Harry Christophers and The Sixteen

Saw Harry Christophers and The Sixteen tonight at Tewkesbury Abbey. They are on their choral pilgrimage around the country singing music of 16th century Tudor England. This is highly recommended, superb singing in superb surroundings - go and see them if you get the chance.

Severn Bridges

Took Dexter to the Severn Estuary at Aust this afternoon. This is a panoramic view between the two bridges. I am uploading more pictures on his blog.

Bluebells and cowslips

Found both this afternoon at Sheepcombe and Lower Hazel.

Mahler's Resurrection Symphony

Members of the Alveston Singers and Thornbury Choral Society are joining the Cardiff Philharmonic Chorus in a performance of Mahler's Symphony No 2 ("Resurrection") on 20 June. See Cardiff Philharmonic for details of the concert. This piece is 97th in this year's Classic FM Hall of Fame. It should be near the top - a truly inspirational work. Here is the fifth movement in which the choir will be singing, divided into 4 parts on YouTube. The choir starts to sing at 1 minute into the third part.

Euro-whiff

Did you smell the 'euro-whiff'? I did last night at about midnight and I live in South Gloucestershire! See the BBC and Telegraph websites.

Free compost bin

Whilst searching for the best price for a compost bin, I found this recyclenow website. You can get a free 220 litre compost bin here if you live in South Gloucestershire. Or you can find out what special offers there are in your area here.

Sayings

In church today, Dr Anne Spargo in her last sermon with us, reminded us of the fable of the chicken and the pig:
One day the chicken said to the pig, 'Hey, I've got a brilliant idea. The two of us should go into a business partnership.'
'Great,' said the pig, 'but what sort of business?'
'Oh, I don't know ... how about the bacon and egg business?'
'Well, that seems like a good idea, let me think about that,' said the pig. 'Wait a minute, though - it's okay for you to produce eggs, but for me to produce bacon I'd have to give up my life.'
'That's right,' said the chicken, coldly.
Well worth remembering the difference between contribution and commitment.

Yesterday, on Any Questions, Archbishop Sentamu reminded the Radio4 audience of Archbishop William Temple's saying: "Coincidences seem to occur much more frequently when I pray".

Gift Aid

It was expected that when the income tax rate was to reduce by 2% to 20% on 6 April this year that the tax reclaimed on Gift Aided contributions to charities would correspondingly be reduced. This is not the case. The welcome news for all charities is that they can continue to reclaim 22%. This came out in the 2008 budget: the additional 2% is called transitional relief.

Alveston Weather

Just found this cool website. Should be of interest to anyone in Alveston with an eye on the weather! I cannot find out who runs it though?!

Classic FM Hall of Fame - results

Further to my previous entry here the results are now out and the top 3 are:

1 Vaughan Williams: The Lark Ascending
2 Rachmaninov: Piano Concerto No. 2
3 Vaughan Williams: Fantasia on a Theme by Thomas Tallis

It couldn't be that this year is the 50th anniversary of Vaughan Williams' death that has something to do with it? (Note: the Alveston Singers are singing his Benedicite in June.)

My top 3 were:
1 Beethoven: Violin Concerto
2 Mozart: Requiem
3 Handel: Messiah
and they were placed 45th, 19th and 20th respectively.

The Apprentice

The Apprentice starts again tonight at 9pm on BBC1.

Archbishop Robert Runcie

Just heard this on tonight's Radio 4 comedy programme (The Museum of Curiosity):

Baron Runcie (former Archbishop of Canterbury) said: "the church is like a swimming pool; all the noise is at the shallow end". Very true!

Start the Week

Listening to Start the Week with Andrew Marr. One of his guests is Simon Russell Beale, the actor, who was a chorister at St Paul's Cathedral. He is starting a new series called Sacred Music on BBC4 starting on Good Friday at 8pm and Easter Day at 8.30pm featuring the award-winning choir The Sixteen, conducted by its founder Harry Christophers. Must see!

BBC Music Magazine

Reminder to myself - I must get it!
Informed by the BDOA of the April issue of the BBC Music Magazine. The free CD is of David Briggs playing Vierne's Organ Symphony No 3, and Widor's Symphony No 5, plus a 5 minute improvisation by David Briggs on the bell chime of St Sernin Basilica, Toulouse, where this recording is made. It is a recording on the magnificent original Cavaille-Coll instrument.

Tewkesbury Abbey

I visited Tewkesbury Abbey for the first time on Saturday. Why I have not visited this splendid place before, I just do not know. Anyway, having a friend stay for the weekend was an ideal excuse to go, and I recommend a visit to this Norman abbey.

Converting .mov files to .avi files

Videoclips on digital cameras tend to be .mov files which can be played by QuickTime. However, if you want to edit them using Windows Movie Maker, they need to be converted into .avi files first. You can do this by purchasing QuickTime Pro, or for free by using RAD Video Tools. If at first the latter does not work, try different compression types. I use Intel Indeo for my Panasonic Lumix DMC-TZ3 camera clips.

New BBC homepage

Just looked at the BBC homepage. You can now customise it - very useful.

Mock the Week

Hilarious clips from Mock the Week, currently being repeated on BBC2.

On my doorstep

Found this frog on my front doorstep wanting to come in after choir practice (mine not its!).

Karl Jenkins: The Armed Man

Attended a workshop to rehearse and perform this work with Thornbury Choral Society today at Thornbury Baptist Church - excellent work, excellent conducting (Steven Kings), excellent venue!

Excess Baggage

Did you listen to this morning's Excess Baggage programme on BBC Radio 4? Included was a feature on the Island Man who is the first person to sleep on all of the 162 Scottish islands over forty hectares (as featured in this book - must put it on my wish list). You can hear Mendelssohn's Overture "The Hebrides" (Fingal's Cave) here: http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=ne5sb1LBaJw

Embedded routes and photos on walking logs

I would really like to do what you can do with EveryTrail (see earlier posts) with OS mapping.

The Ordnance Survey have just announced the launch of OpenSource for developers. This looks like rather hard work unless you are used to Java programming.

Anquet tell me that they are soon to launch something similar to EveryTrail but with OS mapping so I will be interested to see how that pans out. However, there are licensing restrictions with showing OS maps on websites, so I will be getting in touch with OS to see exactly what the situation is. Watch this space.

The demise of the British pub?

Listened to You and Yours on BBC Radio 4 at lunchtime. You can listen again here at BBC iPlayer. There was mention of the Black Swan in Ravenstonedale which the BAsWC have used as a base for memorable walks in the Howgills. Is diversifying the way forward for the country pub?

Lunar eclipse

The next lunar eclipse is on 21 February at about 3am! See wikipedia for more information.
Here is a YouTube film of the one on 3 March 2007 taken from Bristol!

Another test of EveryTrail

A Cotswold Way leg last month. The software is a bit quirky and takes some getting used to, but I haven't found anything better yet....
Cotswold Way Cleeve Hill to Stanway at EveryTrail

Map created by EveryTrail:Share GPS tracks