Stuff Of The Day. January 2017

31st January
Marketing of the day: seapieparcel. That’s me and I write songs and other music and today I’ve been doing a lot of marketing and reminded myself of this collection of enthusiastic songs for young choirs and classes which are sung all over the place, particularly in New Zealand and around the UK. What an excellent selection it is, I might add! Here’s the bumpf about it, and here also is the video advert I made a few years ago to promote it. Pass it on, if you know anyone with such a choir! https://cherylcamm.co.uk/sea-pie-parcel/

 

30th January
“Song with more numerous and bloodthirsty deaths than a week of Silent Witness and Midsomer Murders combined” of the Day: “Yo Ho Ho And A Bottle Of Rum”. For instance: fixed by the bosun’s pike; brained with a marlinspike; throat gripped by fingers ten; the scullion’s axe his cheek had shore; scullion stabbed times four; ten had the murder mark; a cutlass swipe or an ounce of lead; a yawing hole in a battered head; she dared the knife and took the blade etc etc… I’ve been working with this song today for an upcoming children’s workshop…er, I mean for The Bridge Singers’ tenors and basses. I had thought we’d be rolling around tipsily in a merry drinking song, but that was before I knew all the words. We’ll still do it in our glass-inspired concert because it’s got bottles in it, but a different interpretation is required I feel.

29th January
Gig Of The Day: Lionheart Harmony at Howick Village Hall in Northumberland.
Lionheart Harmony were part of the entertainment for the Alnwick Castle Guides’ function this evening. I noticed a few things from my seat, from my rehearsal spot, and when I was busy, my camera noticed me!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

1.7 o’clock              2.Heater          3.Bookcase
4.Daffshadow       5.Curtain         6.Fire
7.Vase                    8.Petals            9.Corner
10.Waiting for the entertainment
11.Bunting            12.Shared supper
13.Chord               14.Daffphone  15.Harmony
16.Applause         17.Tipple          18.Corkfloor

28th January
Social event of the day: shopping in Sainsbury’s, Alnwick. I had two very cheery, laughter-filled and lengthy conversation catch-ups with my wonderful choiry friends Julia (next to the cider display as I headed twixt self-raising flour and sage and onion stuffing) and Lorna (next to the oranges as I headed twixt bananas and potatoes) as well as passing merry banter with Colin and the other Julia I know. It is a well-commented upon phenomenon aound these parts that it is indeed impossible to go into Sainsbury’s in Alnwick at any time of any day without seeing at least one person you know, and as I left I saw Lorna in coversation with someone else, thereby ramming home the point.

 

27th January
Cake of the day: Mango Jouissance – layers of light sponge with gallimaufrey of fresh, chopped mango, fresh cream and mango yoghurt,  topped with mango frosting and chocolate ganache. Not a banana in sight, and part of Rock Festival Choir’s first shared supper, mini-rehearsal and merry chatfest of 2017.

26th January
Jellybaby Of The Day: this one. The reason it’s so special is that I found it in my bag having thought that there were none left. And if you’re worrying about it having been there for ages and covered in fluff, fret not – I only bought them yesterday. In the background of this picture you see the roadworks on the bridges – the workmen have extended their efforts to the new bridge as well. These are new special workmen though – rather like my jellybaby. They are tending to the bridge while abseiling. They had already left for the day by the time I found my jellybaby, and what you’re seeing albeit blurrily, are the reliable, ever-present twosome who are here every day. Their main task today was re-erecting the posts at the ends of the old bridge so that no vehicles may cross, but at this precise jellybaby moment the traffic lights had stopped working so they were having to direct traffic while awaiting the arrival of the council workers with the spare batteries. While all this has been going on, I’ve made a learning track for our Purcell’s Ass song. Thought I’d use it with the jellybaby to complete the story of my day.

 

25th January (afternoon)
Worm of the day: The Lambton Worm. We had a musical fight fight fight fight…. and lots of shut up music (Whisht lad haad yer gobs, haad yer mooth, haad yer cake-hole zzzzzipit etc etc) today at the Tyne Theatre in Newcastle with children from Gateshead and Gosforth. It’s been a while since I was let loose on lots of children like this and I don’t seem to have lost my knack of enabling them to have composing ideas and put them together in an interesting order, with even a spot of musical development thrown in for good measure. I took no pictures and made no recording – too busy, but Jane did, so hopefully there’ll be evidence anon. There was a bit of debate about whether Sir John cut him in three halves or two halves – some 10 year olds are too literal and too mathematically precise for their own creative good! On a historical note, I might point out that it was a proud moment working on this song in this theatre as this is where the first ever performance of The Lambton Worm was made 150 years ago this year – the Tyne Theatre’s first pantomime.

25th January (morning)
Poet of the day: Robert Burns. One of the phases I’ve been through in my life is setting Robert Burns’ poetry to music – early 1990s it was. Tam O’ Shanter for my Doctorate, Three Burns Settings for clarinet, soprano and cello for which I won the Phillip Neill Prize and this in Dunedin for Queens’ High School’s top choir Vocarmony. Since then, not so much, but I do recall that at that time there were plans for more, so maybe more will follow soon, but in the meantime, 25th of January is his day, so I’ll look back for now.

You can listen to my Three Burns Settings here: http://www.radionz.co.nz/concert/programmes/resound/audio/201787165/camm-three-burns-songs

 

23rd January
Road sign of the day: Give Way pocked by gun shot on Mouldshaugh Lane. I walked to the choir librarian’s house to drop off music and was taken by the sunshine, which there has been a dearth of in recent days, and this sign. The standardised warning, direction and information road signs were designed by Jock Kinneir and Margaret Calvert in 1963, I learn. When I lived in New Zealand, I went through a phase of taking photographs of road signs, which I used in composing activities with school children. I’d forgotten about that until this morning, but what a great idea it was and is. Also, I was reminded of “If” by Rudyard Kipling (here’s an extract with the give way!):

If you can keep your head when all about you
Are losing theirs and blaming it on you,
If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you,
But make allowance for their doubting too;
If you can wait and not be tired by waiting,
Or being lied about, don’t deal in lies,
Or being hated, don’t give way to hating,
And yet don’t look too good, nor talk too wise:

Yours is the Earth and everything that’s in it,
And – which is more – you’ll be a Man, my son!

 

22nd January
Henry of the day: Purcell. I have spent the entire day drinking with him. He’s a merry and emotional fellow. Have a listen to some of his music and see if you don’t agree. http://www.bbc.co.uk/music/artists/ddea5540-2c7d-4266-8507-b367c2635d35

 

21st January
Sloths of the day: Cheryl and Jamie. Telly-watching, ready-meal-eating, slow-moving, no-picture-no-music-no-video, Saturday-off us.

20th January
Milestone of the day: seapieparcel slipped passed 23,000 views today on YouTube. It’s been a bit of a snippety day with arranging music for The Bridge Singers, observing the progress of the workmen outside, heading off to Longframlington for meetings, marketing, taking and fetching Jamie to and from the trains, catching yawns of inauguration blah-ishness, and in amongst it all this little milestone has been passed. The video that contributed the most views to this statistic since the 22,000-view milestone is this one, featuring the afore-mentioned wonderful choir:

 

19th January
President Of The Day: Barack Obama. I like him. I like that he is serious and funny and clever and kind and inspiring. I like his wife too who is all the same things. I have thought a lot about him and his successor today. I find it all a bit depressing and have not sparkled today as I should, perhaps because of this. I’ve been looking at the White House Photos Of The Day on and off and it doesn’t matter which album you choose, these qualities I like, seem to shine through. My particular favourite album though is March 2015, but now (Jan 21st) I see that all these pictures are gone so instead of a link to the next president I give you a BBC link.  http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/in-pictures-38471734

 

18th January
Workmen of the day: the ones right outside my composing window on the bridge. They’ve been there since last Monday in various formations with traffic lights. Each morning things are delivered darkly and then men turn up variously clothed in orange and yellow highvizzes. Earlier today, as with most mornings, there was a meeting of several males and also one female who we saw quite a bit of last week. She has a clipboard and says things that the others nod sagely at. Earlier still, before the nodding meeting, the side door to the “comfort” container (which was yesterday moved from the telephone box area to the road on the West Thirston side of their operation) was thrown wide open as they attempted en masse (six of them) to fix what looked like the soap dispenser. They have provided much interest in those moments when you get up from the notes formulating on the page to take a thinking break. Yesterday, the two that remained post-meeting had a dandy time with small bits of pipe – longer lengths and pipey joints were added as the day progressed, a massive blow torch appeared at one point and there were flames. Two further men arrived in what the antipodeans call a ute and made something in their cement-mixer which the two stayers applied delicately to the blow-torched area with a trowel. This morning the two stayers were back and cajoled all the kerbstones back into place. I did sense that holes would be filled in today, and indeed the cement-mixing duo did return with some aggregate which was tossed into the deepest holes. Two new workmen appeared, one wearing a tie and the other sporting a hipster beard and wielding one of those wheelie measures and a can of white spray paint. There are now arrows painted on the road, so I think perhaps tomorrow there will be drilling and tar.

17th January
Learning tracks of the day: Gabriel Fram Heven-King. Reading stuff, talking to people and listening to recordings by people who should know, thinking laterally, arranging, singing, playing, messing and grappling with the mardy technology, walking down to the Gabriel windows for inspiration….have all resulted in this video which will hopefully assist the delightful choristers of The Bridge Singers with their Medieval English for our glass recital in June.

16th January
Spillage of the day: there are four candidates, unusually all by me. Jamie’s normally the spiller in this house.
1. Warmish wax from a vanilla-flavoured tea-light poured itself onto my right thumb. As the day wore on I realised that it had also dripped on my right slipper and all down the right sleeve of my Cardiff City hoodie.
2. Whilst filling up the water purifier jug thing from the fridge, the lid closed prematurely and water sprayed all over the front of the same Cardiff City hoodie, all over the kitchen window ledge, all over the floor and all over Jamie who was nearby.
3. Whist making up the bed with freshly-washed sheets, I knocked over Jamie’s bottle of bedside water which went all over the floor and his pyjamas. I used the pyjamas to mop up the carpet while the two of us guffawed uncontrollably.
4. Whilst driving home from the supermarket, an egg in the boot of the car escaped from its shell and made a sticky mess all over the contents of my bag-for-life.
Hard to pick a winner, really.

 

15th January
Medieval English of the day: “Gabriel, fram heven-king, sent to the maide sweete, broute hir blisful tiding and fair he gan hir greete”. I’ve been using it and more in an arrangement for The Bridge Singers’ windows concert. We might have a go at it tomorrow if I can bypass the stringent new library regime.

 

14th January
10 O’clock Of The Day: York Minster. Mellow chimes with man clicking past. Nearby a K6 phone box. Later on a wonderful, wonderful afternoon helping Alex and Hilary celebrate their 50th wedding anniversary, chatting with Bryony, Karen and Fran, listening to some top jazz music from their family, driving home. There’s about to be another 10 o’clock, but I will hopefully be asleep for it.

13th January


Minor traffic disagreement of the day: Person with camera squeals, “Look how beautiful the traffic is in the sun!”
Person with the steering wheel, while lowering the visor and gently applying the breaks, responds, “Tut…”

 

12th January
Moon of the day: the moon. It was big and bright and round as we drove to and from a very jovial Lionheart Harmony tonight. I couldn’t take my eyes of it as it played behind the trees and glowed on the ocean and cast glimmering shadows all about. I was reminded of this poem by Robert Louis Stevenson, which of course I’ve set to music, and has been performed several times.

The moon has a face like the clock in the hall;
She shines on thieves on the garden wall,
On streets and fields and harbour quays,
And birdies asleep in the forks of the trees.

The squalling cat and the squeaking mouse,
The howling dog by the door of the house,
The bat that lies in bed at noon,
All love to be out by the light of the moon.

But all of the things that belong to the day
Cuddle to sleep to be out of her way;
And flowers and children close their eyes
Till up in the morning the sun shall arise.

 

11th January
Sort-out of the day: The Bridge Singers’ back catalogue of randomly handed-in music. Following several reminding emails from the new choir librarian, eager to implement his new super-system, I have gathered together all the various sub-piles of music that were strewn about the house, organised them into piles, put them in alphabetical order and given them all a folder, then made one mega-pile (which actually looks quite tiny compared to the pile of mess I started with), ready for the big hand-in next week. This will all be handed over tomorrow morning and I can concentrate on creating some more music. I give you “during” and “after” photos – I didn’t think of a “before” photo until half way through the task and I wasn’t going to unsort it just so you could see the almighty mess. You’ll have to imagine it.

10th January
Transport system of the day: The Tyne and Wear Metro Yellow Line, specifically Haymarket to South Shields and back. I went into The Word in South Shields amongst other places – it’s the new library, and stuff hub, including the National Centre For The Written Word. There’s dialect everywhere. There was a lot of dialect on the trains as well, some quite fruity. The dialect on the bus from Newcastle to home was mind-numbing, starting in Morpeth when a load of teenagers got on after their school day. They do talk some drivel. You see an escalator going up, a platform, some yellow handrails, a seagull in the sunshine at South Shields and the setting sun over the River Tyne with multi-coloured beams.

9th January
Scrunchy music of the day: Antonio Lotti’s Crucifixus. We started learning this at the first 2017 rehearsal of The Bridge Singers this evening. We’ll be performing it in June in St. Michael’s Church, Felton in our recital “Magical Glass” which will initially be inspired by the windows in the church. The main window behind the altar is a depiction of the crucifixion, and this sublime offering will be the closing piece of the first half. If we can sing it like this, we’ll need a break to wipe away the tears of emotion at the beauty of it all. This is the choir Tenebrae doing a very well-blended job – a characteristic we’ll be going for too.

8th January
Drive Of The Day: West Thirston to Wakefield arriving 9.50am. At departure there was deep red in a strip along the eastern horizon, this became bigger and brighter for approximately 45 minutes. During this phase of the drive the highlight was crossing the fiery River Tyne with all the rufescent windows of Blaydon aglow on the hill. Shortly after the Durham turnoff with the sun still not fully up, the fog started, and the sun continued to sport with the fog all the way to York, sometimes peeping through coyly, sometimes a swirly disc of pearl, but mostly casting a golden spell on it with the occasional complete vanishing act leaving a deathly white with only distant tail-lights for company. Once I hit proper Yorkshire it was just cloudy and the traffic increased from minimal to Sunday-ish. All the traffic lights in Wakefield turned to red as I approached, which neatly continued the rosy theme of earlier. The brilliance and colour of the day did not wane as bundles of willing families entered happily into the “precarious cat” composing adventure. The drive home was black in colour, light in traffic and as swift as it’s legally possible to be.

 

7th January
Groyne of the day: South Shields. We had fish and chips in sight of The Groyne at South Shields. This was after going to see Moana at The Customs House and wandering about a bit. I was going to write cheerily about Moana, and I like to be positive about things, so on a less than delighted front. I will merely say that I found it a bit underwhelming. However,  I absolutely loved all the Te Vaka music – everything that sounded like it was by Opetaia Foa’i, the music that sounded as though it really was from The Pacific. So brilliant to hear in a tiny English cinema, reminding me of other parts of my life. Anyway, the fish and chips were a rare delight and South Shields has a lots of splendid architecture, and look – you can see Collingwood’s Monument and Tynemouth Priory across the splendid River Tyne, as well as this wonderful Groyne.

 

6th January
Epiphany anthem of the day: Omnes de Saba. I wrote this a few years ago – the whole thing in one day. I was asked at short notice for a short choral piece by a choral director. I came up with this, which has a hint of the medieval about it. That particular choral director decided not to sing it as he decided it was in a difficult style and would be unpopular with his choir and their congregation. A shame, but there you go. Anyway, it’s since been performed by Rock Festival Choir and others have purchased the scores so they may have performed it too. This video features images of our garden in better times. I’m aiming for something similar later in the year!

5th January

Album of the day: Thing that happen while you’re pruning. 2.30-3.45pm. Essentially I went up into the garden to do weeding to discover that the micro-climate that exists up there means that everything on the ground was frozen solid still, so I pruned half the climbing roses which were rendering the route to the tools hazardous.
1. You survey that which is to be pruned.

2. Rooks gather in next door’s copse.

3. Vapour trails abound.
4. Vapour trails abound because approximately 25 planes head in to land at Bockenfield Airfield in the space of one hour and 15 minutes. We’re in a flight path.
5. A robin comes to say hello – very, very close.
6. The sculptural remnants of last year’s lilies notice that the sun’s going down.
7. The pruning fights back.
8. The sky behaves in a spectacular manner over by the airfield.

 

 

9. The moon appears behind West Thirston.
10. Tomorrow’s pruning victims enjoy their last sunset.

 

January 4th
Statistics of the day: seapieparcel Youtube Channel 2016: they’re in. My pieces have been listened to 6,268 times during 2016, the most popular video of the year being Magical Glass performed by The Bridge Singers with 305 views. Over 4000 of these views (66%) were in the UK but 2nd place now is the USA with over 700 views. This is quite encouraging as I only know two people who live in the USA and they can’t be responsible for all of that! The busiest day of the year was 12th December with 157 views, and the quietest day 12th March with no views at all. I’ll give you one more fact, shall I? On 3rd January last year someone in Kuwait listened to the entirety of Push The Boats Out. I wonder what 2017 will bring? Why not choose something to listen to yourself here?

 

January 3rd
Irishest treat of the day: The Parting Glass by the Voice Squad. Following up a tip-off from Sylvia I’ve been making an arrangement of this Irish folk song for The Bridge Singers’ Magical Glass concert coming up in June. I’ve listened to lots of renditions of it and this is my absolute favourite. There are four things I love the most about it – the squidgy harmonies, all the little melodic twiddles, the Irishness of their pronunciation, their lack of facial emotion until the very end when they erupt into beautiful smiles. I have also discovered that this song in a different arrangement plays during the closing credits of the film “Waking Ned Devine”, a film in which a phone box plays a vital part. This is a film that I should now like to watch again. Funny how things come together, eh!?

January 2nd
Inspiring activist of the day: Mark Ashton
Jamie and I watched the film “Pride” on the BBCiplayer. It’s about the story of “Lesbians and Gays Support The Miners” who raised money for the striking miners in the 1980s, particularly those in the Dulais Valley in South Wales. It’s a brilliant, funny, moving film, for starters, but it subsequently set me a-thinking about that time. I could write about the all-pervading awfulness of the miners’ strike, about the belligerence of Arthur Scargill, about the cold ruthlessness of Margaret Thatcher, about how neither of these two leading political figures at that time seem really to have the real interests of the wider community at heart, about how the subsequent closure of just about every coal mine in Britain with no plan for the futures of the thousands of redundant miners or the communities that relied on the mines for their well-being devastated so much of working Britain, about how three places I know so well (Worksop, Sunderland, Wakefield) are still struggling to recover after the closure of their main industries in the 1980s, about how this lack of foresight and long term thinking is still happening today with the sudden closures in the steel industry for instance and with the political decisions voted for last year.
However, the character in the film I found to be the most inspiring was Mark Ashton who was the energy and inspiration behind the movement. I have found out that he was an activist and his friends found him to be warm and charismatic – ‘a firecracker of a human being’. Jimmy Somerville from The Communards wrote a song about him when he died in 1987 at the age of 26 from pneumonia after being diagnosed as HIV positive a few days earlier. You can link to the song here. There is a fund set up in his name which in turn supports The Terence Higgins Trust. I’d never heard the song before, but I find that it’s beautiful. To have such a beautiful song composed for you is surely a most excellent tribute to someone who had a huge impact on those who knew him.

January 1st
Song of the day: Who Killed Cock Robin? Last week I went up into the garden to survey the mess, armed with my camera and here’s the shocking evidence of our neglect of it during most of 2016. To spur me on to better things this year, I am sharing this with you so that you can bear witness to my shameful behaviour. I decided to soften the horror with some music and considered this tale of death and despair as suitably apt. I wrote it in the Brisbane days for Chanterelle and Sandra . I seem to recall we sang the world premiere during a very loud thunderstorm in Woolloongabba.

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