We liked the participation elements of the show and threw ourselves into those with reckless abandon.
Mucking about inside a black bag…or rather, “performing Bag Piece” as I should properly describe it, seemed like my idea of fun…
…until I realised that I needed to get up again and get out of the bag…
Rescued by a helpful exhibition steward who also kindly consented to being photographedJanie seemed more at home in a black bag
Then on to an exhibit where you can draw (and/or photograph) your companion’s shadow on the artwork.
Some wags might suggest that I look better in the shadowthan in real lifeA rare opportunity to vandalise an art work with both a hammer & the artist’s consent.Has Janie missed me while I was messing with the art works?
Then on to the refugee boat piece for some more graffiti art
Janie was then horrified to learn that our next contribution to Yoko’s art required us to eulogise our mothers.
Oh crikey!Let’s work on this one togetherResultBottomsI think I’ll play whiteMore messages of peace even in the lobby outside the exhibition
And in the new swanky bar on the river side of the Tate Modern…
…a message in a bottle of ginger beer.
We enjoyed our afternoon. Shame about the rush hour journey home, saved by dint of using the Elizabeth Line westbound instead of the Central.
It’s been a while since I attended a Gresham lecture live. In Janie’s case, probably not since the most recent of mine…
…which took place before we met James Larkin in 2013 in the most stressful of circumstances, as Janie had a dismal diagnosis/prognosis of melanoma at that time.
The worst did not come to pass, against the odds.
We had been impressed with James Larkin and were keen to see what he had to say about developments with immunotherapies since our formal interactions with him on that topic.
A few of the usual suspects were at Barnard’s Inn Hall that night, including Basil and Lesley from the Gresham Society.
There was a drinks reception after the lecture, which gave me a chance to speak briefly with James. He hadn’t recognised us, unsurprisingly (just one consultation more than 10 years ago) but the dismal nature of that consultation clearly returned to his mind as we spoke.
So, she’s alright? Completely well?
James asked, looking at Janie with a slightly bemused expression on his face. Perhaps I was reading too much into it.
It might have had something to do with one of the FoodCycle head office communications team joining our shift at FoodCycle Marylebone in January. Soon after that, I had a message from someone else in communications there wondering whether we’d be prepared to be featured as a Valentine’s story.
It would have been churlish to say no.
We had no action pictures of us working together on FoodCycle in our FoodCycle shirts, except for some masked-up ones for the pandemic days. I asked if a sofa-selfie would do and we were told “yes”.
Don’t ask how many goes it took for us to obtain the half-decent picture that was used.
I should imagine that the library book club occasionally has evenings about books that don’t revolve around gritty Yorkshire cricketers whom I once met. But Ray Illingworth, like Geoffrey Boycott, had the joy of my company once. In Illingworth’s case, for considerably longer than my one-minute exchange with Geoffrey in 1969.
Janie’s interest in cricket tends to revolve around the people, so these talks about biographies please her, as does the charming, relaxed atmosphere of a light meal and talk on a winter’s evening.
We were seated next to Alan Rees, who runs the library and who introduced the speaker, Mark Peel, who was seated to Alan’s right. It was fortuitous sitting near to Alan, as he can help me find some rare real tennis history books in the MCC’s extensive collection to help with my research. A really pleasant, friendly and helpful chap.
Alan looks remarkably calm in the above picture, although he confessed to Janie that he feels nervous introducing such evenings. Alan’s calm look in such a photo reminds me of the deceptively calm look on my face when I am doing something that makes me very nervous, such as riding an elephant.
I don’t look terrified, but…
The pachyderm image leads us nicely to the subject of Ray Illingworth, who must have been one of the thickest-skinned cricketers ever to play for Yorkshire and England…which is a cohort of especially hardened characters.
Of course I met Ray in his dotage, by which time he had softened in the way that legends often do. I told him, as I am now telling you, dear reader, that I started taking an interest in cricket in the early 1970s, when he was the England Captain. I couldn’t really imagine anyone else being the England Captain until, all of a sudden, in 1974, someone else was.
Mark’s talk was excellent. Lots of detail, lots of interesting anecdotes, all delivered with aplomb. Mark also answered all of our questions thoughtfully and in depth.
Undeterred by the “strangely reflected” pictures Janie took last time, she couldn’t resist taking some pictures pointing away from the Writing Room, where the meal takes place. Again, she obtained a rather weird effect but I rather like this one.
In truth, the pomp and circumstance of The Lord Mayor’s Show is not really “our thing” – neither Janie nor I had ever been before, nor had either of us even watched the show on TV.
But in these circumstances, with Michael being the incoming Lord Mayor and all, it seemed only polite to accept the invitation to see the show as a guest of The Lord Mayor and Lady Mayoress at the Mansion House.
But returning to November 2023, before the show, I wanted to show Janie the Z/Yen office at 1 King William Street, just around the corner from Mansion House, as Janie had not yet seen that “new” office. Nor had she seen the oft-mentioned roof terrace. It was also an excuse to make sure we would be on time, while still able to take some warm sanctuary indoors before the Mansion House opened its doors. At least half the Z/Yen team had taken a similar precaution.
Janie loves a roof terrace: 1 King William Street does not disappoint in that regard
Then Janie and I popped around the corner to the Mansion House. I suppose I’ll be popping around that corner a few times in the coming year. Following pre-show refreshments, in which we did not partake, Janie and I were stewarded to our pavement seats right at the front, underneath The Lord Mayor’s viewing position, next to Michael’s brother Kelly. I don’t think we’d seen each other since Michael’s shrieval ceremonies four years ago:
Janie, despite her stated lack of interest in pomp and circumstance, was irritated with herself for forgetting her phone and therefore being without a camera. I allowed her to use mine, on the proviso that she didn’t use up all my film. Janie, cognisant that phone cameras don’t use up film (she knows a thing or two, that lass), proceeded to take about 300 pictures, only 20% of which were fully deserving of the bin.
The weather absolutely smiled on the City of London that day. We have had a rather relentlessly wet autumn in 2023, so all assembled thought we had struck very lucky…except for the (surprisingly sizeable) minority who were convinced that Michael Mainelli is able to control the weather and therefore the crisp but sunny day was by design.
Regardless of how or why the weather ended up so good, it did make for an especially photogenic show. As did the fact that there was an even broader international flavour to the parade than usual.
If you would prefer a brief highlights skim through eye candy and a few choice words, then read and look on.
Evidence that I was there. Just one picture of me amongst the hundreds.Xenia Mainelli (Michael & Elisabeth’s daughter) at the rear of this mounted troupeMichael arrives
After the Armistice Day two-minute silence, the parade began. Here is a small sample of our (Janie’s) pictures.
Janie formed a surprising fondness for the giant effigies Gog & MagogI was able to explain the true and fictional stories of Richard/Dick Whittington to Kelly and Joan seated next to me. I guess Michael and Elisabeth knew I’d have my uses sitting there.Pageantry west meets pageantry eastListen up! The late Mayor’s key charity, The Samaritans – Janie is one of their listeners.Punjabi dancing well-timed for DiwaliVic Reeves aka Jim Moir with his arty crowdA Lord Mayor’s Show delegation from Lagos for the first time“Oh goody. Chigley…” said Janie at this stage of the showA Mongolian themed troupe, for theatrical reasons I believeJanie loved the Hong Kong dragons perhaps as much as Gog & MagogMichael’s partial to a puffin. The Institute of Couriers pandered to that preferenceAlderfolk – the boys and girls on the bus90 minutes later, the pageant was over, once Michael set off for The Royal Courts of Justice.O farewell, Farewell the neighing steed, and the shrill trump, The spirit-stirring drum, th’ ear-piercing fife; The royal banner, and all quality.
Then milling to get back inside the Mansion House, a light lunch and some socialising/chatting before setting off for home.
If you are keen to see the BBC broadcast of this event but don’t know where to find it – as long as you have found this piece within 11 months, you can see it by clicking here.
Gresham Professors Singing The Gresham Professors’ Song, With Thanks To Basil Bezuidenhout for the pictures and the “live music” video
Was it really three years ago that we last enjoyed one of these soirées? Yup. Last year’s event had to be postponed at the last minute.
The only good news about that delay was that the Gresham music professor, Jeremy Summerly, who was unavailable to attend in person last year, was available this year. Splendid news in particular because his deep knowledge about and insights into early music were especially welcome in the matter of the piece that I had “uncovered in autograph manuscript form”, just before the pandemic.
Long lost medieval canticle? We’ll return to this later
Fortunately for all concerned, we had professional musicians to entertain us for the first half of the show, before we Greshamistas got the opportunity to ruin everything.
Actually, before the professionals got the chance to entertain us, the noisiest amateur of us all, Michael Mainelli, piped us in to Barnard’s Inn Hall in the now traditional style.
Michael at full blast. Thoir an aire yer cluasan, folks
Someone once asked me if I ever duet with Michael. My reply:
What would be the point? You’d only hear Michael.
Mercifully for all our ears, the professional team of David Jones and Sofia Kirwan-Baez soon established a pleasant tone to proceedings, both treating us to their fine keyboard skills as well as their excellent voices, with Part 1 of the show.
Sofia has a fine operatic voice, which really came to the fore when she sang the Massenet and the Puccini. David always entertains, not least with his “party piece”, Lehrer’s Elements Song, in which he subtly switches from “Harvard” to “Barnard’s” for the punchline. Also a lovely rendition of Misty, although I can never hear that song any more without thinking of the Gresham Society visit to the London Mithraeum and my resulting Mithras version of that song:
Part 2 of the programme was a different affair, of course, with some regular and irregular antics.
Tim Connell updated a couple of literary standards, deliberately lowering our intellectual and linguistic standards in so doing, aided and abetted by Frank Cox & Mike DudgeonMaths Professors Wilson & Hart taught us how to sing numerical carols. Turns out, it’s as easy as 1-2-3…as long as 4-5-6-7 and 8 are also in your repertoire, naturally. Tristis opus non est beatus, as PC Wilson might put it.
As for my little offering, Þe Fair Weather Canticle, it had been long in the process between “rediscovering” and performing.
I supplied Professor Jeremy Summerly with a copy of the “autograph” and a demo recording, the latter you can see below:
Professor Summerly very kindly gave this opus more than its fair share of scholarly attention, helping the audience to understand the historical significance of my “discovery” with a professorial dissertation on the piece. Unfortunately, that mini-lecture, a masterpiece in its own right, was not recorded for posterity on the night, but I do have some of Jeremy’s notes, which I can share with readers:
Of necessity, discoveries of new sources in the field of early music are less and less frequent as time goes on. All musicologists dream of finding a source of forgotten music, even more so a fragment that might fill in significant holes in our understanding of music history.
Yet such a discovery has been made recently. It is hardly surprising that such a fragment might turn up on the site of a medieval coaching inn, and even less surprising that this inn should be located in Middle England.
The musico-poetic gem þe Fair Weather Canticle, like much early music, surprises us through its apparent modernity. Like the brightly-coloured decoration of a medieval ceiling, or the dissonant harmonies and boldly-contrasting texts of a medieval motet, there is something shockingly modern about this ancient canticle.
Scholars will need time to consider the implications of this newly-found piece within the pre-Baroque jigsaw.
Meanwhile, the words and music should be enjoyed for what they represent: a perplexingly polystylistic mesh of jumbled ideologies and opaque thinking.
Professor Summerly then went on to examine the words of the canticle, noticing some astounding…in some cases shocking…similarities between those words and the words of subsequently well-known songs from periods ranging from the 12th to 17th centuries. In one case, even the 20th.
Finally, Professor Summerly, being an expert on early music, provided some historical context to my performance on an original instrument, which he kindly described as:
a rare and fascinating example of a gittern-ulele, an instrument probably of similar vintage to the canticle.
The instrument has an exceptionally sweet sound in the hands of an appropriate musician…or so we are led to believe, if only such a virtuoso performer could be found.
In the right hands, this gittern-ulele would quite possibly be, to the guitar-family, what Paganini’s Il Cannone Guarnerius is to the violin.
As for the gittern-ulele performance you are about to hear, many of you will surely be moved to tears when listening to the sound of this extraordinary old git?”
It was hard for me to follow that introduction, but I tried, after a subdued start. Basil recorded the moment for posterity – for which I am grateful. It is not every day that my work is professorially conducted, but the triumphant chorus at the end benefitted greatly from Professor Summerly’s expertise, as I had my hands full at the time:
For those who would like to study the words or are crazy enough to try singing along with the vids, here are the words:
Sumer is icumen in, þe nymphs and shepherds dance Bryd one brere, groweth sed and bloweth med And don’t you know, amarylis dance in green–ee-ee-een.
Lightly whipping o’er þe dales, with wreaths of rose and laurel, Fair nymphs tipping, with fauns and satyrs tripping Mister Blue Sky is living here today hey, hey hey.
Mister Blue Sky please tell us why, you were retired from mortals sight, stars too dim of light.
Hey you with þe angels face, bright, arise, awake, awake! About her charret, with all admiring strains as today, all creatures now are merry… (…merry merry merry, merry merry merry merry, merry merry, merry, merry merry merry merry merry merry minded.)
Mister Blue Sky please tell us why, you were retired from mortals sight, stars too dim of light.
Hey there mister blue, who likes to love, lhude sing cuccu, Nauer nu, ne swik thu, sing hey nonny nonny nu.
Mirie it is while sumer ilast, in darkness let me fast, Flow my tears, fairwell all joys for years, Never mind, I joy not in early, I joy not in early bliss.
Mister Blue Sky please tell us why, you were retired from mortals sight, stars too dim of light. Ba ba, ba ba ba ba, ba ba, ba ba ba ba, ba ba, ba ba ba ba, ba, ba x2
After the show, there was plenty of time for eating, drinking, chatting and making merry, as is the case at any good soirée. The Gresham Society Soirée is certainly always a good one.
Janie and I were so pleased to be invited to this Crisis event – a thank you to us 2021/22 Crisis At Christmas volunteers. I wrote up much of our volunteering experience at the time – click here or below.
Our extended volunteering for several weeks into January was unfortunately foreshortened (although only by one shift) when I tested positive for Covid after what should have been our penultimate shift. Which meant we hadn’t had a chance to say goodbye properly to several colleagues.
Reunited with Tracie & Connie
Further, we had heard such great things about the outcomes from this year’s Christmas initiative, we were keen to learn whether the new delivery model would be repeated in 2022.
Tristia and Matt express thanks and bring positive news ahead of 2021
Janie and I wondered whether we might also run into Kathy & Caroline from FoodCycle at this event, as we knew that both of them do Crisis, although we hadn’t shifted with either of them at Christmas. Almost as soon as the speeches finished, those two sought us out:
Caroline & Kathy “soughting” me outNot sure what Mike just said, but no-one, least of all Mike, seems pleased in that instant It wasn’t all bearded, long-haired, bright-shirt-wearing hunks named Ian
We had a very enjoyable time. Afterwards, Janie and I treated ourselves to a shawarma supper takeaway from Ranoush. It would have been rude to walk past the place on the way home, after all.
A Prize Dinner – Kitchen At Holmes, 29 July 2022
Free to choose whatever we want
Back in the mists of time – before we did our 2021 Crisis at Christmas volunteering, I went to a really charming Baker Street Quarter Partnership event, which was, in part, a fundraiser for Marylebone FoodCycle…
…and won a dinner for two courtesy of Kitchen At Holmes in the fundraising raffle.
Janie and I had not got around to booking that evening, as I pointed out every now and then when I stumbled across the envelope/voucher in my in-tray. We agreed that we really shouldn’t push the “valid until November 2022” deadline and that a summer Friday evening out rather than in would be a treat for us.
This meal certainly was that.
Please explain the difference between chanterelles and girolles, Genaro.“It’s like this…”
Genaro looked after us extremely well throughout the meal.
The food looked amazing and tasted just as good. We photographed the food like a couple of youngsters.
In fact, if it is culinary eye candy you are after, you can click the link below and see all the foodie pics we took:
Janie started with the lamb kofte, depicted above, while I started with a tuna tartare dish. Janie then moved on to fish – sea bass, while I enjoyed a veal steak. The chunky chips were a delight for us to share, as were the carrots & purple potties, also depicted above.
Of course a raffle is all luck but, as the organisers said at the Baker Street Quarter Partnership do all those months ago, it was really nice to have FoodCycle volunteers win one of the high-end raffle prizes
Our deserts – we sort of feel we got our just ones
Janie and I were super excited ahead of this one. During lockdown Janie had taken to fine art and had been reading up on graffiti art/street art. This Alternative London street tour, with an opportunity to try out some spray can art at a workshop afterwards, seemed like a very good idea, so I snapped up a couple of tickets for an alternative Friday afternoon off.
Gary was the geezer we rolled with
We were part of a group of 12 to 15 people, most of whom were tourists from outside the UK and very few of whom seemed to come from anywhere near Janie’s and my age range. Unlike my visits to Lord’s lately, no-one addressed me as “young man” on this afternoon.
Janie and I went mad with our camera-phones. We took nearly 140 pictures between us and if you want to flick through them all, unedited but in time sequence, this Flickr album (here and image below) has the lot:
I’ll pepper this account with some highlight pictures, which should give you a reasonable idea.
The Walking Tour
We started in Fashion Street, where there were many superb street art works, including this one, which had recently acquired its tears and farewell messages:
The above two pictures also Fashion Street, with moving stories to go with them
It also dawned on me that we were walking streets (and due to walk streets) close to the locations I have recently been researching regarding the early years of my mother’s Arkus/Markus/Marcus family in London. More on that later.
Some of the most spectacular street art in the area emerged during (or just after) lockdown, when artists needed an outlet for their outpourings and many building owners presumably thought, “why not?”:
Extraordinary and exceptional skills needed to produce works like these
We wandered a bit further east, around Princelet Street…
Janie was already getting funky with the art, snapping Princelet Street through the looking glass
We then wended our way to the open space around the old Truman Brewery, where a great deal of street art and graffiti art resides.
Lots of symbolism…Banksy himself had a hand in the car……Gary tried to explain some of it to me – it reminded me a bit of situationismThis concrete sculpture was simply stunning
Then back along Hanbury Street..
In Hanbury Street, Gary pointed out the utterly compelling Libreria bookshop and then didn’t stop to give us time to have a look around – you cannot do things like that to me!
In the few moments I grabbed in the shop, the attendant spotted my Middlesex CCC shirt and engaged me in conversation about that as well as books. I’ll have to go back, I suppose.
At the end of Hanbury Street, we were on the corner of Spital Street, where my Great Uncle John (Johnny) lived and worked as a cabinet maker at the turn of the 20th century.
On Heneage Street we rather liked the Up Yours street art piece.
Multi sport facility – well streetWe SO nearly ended our tour prematurely in there
Then back to Brick Lane…
Kill The Cat
…more or less completing a circuit before ploughing south towards Whitechapel.
A wonderful, almost new, symbolic piece by an artist of Bangladeshi origin
We said goodbye to the few walking tourists who had chosen not to try some spray can art – the rest of us ploughed on towards the Hessel Street studio.
A Brief Arkus/Markus/Marcus Family Tour
We walked along White Church Lane and then past Back Church Lane – the latter (No 132) being the residence of my Great Uncle Max & Great Aunt Leah Markus at the time of the 1901 census – just a few years after Max arrived in London and while he was still labouring in the tobacco industry and dreaming of returning to his chosen profession – violinist.
Modern buildings & street works where 132 would have beenGreat Uncle Max c1900
When Max first arrived, in the late 19th century, he lived at 1 Matilda Street, where the rest of that enormous family (including my grandpa) still resided in 1901.
No longer there, Matilda Street has been absorbed by council housing buildings on the block just south-west of Gary’s Alternative London studio…
Of course I hadn’t yet got around to taking that stroll (I spend so little time in the City these days) and it hadn’t occurred to me that we might be close by, when I booked this experience.
But let us return to Whitechapel and spraying paint around.
The Studio Session
Gary made us all mask up and glove up (thank goodness) and then taught us how to spray paint on walls/boards rather than ourselves (useful skill, that, when spraying paint).
These pictures taken just before we all masked and gloved up
Keeping us away from the stencils until we had “mastered” the basics, we were charged with making a rectangular base and graffitiing our names. This, even I could do quite well.
Quite well, although my street art name should really be Ged
Even the use of the larger stencils was within my skills grasp with relative ease – the trick being to spray enough but not too much.
It was the attempt at some detailed lettering with stencils that confounded me, with more red paint on my fingers and blotching that corner of my masterpiece than actually communicating words. I wanted to spray “Media Kills”, but I think I’ll stick to the keyboard for such detailed messages.
Janie chose, instead, to “give it large” with the visual imagery, absorbing some of the existing images into her own creation, which, I am reliably informed, is very street.
So there you have it – Janie shows big idea talent at this art medium while I scratch away thinking that words are necessary in all cases.
We’d had a wonderful afternoon. Although we haven’t travelled to far-flung locations now for years, this experience transported us in far-flung cognitive ways.
And for those who think that the words are unnecessary for this experience, there’s always the Flickr album with all the pictures from the day:
What a palaver getting tickets for this exhibition, even though we are members of the V&A. Don’t get me started. But once Janie gets started with a mission to get something, she can be quite tenacious and I can sometimes help.
Anyway, one thing led to another and we scored a pair of tickets for 8:00 a.m. on the last Saturday of the show. Here’s the trailer for those who would like to know more about it:
Janie was keen to take pictures, undaunted by the professional pictures on the website and the beautiful Epic Iran book, which naturally we procured on exit:
The headline picture and those below are a few of Janie’s own efforts as we went around the show.
The scope of the exhibition was awe-inspiring – from the earliest civilisations to modern Iranian arts and culture.
This was the first cultural event that we have attended since the start of the pandemic. It occurred to me, as my head started to spin with the mental energy required to take it all in and the sensory stimulation from all those extraordinary exhibits, that we should have “warmed up” for such a momentous exhibition.
We wouldn’t have gone straight back to the tennis court and played a five-set epic as our first match back, would we? So perhaps we should have warmed up for Epic Iran by looking at a smaller, more familiar collection first. Twenty minutes in the MCC Museum during the Lord’s test match for example.
But I digress.
Epic Iran was a truly superb exhibition.
I wanted to try and bargain for the above carpet, but the owner was nowhere to be found. I should really complain to the V&A authorities about that.
Meanwhile Janie, being more sensible than me, made a bee-line for the V&A shop, snapping up a copy of the beautiful Epic Iran book at a member/attendee price before the exhibition closed and stocks ran out.
On the way home, Janie was still in the mood for sensory stimulation, so asked me to stop in Hyde Park briefly so she could see this year’s Serpentine Pavilion construction.
Counterspace
All that culture and still we were home before noon. Not bad for our first cultural outing since the start of the pandemic.
We’re more than a week past April Fools Day, so pieces that start, “we have discovered a long lost…” would normally have to wait another year.
But this one is true.
While Janie was busy deep cleaning the place yesterday, ahead of her restart on Monday, she knocked a small Peter Harris (my dad) painting off the wall, smashing the glass of the clip frame.
She was momentarily upset, wanting everything to look right from day one of the restart, until I pointed out that Amazon Prime could ship an exact replica of the frame to us next day. Of course they could; of course they did.
The new frame has just arrived.
To our surprise we discovered, between the backing sheet and the clipboard, dad had left the above sketch. Perhaps in error. Perhaps deliberately to add bulk to the backing having abandoned the sketch. It’s unsigned, so he clearly didn’t consider it to be finished. He was not one of life’s finishers, my dad.
Good artist, though. And a lovely bloke.
Moved I am, to see this sketch for the first time. Actually Janie and I were both a little moved by the discovery.
