station, through which the photos were taken. Guess what. I don’t care. So, the photos were taken through windows? So what. And actually, I think the glass may have increased the contrast, by darkening the sky somewhat bit, but not being able to darken the Cathedral, because it was just too brightly lit by the sun.

Photography is light.

Originally posted at Brian Micklethwait’s Old Blog

Photoing the man playing a flaming tuba

So today I was up to my neck doing other things. Well no not really, I just forgot about doing this, until it was bed time. So, here are some photos of people photoing a man playing a tuba with flames coming out of it:

Photoed by me, under Blackfriars Bridge (the one with a railway station on it), earlier this month.

I do not know why the man in the red and white hat was holding a bit of silver paper. Something to do with food he had been eating?

This man is regularly seen playing his flaming tuba, all over London. I myself saw him playing outside Embankment tube, not so long ago. Also being worshipped by photoers.

Originally posted at Brian Micklethwait’s Old Blog

Strange home decorating photo

This is a strange photo, which looks somewhat like Modern Art, but which actually isn’t (a pleasing phenomenon which I referred to in passing in this recent posting of mine). What it is is a photo of some home decorating:

Aren’t you supposed to put the glue on the wallpaper, rather than on the wall? Perhaps both? Personally, I chose my wallpaper by not caring what it was when I moved in and thus keeping it as was, so I have never done anything like this.

Also, what are those peculiar white marks on the right? They look like random smudges of white paint. But why are they there? Very strange. Presumably something else was being painted before the wallpaper went on.

All is explained here. It’s number nine of those thirteen photos, which I found out about here.

Originally posted at Brian Micklethwait’s Old Blog

Michael Fabiano does a Master Class at the Royal College

Yesterday afternoon GodDaughter2 arranged for me to be in the audience (which was mostly singing students like her) of a master class presided over by American operatic tenor Michael Fabiano, a totally new name to me. He should not have been. My bad, as he would say. Very impressive. Very impressive.

This event was the most recent one of these. But they scrub all mention from there of the past, however immediate, so no mention there of Fabiano, which there had been until yesterday.

Here are a few recollections I banged into my computer last night before going to bed. Not tidied up much. I just didn’t want to forget it.

Sing, every note, all the time – switch off singing and then when you need to switch on again, you won’t be able to do it.

Singing is not just done with two little things in your throat. Sing with your whole body, from head to toe. Including your balls. (The student singers he was teaching were all guys, two baritones, two tenors.) I hope you don’t mind me saying such things. (Nobody did.)

You must sing to the people way up in the roof. They must hear every note you sing. Not just the people in the first five rows.

Don’t be afraid to take a breath – I’m a great fan of breathing when you need to breath – no seriously

First note is critical. Final note is critical. You can screw up in between. But first note bad can mean they’ll hear nothing further. Final note good, and that’s what they’ll remember.

Stay firmly planted on the floor. Stand how you stand in the tube, when you have nothing to hold on to. Don’t rise off the floor on your toes when it gets difficult.

Stay relaxed by going to your “happy place” in your mind.

In auditions, don’t be bound by rules that box you in. Break those rules, do whatever you have to do to do what you do. Applies to all artists.

Piano accompanists: play louder, like an orchestra. Louder. Twice as loud as that. (He spent a lot of time conducting the pianists.)

Go for it. (Said that a lot.) Be free. Fly like a bird. Never relax your wings (keep singing) or you fall to the ground.

In my opinion … this is my opinion …

Make progress as a young singer by finding one or two people whose judgement you trust. Follow their advice and work hour after hour, day after day, with them. A hundred people advising is confusion. One or two is what a young person needs.

How to make the transition from student to real singer? With difficulty. I began by doing 22 auditions all over Europe. First 21, I followed the rules, stood in the spot marked X: nothing, failure. 22nd audition: disaster. Fell over at the start, literally. But laughed at myself. Good middle notes, they knew I had a cold, but also a good personality. Got work. They trusted me to do better.

Mentor? Renee Fleming was one. Sang next to her on stage. Her voice ridiculously small, on stage. But, my agent way up at the back heard everything, and wept. I then sat way up there myself and listened to Fleming sing equally quietly, heard everything and was equally moved

Sing oh well and sing ee well, and you’ll sing ah well. (Think that was it.) …

And probably lots more that I missed. But, I now find, you can watch the whole thing on YouTube. However, the length-to-content ratio of watching something like this on YouTube is such that you, if you have got this far in this posting, are much more likely to make do with reading what I just put. So let’s hope I didn’t get anything too wrong. Plus: more mentions of this event, with video bits, at the RCM Twitter feed. Fabiano also tweets, of course. More reaction to yesterday there.

There were four student singers on show, first two being baritones, and in the second half, two tenors. The most extraordinary moments of this event came in the second half, when the two tenors took it in turns to sing things that Fabiano has presumably sung for real, as it were. And occasionally, to illustrate a point he was making, Fabiano would sing a snatch of the thing himself.

At which point, as the young people say these day: OMG. His sound was about four times bigger than what the students were doing. (The first of these moments got Fabiano a loud round of applause.) Fabiano’s talk, about filling the entire 2,500 people place, was a hell of a lot more than talk. He does this, every time he sings in such a place. The message was loud and the message was clear. That’s what you guys must aim for. That’s what it sounds like.

The good news is that the first tenor in particular (Thomas Erlank), was taking audible steps towards being an opera star, after only a few minutes of badgering from Fabiano. I think you’re great, said Fabiano, which is why I’m being so hard on you. Fabiano didn’t say those exact words to any of the others, so that will definitely have counted for something, in Erlank’s mind. You could see him getting bigger, as Fabiano both talked him up and hacked away at his mistakes.

Of the others, the one who particularly impressed me was the second baritone (Kieran Rayner), who looked and behaved like a trainee accountant, but who sang like a trainee god. By the time Fabiano had been at him for a bit, he started to get a bit more like an actual god. The sheer sound of Rayner’s voice was beautiful from the start, I thought. As did Fabiano.

Fabiano made a big deal of vibrato, which he seemed almost to equate with singing. But vibrato is, for me, a huge barrier. Rayner did do enough of it to satisfy Fabiano, but not nearly enough to put me off. I mention this because I believe that I am not the only one who feels this way. Too much wobble, and it just sounds like wobble and nothing else. Singers who overdo the wobble never break past that oh-god-it’s-bloody-opera barrier. But not enough vibrato, and they don’t get to fill those 2,500 seat opera houses. And even if they do, no OMG, Fabiano style.

Final point, by way of summary. When each singer did his performance, Fabiano made a point of going to the back of the hall, to hear how it sounded there. Fabiano made no bones about it that what concerned him was not how you or he felt about it while doing it, or how Renee Fleming sounded to him when he was standing on the stage right next to her. What matters is the effect it has on the audience, all of the audience, including and especially the audience in the cheaper seats. Are they getting what they came for and they paid for?

Deepest thanks to GD2 for enabling me to witness all this.

Originally posted at Brian Micklethwait’s Old Blog

Quota creative misquote

I only just noticed it, but I do like this blog posting title from October 2016, from Archbishop Cranmer:

Brexit, pursued by a Blair

Blair wants another referendum, with an opposite result. The Archbishop doesn’t. But then, the Archbishop wants Brexit and Blair doesn’t.

The Archibishop quotes Blair:

The issue is not whether we ignore the will of the people; but whether, as information becomes available, and facts take the place of claims, the ‘will’ of the people shifts.

But what if, after Blair then gets the result he wants, and the matter is then, for him, settled once and for ever, yet more facts become available, replacing Blair’s claims, and that ‘will’ shifts again? Back again to Brexit being the good move? What if the EU then goes to hell and takes the UK with it, and the voters then want out, again? Then what? Then: the matter is settled, time to move on and stop grumbling. So, why is it not time for Blair to move on and stop grumbling, now? It comes down to the Divine Right of Blair. Is that a thing? I say: not.

Via Dan Hannan.

For those who don’t know their Shakespeare: the original stage direction. It’s famous. You should know this. Now you do.

Originally posted at Brian Micklethwait’s Old Blog

Primrose Hill photoers

Yesterday’s photo, taken at Primrose Hill before Christmas, was very pretty. That lovely light you get when the sun is low, which it always is, which is nice because it’s nice, and nice because it means you can see what’s on people’s screens. Trees uncluttered by leaves. Distant Big Things. Wonderful. Which is why there were so many other photoers in action:

No computer-recognisable faces, but lots of winter clothing, including woolly hats and woolly gloves.

18 photos there, and just two of them (2.1 and 5.1) do not feature smartphones. I chose the photos entirely for artistic impression. It merely turned out that way.

See also 1.3. It looks like she’s holding a giant cock of the unmentionable sort. But, it’s a glove. So (see 4.2): No Bad Vibes.

Originally posted at Brian Micklethwait’s Old Blog

Primrose Hill crowd

One way to photo and show strangers is to pick an angle that omits their faces, or have things in front of their faces. Another is to do it from a sufficient distance to have no visible faces:

That crowd photoed by me on December 18th, on top of Primrose Hill.

Click on that to see why I so much prefer trees in the winter, rather than when they are smothered in leaves.

Originally posted at Brian Micklethwait’s Old Blog

Pimlico in Kensington

Incoming from GodDaughter2:

Pimlico in Kensington, said the email, photoed near her place of work. She knows the kind of thing I like, doesn’t she?

Are such vans rare and exotic in Kensington? I see them all the time, in and around Pimlico.

Originally posted at Brian Micklethwait’s Old Blog