This regathering of the youth club crowd has been going on for a few years now and has settled on the second May bank holiday week, mostly for practical reasons to do with school half-term and those involved in teaching.
This time the turnout was even bigger than the previous year, with the re-appearance of Ivor Heller, a first visit from David, Ivor’s “big” brother (all adjectival things are relative), plus a special guest appearance by that giant personality, Simon Jacobs.
Booking Bill’s for this group is an odd business. We’ve been there several times now, but I always deal with a different person on the phone for the booking – they won’t take on-line bookings that large. This year they didn’t seem to want to take such a large booking at all. When I pressed the point with the manager, explaining that we are a regular, reliable group, they reluctantly took the booking. Perhaps such places get a lot of large group no-shows or something – but they could always take a deposit rather than almost turn good customers away.
Anyway, once it was booked and we turned up, we were very well looked after, as we have been previously.
The waitress did a grand job of snapping all of us looking cheery and engaged in the above photo. Eighth time lucky, eh?
A few members of the clan who have been before couldn’t join us this year; Jacey and Natalie for example. Wendy didn’t join us in person this time but did join for a while via Facetime – that was a first for this gathering but might not be a last. Some time soon we’ll probably need a video link between London and Hollywood…or something of that ilk.
Without meaning to repeat myself, I do really feel at home with this group of people. The years seem simply to peel away and it really is like a gathering of the youth club; just forty years on. None of us has really changed that much since our late teens. Of course we have all lived several decades of adult life and had some very different experiences since our youth, but the essence of our personalities and why we gelled as a group back then is still there.
It was a very enjoyable evening and several of us, me included, already seem to be looking ahead to the next one.
Further, all of my previous attempts to watch cricket at Merchant Taylors’ School (I believe three) had been totally rained off on my attempted day, to such an extent that I hadn’t even ventured to the ground before.
So I suppose it was understandable that the weather forecast a few days ahead of the game somewhat spooked Fran:
Oh heck, just seen the weather prediction for Merchant Taylors on Wednesday; rain, thunder and lightning. You couldn’t make it up!
By the time I got to see Fran’s message, about 12 hours later, the weather forecast was showing rain for the previous couple of days but clear weather for the Wednesday itself. Me to Fran:
Unreliable forecast, yours. Look again – problem solved. Seriously, I won’t go if the forecast on the day is poor but I suspect it’ll be ok.
Nearly 24 hours later, when Fran picked up my message and by which time the forecast was again showing thunderstorms spilling over until Wednesday, she was unconvinced:
Yeah, as long as you don’t mind being struck by lightning! Charles the gent did mention you were a perpetual optimist…
In the end, the weather pretty much did what the forecasters were inferring – i.e. we had quite a lot of rain, thunder and lightening on the day before the match including some into the early hours and even the morning of the game, but all passing through before the match was due to start.
I guessed there’d be a delayed start but with the forecast clear for the hours of play, it was highly likely that, once they started, they’d get a game in, even if a reduced one.
I kept an eye on the on-line information. Almost as soon as I saw that the 11:30 inspection confirmed that play for a slightly reduced match would start at 12:00, Simon called me to tell me same. I told him I’d probably get to MTS around 12:30, which I did.
Fran and Simon had got there pretty early and saved me a seat with them at the front at a pretty handy “third man” view, quite near the hospitality tent.
What a lovely setting Merchant Taylors’ School is for watching cricket.
A lovely setting for watching cricket
I knew that Fran lived nearby, but I hadn’t realised that her son, Paul, went to MTS, so she really does know the school well:
A view of the school across the playing fields
I learnt last time that Fran and Simon are not picnic lovers, so I simply took some nuts, fruit and liquids for sustenance, as had they.
It was actually perfect cricket watching weather; warm but not hot. Not sunny, but not gloomy either. Out-ground county cricket has a lovely relaxed atmosphere to it; you are watching a very high grade of cricket but you are watching it in an environment that feels more like a club or even a village match.
Time passes, the scoreboard ticks round…
We chatted, we watched, we engaged with one or two other spectators and with one or two players.
Such a day passes very quickly and very pleasantly.
This wasn’t a good match for Middlesex. Yet again Middlesex batted first, stalled/didn’t really get going and thus ended up short of a total that would really enable our bowlers to apply pressure. 30 or 40 more would have been a different story, I sensed. It was the same story in several such matches this season.
But as a day out and gathering, for sure it was a success. Fran and Simon got to see a whole match. And we actually got to spend best part of a day watching cricket together; third time lucky. A very enjoyable day.
It had not been my plan personally to spend three days on the trot at Lord’s for this test match.
The plans, hatched many, many moons before, revolved around a request from Charles “Charley the Gent Malloy” Bartlett and Nigel “Father Barry White” Hinks for me to assist those two in a mission to spend three days together at the Lord’s test.
The plans were:
Thursday – I would join Chas and Nigel;
Friday – just Chas and Nigel;
Saturday – Daisy and I would both join Chas and Nigel.
The logistics of implementing those plans to the point that we had tickets to enable all that were complex, onerous and uninteresting to the casual reader. Still, the plans were all in place…
…but we all know what can happen to plans…
…and Nigel’s knee decided to muck up the plans by rendering Nigel unable to attend Lord’s. Here’s wishing Nigel a rapid and speedy recovery.
The logistics of reworking the plans to the point that we were not dumped with unwanted tickets were complex and uninteresting to the casual reader. Hats off to the MCC ticket office for helping to minimise the onerousness of it.
But the upshot was that I agreed to join Charles on the Friday, so he could avoid being “Charley No Mates” that day.
Hence three days on a row for me.
Day One: Thursday 24 May
I went to the gym early and then got to Lord’s really early to avoid the crush and to observe the real tennis for a good few minutes before taking up my seat. I had learned that Mr Johnny Friendly was to be playing at doubles that morning; I wanted to observe his technique now that I play.
When I got to my Upper Compton Stand seat, about 10 minutes before the start of play, I observed that Chas had not yet arrived and that a well-built gentleman was sitting in the seat that would have been Nigel’s.
Chas arrived some 15-20 minutes after the start of play, bemoaning the length of the queues for security at that hour at Lord’s…as if he’s never been before.
“How come I’m sitting next to the big bloke?” asked Chas, in a voice that sounded, to me, loud enough for said big bloke to hear. Soon enough, though, we were both in conversation with Liam Big Bloke, who turned out to be a really pleasant young man, well-versed in matters cricket and also in matters food – he is a trainee chef working for Sat Bains in Nottingham’s only two-star Michelin restaurant.
At one point in the conversation, Chas talked up Daisy’s cooking ability in glowing terms. “Really good homely cooking,” I interjected, “not two-star Michelin style”. “I understand”, said Liam gently; I’m quite sure he did.
In fact, everyone in our immediate vicinity on our row seemed very nice. A very friendly couple to my right; the woman, Marilyn, said, “excuse me, young man” to me, on the first occasion she wanted to leave her seat. I told her that I am thus addressed all-too rarely these days, even at Lord’s and the Wigmore Hall. She seemed to find that funny but found different appellations for me each time for the rest of the day.
I wish I could speak highly of other people around us, but sadly the group of young men behind us were very loud, very drunk from very early in the day and really quite a nuisance. My back was soaked in lager at about 11:30 – anyone can have an accident, but I really didn’t appreciate them finding the incident funny and needing to be told to apologise and to try and sort out the mess.
By the end of the day, that group was singing raucous Barmy Army songs and trying (without success) to start a Mexican wave in the crowd. It’s the first time at Lord’s that I have really felt stuck in front of an unpleasant crew all day. At least the rapidly drunken posh boys in 2014 only managed to stick the first session.
In front of us was a very grumpy couple, the man of which wanted to read his book in the quiet and seemed as pissed off with our row for being gently convivial as he was with the raucous row behind us for being raucous. The woman of the couple left early.
Still, the day had its compensations, not least one of Mrs Malloy’s splendid picnics, complete with personalised notes in ornate gold-coloured calligraphy describing our sandwiches in mouth-watering detail. The centrepiece of one being corned beef, the centrepiece of the other being smoked cheese. I brought a bottle of wine, an Austrian Grüner Veltliner since you asked, which we had agreed would be enough for the two of us that day. I also brought arm-extending quantities of liquid and fruit, as promised, but Chas had forgotten that promise so also brought heavy quantities of liquid.
…Mike Archer, Trevor Cooper and Geoff Young. It was really nice to see them – it had been a while – we chatted behind the Compo stand for a while before going our separate ways.
I walked home.
Day Two: Friday 25 May
Same morning routine as the previous day – early gym, cab to the ground, virtually queue-free passage through security, followed by 30 to 40 minutes of observation from the dedans of Mr Johnny Friendly and others at real tennis doubles.
Seats at the front of the Lower Compton for today. Chas was already in his seat when I got there, chatting with the two gentlemen who were to be our neighbours for the day; Michael and Peter. A pair of cricket fans who had known each other for years and whose sons – also keen young cricketers – had ended up at the same school.
After a few casual questions, we ascertained that Michael had grown up very near me, around Tooting Bec Common and that Michael had been very friendly with the Rich family from around the corner. Michael (and Steven Rich) are a few years younger than me, but I grew up with the older sister Gillian, who was my contemporary. What a small world it is.
That pair were really good company for most of the first two sessions, until Michael got called away to a family emergency just before tea and Peter agreed to collect their children from school.
…was at Lord’s that day, just above us, with his mother, Awesome Mummy. We had arranged to meet behind the Compton at tea, but with the unexpected departure of our neighbours, I texted Simon to suggest that the Awesome Duo join me and Chas in the front row of the Lower Compo for the final session, which they did, with predictably convivial results.
Chas and I had agreed that Friday would be a light picnic and dry day. Mrs Malloy had provided some mini pork pies, sausage rolls and nibbles just to ensure the absence of the wolf from the door.
During the final session, we nibbled at some sweetmeats and Awesome Mummy’s strawberries, although we lost a few of each to the delightfully friendly but increasingly clumsy passers-by on our row during the latter stages of the game.
Chas asked me, quietly and sensitively, whether he should offer the remainder of the porky snacks to either of the Awesome Duo. I suggested better not, unsure but suspecting that Awesome Mummy might not approve.
I had pre-warned Chas (and latterly the Awesome Duo) that I would need to leave before stumps, as Friday had not been part of my plan and I had a late night concert to get to at the Wigmore Hall.
So I personally upped sticks at six (about half-an-hour before the umpires did same) and walked home.
Day Three: Saturday 26 May
Due to the change of plans, Daisy very kindly took over picnic responsibilities and we thus switched our overnight location from the planned night at Cityland to Noddyland.
So a very early start, Daisy made up a splendid picnic and we set off for Lord’s early to secure good seats in the Warner. We timed our arrival to perfection.
Ground staff getting ready……Ged Ladd getting ready……Pakistan getting ready…only England seemed unready and unsteady
Chas arrived about 30 minutes after the start of play, by which time a very nice gentleman from Fulham had done a superb job of manspreading onto the seat we had saved for Chas. Mercifully we all managed to come out the other side of that etiquette-dilemma socially unscathed.
The wasabi mayonnaise had gone down so well last year, Janie used it with the turkey as well as with the beef. We took a bottle of white (Vouvrey) and a bottle of red (Jip Jip Rock Shiraz) but no option for a bottle of rose instead.
I got a message from Awesome Sue (Awesome Simo’s sister) wondering if we were at the ground, as she was there with her sister Ruth and daughter Lily. I knew that, of course, having spent best part of a session with Awesome Simo and Awesome Mummy yesterday. In fact I had intended to message Sue myself, but she beat me to it. So we agreed to meet up behind the Warner at tea. Which we did.
Chas, Awesome Ruth, Awesome Sue, Me
Only after Daisy had finished taking photos did we realise that Awesome Lily was temporarily absent from the shoot. That is a shame, not least because Lily is probably the only member of that family to have, in cricket terms, earned the moniker “Awesome”, having consistently taken five wicket hauls so far this season for Gloucestershire Under 15s et. al.
When I subsequently reflected that we had not taken any pictures of Lily, Chas instigated a conversation about The Who:
Anyway, it was really nice to catch up, albeit briefly, with Simon’s awesomely lovely family. We needed to keep the catch up brief, for fear that we might all miss the end of the match if we didn’t keep a watchful eye over the England cricketers for the next two hours or more.
For in truth, although we had a good time at Lord’s, as always, the England cricket team had a shocker pretty much from start to finish. In fact, that final session on the Saturday was England’s only decent session in the whole match.
Not just a bad match for England – a shockingly bad one. All credit to Pakistan for playing really well, but England didn’t even compete. Click here if you dare.
At the end of the day, a steward kindly takes our picture……while making us laugh too. Good chap.
Still, that Friday I had an abstemious day at Lord’s, with a view to having dinner with Daisy and then going to the concert. Daisy indeed came over to my place for a Four Seasons dinner, but then decided that the whole idea of going to a late night concert and then rising for a crack of dawn picnic preparation was too much, so she returned to Noddyland and let me go to this concert on my own.
Probably just as well – she’d have absolutely hated it.
The rubric had inferred a folk/jazz interpretation of Schubert’s songs…which in a sense it was, but it felt a bit gimmicky, at times verging on naff. The tuba/trombone giving the music an Oom-pah-pah band sound…
…if I mention the song where the leader, Bryan Benner, got us to yodel along with him…
…you’re probably getting the gist.
There was a small claque of Erlkings fans sitting behind, but the front row mafia, comprising Wigmore Hall regulars, seemed a little stunned by the style.
The idea is laudable and I even enjoyed some of the tracks. The song which Bryan Benner sang unplugged on the guitar, for example, had a lovely sound to it transposed from piano to guitar. His translations of lyrics generally worked well and he has an outstanding baritone voice. The voice was somewhat wasted with most of the louder arrangements.
Below is one of the songs they performed on the night, with a relatively minimal arrangement:
Below is their signature song, the arrangement of which I thought overpowered Bryan Benner’s powerful voice:
…and here is one from their latest album/project:
At the end of the gig Bryan said an emotional goodbye to Gabriel, the brass instrumentalist, who is leaving the band and for whom the Wigmore Hall was a final gig.
It all felt a bit “ego project” to me, but perhaps I just wasn’t in the mood.
It’s a rare day in the social calendar that includes two such a special occasions; one for the happy young couple of the moment and the other a major sporting rivalry unfolding.
But 19 May 2018 will go down in history as just such a day.
No, I’m not talking about the Heghan nuptials – more than enough has already been written and spoken about that for a lifetime. I’m talking about Escamillo Escapillo and Lavender having diner at Il Baretto with me and Daisy…
…and of course I’m not talking about the FA Cup final between Chelsea and Manchester United – surely that is only of limited interest to most people. No, I am talking about the intense rivalry between me and Daisy on the modern tennis court. A battle at which Daisy had, in recent months, seemed to have found an upper hand, but just these last couple of weeks I seem to have found my mojo again. Some extra gears, decisive play and a brutal finish – believe me you had to be there truly to sense the sheer thrill of it all.
Anyway, to Il Baretto. Most unusually, we all arrived a few minutes ahead of the appointed hour. Central London seemed surprisingly easy to navigate that evening – word was that there was congestion to the South West (out Windsor way) and the North West (Wembley direction) for some reasons.
The happy young couple of the moment
Escamillo Escapillo looks especially happy in the above picture, as he has received a birthday present in the form of the documents you can see by his elbow – tickets to Middlesex v The Australians – which will be the next outing for the four of us.
The food and wine at Il Baretto is consistently good. Janie and I shared some calamari and fried zucchini to start, while the youngsters had some very tasty-looking bruschetta. For mains, Lavender had risotto, Daisy had tuna steak, Escamillo Escapillo had sirloin steak and I had grilled sea bream.
We sort-of went our own way with wine – Daisy and I persevering with Riesling while Escamillo Escapillo switched to Pinot Nero. The wine waiter was a bit farcical – he told me that he had to replace the Riesling we had chosen with an alternative, which he promised was “better” and did taste absolutely fine, but he refused to show us what we were drinking. Then when Escamillo and I did the recommended wine match with deserts, he seemed unable to work out which wine should go with which desert…he even had two goes at it. Minor stuff – more amusing than irritating.
I haven’t the foggiest idea what I’ve been drinkingA very convivial evening
Janie chose a desert named “When Harry Met Meghan” which comprised a fruity, tasty-looking small tart and a long cocktail. Very apt.
Daisy indulging in her “When Harry…” It is an optical illusion making my cup of tiramisu look three times the size of Daisy’s pud
What else can I say? We all had a great time and went our separate ways at a respectable hour – Daisy and I needed to prepare to do battle on the tennis court again first thing Sunday. (Same result, seeing as how you’ve asked. Thank you, Mr Netchord, for the final point.)
The idea of seeing this concert was partly hatched from John Random’s desire to see some lunchtime early music with me. A couple of suitable Thursday dates were either no good for him or no good for me. But this Friday one, during the London Baroque Festival, looked bang on.
The timing was good too, as Janie had arranged to tour the new extension of the Royal Academy at 15:00 that afternoon. Janie very much liked the look of Les Kapsber’girls lunchtime programme.
As John’s availability is subject to the whims of showbiz administrators, the unreserved seating at SJSS makes it a suitable concert venue for an aproximeeting. I bought tickets for me and Janie, knowing that John would be able to get one on the day if he proved to be available.
The e-mails buzzed over the coming days. There was to be a costume fitting for John, so our gathering was off. The costume fitting had been cancelled – John was on again. The fitting was reinstated – off again.
At that juncture I tried to guilt-trip John…with my tongue rather firmly in my cheek, I might add:
John, John, John…
…I can’t handle all four of those Kapsber’girls on my own. And I’m not so keen on your two. No, no, no, two ladies is plenty:
…so I identified the instruments to John while we were waiting for the concert to start…
…but I got more instruments wrong than right. The big thing I thought was a theorbo turned out to be an archlute; the smaller thing I thought was the archlute was actually a tiorbino (a miniature theorbo), the existence of which only became known to me on the day; the small viol I took to be a treble viol was the even smaller pardessus de viole – a soprano viol which, again, was a new instrument to me on the day. Top mansplaining on my part – waxing lyrical while getting most of the facts wrong – I must have sounded like Alan Partridge to an expert observer.
The concert was absolutely charming – as were all four of the Kapsber’girls. They are very young and relatively new to performance at this level; not all of them displayed professionally-grooved stage presence throughout the hour, especially when sitting out the odd piece. But they all four play or sing beautifully and are surely all on the road to success.
The music was early 18th century French popular songs, known as “airs de cour” or “brunettes”. Two voices and two instruments. These songs were published in the early years of the 18th century by Christophe Ballard and were phenomenally popular in France during that latter part of Louis XIV’s reign.
Here is a little vid of “our girls” performing one or two of the songs we heard:
…and if all that leaves you in the mood to hear some actual Kapsberger (and believe me it’s worth it) here are Les ‘Girls playing and singing some actual Kapsberger:
Of course we didn’t hear any actual Kapsberger in our concert; the focus was entirely on the French airs de cour.
Janie snapped this during the final, lengthy applause
John, true to his word, made an approach to one of the girls after the concert – probably to try to understand the difference between the theorbo, the archlute, the chitarrone…that might have been a long, complicated conversation. Anyway, Albane Imps kindly chatted with and then posed with John:
Is that a tiorbino in your pocket, John, or are you just pleased to see me?
We took a snack lunch in the crypt after the concert (Janie’s favourite place at SJSS) where we met a couple of Kapsber’girls again – Axelle Verner chatted with us charmingly for a while – before the girls headed off, returning to France that very day.
The girls were very self-conscious about the quality of their spoken English, although John’s assessment (and he does teach English as a foreign language) is that their spoken English is actually very good. John remarked that the French accent is a very forgiving accent for spoken English – especially when the words are delivered by charming young people! So snap out of it girls – your English is just fine.
John seemed a little star-struck, so we conducted a filmic thought-experiment in which John might make a brief-encounter-like dash to St Pancras for a touching farewell scene with Les ‘Girls, but sadly John decided against.
Not all that many people composed baroque music for eight voices and two instruments, but let’s try naming my thought experiment combination of The Gesualdo Six and The Kapsber’girls “The Zieleński Ten“.
John was clearly inspired by the “baroque girl power” he had seen, so he parted company with us in search of Millicent Fawcett’s statue, at Parliament Square, while Janie and I went on to our appointment with the new extension of the Royal Academy.
In fact it isn’t really a new extension – it is the old Burlington Gardens building behind the main building, which has been conjoined with the main building to bring the whole of the Royal Academy together. This project has been donkey’s yonks in the making and Janie was very excited, as a member, to be allowed a sneak-preview before the doors opened to the public that weekend. Here is a link to a page and vid that explains it all.
Before wandering around and poking our noses into all the new bits of the Academy, we took a quick look at the first exhibition in the new space – Tacita Dean, Landscape – click here for the RA resource on that exhibition. Not especially to our taste, in truth – we were there for the opening more than for this exhibition – but I did like several of the works that fused photographs with spray-on chalk and gouache. One or two of the larger ones were truly stunning and also, strangely, the technique worked well in miniature on postcards.
Then we wandered around the Burlington Gardens extension.
Tim Marlow himself was there, available to chat with the members. We didn’t chat directly with him, but we did chat with several members of staff who were visibly excited about the whole thing. Extra exhibition space, workshop space, studio space and a soon-to-be completed lecture hall with all the modern gadgetry:
Ged is desperate to deliver the first lecture in this place……”this beautiful Burlington Gardens building dates from 1831…”
We then retired back to the City quarters for siesta before grabbing some Persian food and retreating to Noddyland for the weekend. We’d had a super cultural day.
On which day did Middlesex come second twice while Middlesex Seconds came first once?
Now that would be a really good sports quiz question…if it were located somewhere other than this clearly dated blog page.
Confused? Let me explain.
I arranged to go to Radlett with Charley “The Gent” Malloy to see Middlesex v Essex. Long overdue, was our joint visit to Radlett – we had planned to go together to a second team match about four years ago but the rain put paid to that plan, although I did write up our replacement culinary gathering for King Cricket – click here or below:
Tempting the rain gods yet further, I contacted Fran to find out whether she and Simon intended to visit Radlett that day. Our previous attempt to watch cricket together at Uxbridge had been well soggy – click here or below:
Anyway, Fran and Simon were planning on showing up at Radlett, so we planned to all sit together.
Then Richard Goatley (Middlesex CCC’s Chief Executive) asked me if I could join him and some others that evening at the Oval for a London Playing Fields Foundation Sports Quiz Fundraiser. Not really my cup of tea, but given the functional connection with the nascent London Cricket Trust charity, for which I am a Trustee – more on that anon – I thought I should go. Richard promised me a lift from Radlett to the Oval if I wanted to help save the planet by limiting the number of cars criss-crossing London that day – I eagerly accepted that offer of a lift.
In fact, getting to Radlett by train was a doddle…
…certainly compared with Chas’s ludicrous hike across from Malloy Manor, which should have taken him 40 minutes and took more like an hour-and-40. I managed it door to door in not much more than an hour.
That enabled me to nab a few decent seats at the front, with Fran’s vertical challenges in mind. I also thought best to avoid the relentless sun, although I didn’t realise quite how cold the shade would be.
The night before the big day, I had a memory flash that Fran had written to me while I was in Mauritius in 1979 and that I still had the letter. She had…I did…I scanned & printed same and took the incriminating evidence with me to Radlett. Click here or below to see the letter and how all that went down:
Anyway, that correspondence proved an interesting conversation piece for the middle part of the Middlesex innings, during which time Middlesex turned a very promising start into a potential disaster.
While Middlesex rebuilt the innings to something approaching respectability (only 30-40 runs short, rather than the 60-70 runs short that the innings at one point threatened), Fran and Simon observed the Chas and Ged picnic much as a pair of field anthropologists might observe a remote tribe. They had read of such picnics on King Cricket and Ogblog of course, but never actually witnessed anything quite like it.
Not really picnickers themselves, Fran and Simon did bring some cashew nuts, enabling us to share and test the relative merits of Marks & Spencer, Tesco and Lidl in the cashew department. Result: little distinction in flavour, but the more expensive M&S ones are larger and would look posher served up in a bowl.
Unfortunately, just before the end of the Middlesex innings, Fran’s mum, who has been poorly of late, called with a minor emergency which Fran and Simon, kindly and dutifully, went off to attend. I hope I’ll be able to catch up with them again soon – e.g. at Merchant Taylor’s School.
Meanwhile I tried to convince Chas (and myself) that 250 might just prove to be enough runs (ha ha) while Essex set out to prove that even the 280-290 par score might not have been enough if Middlesex kept insisting on dropping catches all afternoon.
Mercifully I had to leave before suffering the indignity of the final nails being driven into Middlesex’s coffin by Essex – click here to see the scorecard and details – in short, Middlesex came second.
Then the drive across London, starring James Keightley behind the wheel, Bob Baxter (Chair of Middlesex Cricket Board) in the front seat, with the back seat navigators being Richard Goatley & me…especially me once we hit traffic and I figured that Waze might solve our navigation problems for us.
We got to the Oval in good time.
The opening overs of the charity event were stunning – it was a glorious sunny evening and we took drinks on that OCS sun deck.
Our team/table also comprised William Frewen (like James, from Teddington CC), Ed Griffiths, his nephew Alex (Richmond CC) and a young gentleman named Bruce (I think).
It soon dawned on me that everyone on our table, apart from me, was bringing quite a lot to the sports quizzing party. It also dawned on me that Richard and the others had sort-of assumed that I might be a useful addition to a sports quiz team. Oh dear.
Oh well, I am what I am, an’ I’m not ashamed.
Strangely, I was able to make a few useful contributions, more through general knowledge questions and sort-of knowing how quizzing works than through sports knowledge itself.
Example: as we were going in to the meal/quiz, James mentioned to me that the master of ceremonies/quizmaster/former Rugby Union international, Martin Bayfield, has appeared as Hagrid’s body in the Harry Potter movies. “Park that piece of trivia at the front of your brain, James,” I said, “that’s bound to come up in one of the questions.” It did.
It was a reasonably relaxed atmosphere on our table, at first. But as we started to do better and better on the leaderboard, the competitive spirit on the Middlesex table started to really take hold.
Heading up the Middlesex competitive spirit big time was Ed Griffiths. I have got to know Ed quite well over the last few months, as he is leading on our London Cricket Trust initiative, to put cricket facilities into parks and commons across London. I have a huge amount of admiration for the way Ed is gently but relentlessly driving our initiative forward. I’ll be writing a fair bit more about the London Cricket Trust in the coming months.
So I suppose it should come as no surprise that Ed is a very competitive chap. But his response to the conclusion of the sports quiz, when it was announced that we had come second (out of sixteen), had to be seen to be believed.
At first I thought Ed was joking, as I might have done, melodramatically bemoaning our “close but no cigar” outcome. But when he nearly smashed a glass in frustration and then went to the quiz adjudication table in order to audit and question the results, several of us realised that Ed really was a ball of combative anger.
Ed returned to our table with the news that we had lost by a mere two points, which, given the charitable circumstances, was news that would satisfy less driven individuals (e.g. me) to conclude that we had done really well and that it was for charity after all and that, but for fortune, we might even have won.
Yet the closeness of the defeat seemed to anger and frustrate Ed yet further. He nearly smashed a wine glass again. Writing this up five days later, I think Ed Griffiths might just about be over the disappointment now…but perhaps not. Middlesex had come second again. Albeit this time in a field of 16 rather than a field of two.
Coincidentally, sitting at the next table to us, was a lady who kept looking across at us and who eventually came over to introduce herself; Tom Lace’s mum. Tom is one of our up and coming second team players who, as the coincidence grows, also plays for Teddington CC. Tom’s mum went on to take selfie photos of herself with William and James from Teddington. I am absolutely sure that breakfast time in the Lace household the next morning will have thrilled young Tom, when mum showed him the evidence of her fun evening with the Middlesex CCC/Teddington CC great and good. In my (limited) experience, youngsters love that sort of thing.
On the evening, I chose not to mention that Tom Lace is (the coincidence simply grows to bonkers proportions) my long-form kit sponsorship player this year. I surmised that such news would have been a relative sub-plot to what was already a bit of a sub-plot, so I kept schtum about that.
But I don’t suppose anyone at that fundraiser was left in any doubt that Middlesex had attended and contributed to the evening big time. Not only did we come second in the quiz (I will get over it eventually, really I will) but two of our number bid very generously in the auction. Ed Griffiths bought tickets to a show he didn’t even know existed (until he was bidding for it), while William Frewen procured one of Harry Kane’s football boots.
As William lives quite near me, I offered to cab him and his new boot home on my way. But I signally failed to find a cab or Uber at the end of the evening…
South of the river? Do me a favour!
…so William and I walked to Vauxhall together and journeyed by tube, with William carrying an unfeasibly expensive soccer boot in a presentation box that had been cunningly disguised, through the use of a simple cardboard box exterior as…
…any old cardboard box. Fiendish.
William and I sat on the Victoria Line train discussing the finer details of Middlesex Cricket Board governance and its integration into Middlesex Cricket…like you do.
How can I win England the World Cup with only one soccer boot?It was a fitting end to an odd but hugely memorable day.
To St. Sepulchre Without Newgate for the last time (at least for the purposes of this lecture series) to see Christopher Page’s last Gresham lecture. This one covers Samuel Pepys’s interest in the guitar later in his life.
I have long been fascinated by Pepys – indeed one of my working titles for Ogblog was “Mr Poopys’s Diary” – based on the notion that it would be like an on-line cross between Mr Pooter’s Diary and that of Mr Pepys…
I had missed the previous lecture, The Guitar At The Restoration Court, in March, due to work commitments, but did find the time to watch it on the web ahead of my May visit, so my attendance at today’s Pepys meant that I have seen all six of them; three live and three on the web.
I also realised when Christopher Page made his closing remarks that I would find several of his earlier lectures (before this year’s series) fascinating – all early music (apart from his first series which was on romantic period guitar) – and they are all on-line too:
I don’t think I’d knowingly heard any William Lawes before – certainly not his viol music.
He looks like a quintessential cavalier of the period, which sums up his career and untimely death (reportedly “casually shot”) soon after entering the theatre of war for the first and last time.
There’s not a lot of Lawes viol music played by Phantasm to be found on the web, but here is the paven from the consort set in F, which we heard on the evening:
…we didn’t have the organ accompaniment, but we did have a sixth viol player in the second half for those pieces that demand six viols.
Likewise, I was not familiar with the work John Jenkins – his viol music was a little lighter in tone, although all such viol consort music is, by its nature, pretty moody.
Even harder to find on line, here are some other dudes playing a John Jenkins Fantasy a6 other than the ones we heard. You’ll get the idea and it is still lovely:
Something about this sort of music heard live touches the soul – I think it is the close proximity to the vibrations of all of those viols.
We both felt so calm and tranquil after the concert we could hardly get our act together to eat when we got home, but somehow we managed it. A very pleasurable end to a Monday off work.
Now that’s what I call a theorboQuintessentially French Baroque
This ensemble was recently involved in a French TV series about Versailles – said to be the most expensive ever made in France – here is a short musical extract from the TV programme:
Mercifully for the down to earth SJSS audience, Fuoco E Cenere did not ponce about in 17th Century wigs and outfits for our concert.
Here is a more down to earth vid and interview about Les Folies d’Espagne by Marais, which they did play on the night:
The highlight of this concert, for us, was the singing of the young guest soprano, Theodora Raftis. She has an outstanding voice and tremendous stage presence. She seemed a little overwhelmed by the occasion at first, but it was great to see her warm to her work and become the highlight of the show by the end of the concert. She was clearly well appreciated by the audience and her fellow performers. Remember the name: Theodora Raftis. Not much of her to be found on-line, but here is some Donizetti – trust us, she’s upped her game big time since this vid was recorded:
The Platters
No , we didn’t see a 1950s vocal group, but we did eat charcuterie and cheese platters with salad and a glass of wine between the concerts. I won’t dwell on the shenanigans involved in booking a table and arranging the platters – let’s just celebrate the fact that waiters David and Ramon did us proud and that we thoroughly enjoyed our twixt concert supper.
Paris-Madras
It was this second concert that really inspired me to book the evening – the notion of a fusion of French Baroque and Indian raga music. How on earth might that work? Well, it pretty much did.
Le Concert De L’Hostel-Dieu provided the baroque element. In truth, we got more out of the ragas than we got out of the Leçons de Ténèbres. The wonderful weather of the previous week had turned to miserable cold weather that day, so neither of us was much in the mood for the lamentations of Jeremiah. More seriously, we’d seen the Leçons de Ténèbres quite recently and didn’t realise that the concert would pretty much give us the whole lot un-fused with the ragas…plus ragas unfused with the lamentations.
…artefacts from the raga element
On the ragas, in particular, we liked the bansuri flute and the sarod. Soumik Datta, the sarod virtuoso involved, is far more rock’n’roll than the rest of the performers on show that night. Here is his showreel:
Below is the explanatory vid in French about the Paris-Madras project, in which you can hear Ravi Prasad sing and Patrick Rudant play his flute, as well as the baroque players of course:
The absolute highlight of this concert for us was the few passages when the musicians segued between the two styles and the ending when they all played together. Perhaps they judged the fusion to be risky, so they minimised its use, but to our mind it was a risk that came off big time and the fusion was the reason we went to see the concert.
Anyway, we came out the other side of the evening feeling very pleased with the whole occasion.
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