Christmas

This is the result of a little photographic project that rather to my surprise I've managed to complete.  The photos were all taken in Princes Street Gardens on the same day of the month (with a couple being a day out) and at roughly the same time of day.

I'd like to claim that they were all the same aperture and exposure etc but that's a bit too technical and anyway I mucked about a little with the camera settings and don't know what's what.  That's the problem with being an ungifted amateur.

So the year is slipping towards Christmas and there have been the inevitable Christmas concerts including my own.  This year we played in Old St Paul's Church rather than in the hall and friends in the audience thought the sound quality better.  From the depths of the band you can't really tell.  I went to hear another local wind band the following evening in Greyfriars.  I thought the quality of their playing superior to ours but they fell down compared to us in not providing lashings of free mulled wine.

Though in fact we were a bit short in the lashings stakes.  I left it somewhat too late to join the queue and got some only through the charity of those already served.

The Grads got into Christmas spirit of sorts with their production of Reckless.  It's not about Christmas as such but it's set at Christmas.  I was at the readthrough some months ago and thought it rather a weird and unwieldy affair, decided not to audition for it but was very pleasantly surprised when I went to see it.  They'd made it a very entertaining piece.  Played in the round it was propelled along by a troupe of Christmas elves who whisked bits of set on and off, pushed a couple around in an open car and generally added to the fun.  I still thought it an odd piece but they definitely made a silk purse out of it, paricularly the final quite moving scene which brought out a tragic quality beneath the zany humour.

Tommy Smith is acknowledged as a great jazz performer but he's also a ccomposer of note and this month saw his most ambitious project to date.  Spirit of Light drew together the jazz singer Kurt Elling, Capella Nova, players from the SNJO and a number of other instrumentalists to present the words of writers as diverse as Liz Lochhead and Meister Eckhart in a Christmas celebration that is both secular and sacred.  I heard it within the lofty walls of St Mary's Episcopalian Cathedral which complemented perfectly the style of the work. It was excellent.