My technology problems and Verdi’s Don Carlos.
Yes, I know I have my iPod nano and it is a wonderful piece of gear. I listen to it in the street, on the train, at the gym and I took it away with me on holiday and sat…
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Thomas Paine’s new statue comes to Lewes.
I couldn’t make it to the unveiling of the new Thomas Paine statue in my town of Lewes, England yesterday but I went down later and managed to take a photograph before the light faded. I wrote about the other…
Tom Paine gets a permanent memorial in Lewes, England
Thomas Paine Born 1737 Thetford, Norfolk, England, Great Britain Died 1809 New York, United States of America. On Sunday, American Independence Day, here in Lewes England, I am proud to say that my home town is unveiling a statue to…
Strange things happening on Brack Mound
When the sun rises above the mound at the back of my house it feels like it is coming from the “other side.” It floods into my garden setting it alight and transforming it into a pagan paradise. Brack Mound…
How I caught Placido Domingo’s cold
The great Spanish tenor Placido Domingo has been getting rave reviews for his performance in the baritone role of Simon Boccanegra in Verdi’s powerful and gloomy opera of that name. Domingo is now nearly 70 and has been singing professionally…
Elgar and the shame of the Bank of England
One of my favourite public monuments is the splendid statue in Hereford of, the great and sublime English composer Edward Elgar propped up against his bicycle gazing at the sky in romantic contemplation of, we are led to assume, the…
Naked hiking gets the thumbs up in Switzerland
There were some pictures of people hiking whilst wearing only walking boots and rucksacks in my copy of The Times this morning. Shocking you may think but it was a story about how a Swiss man has just won his…
The World Cup and England goes very quiet.
It is not as if I really understand football. Well, I played it at school and did, believe it or not, score the odd goal or two but I was never that bothered even if it had been planted deep…
The Dying Gaul knew how to face defeat with dignity.
The Dying Gaul, (a Roman marble copy of a Hellenistic work of the late third century BC Capitoline Museums, Rome.) This piece of heroic and tragic sculpture brings to an end this week where I have been looking at classical…
From One Seated Boxer To Another.
Seated boxer (c.100-50 BC. Museo Nazionale Romano, Rome.) Far be it for me to compare myself to one of the greatest of all Greek sculptures but looking again at the powerful image of the Seated Boxer – I was lucky…