The puff of smoke is in celebration of the Queen's 75th Jubilee.  I happened to be in Princes Street when a salute was fired from the castle.  I didn't count the bangs but I don't imagine there were 75 of them.  There's a strict protocol which I'm not familiar with about the number of bangs that any particular occasion/person merits.

There was no street party in Dicksonfield, not I am sure out of any disrespect for the monarch but rather as a symptom of the apathy and prevailing lack of community spirit here. Personally I enjoyed what I saw of the Trooping of the Colour but other aspects of the celebrations, or at least the coverage of them on the telly, I found cringeworthy.

That dinner with friends at Cafe Konj that I mentioned in my last post turned out to be somewhat fateful.  Of the five of us who were there four came down with Covid within a few days.  The fifth didn't but then he'd had it in the recent past.  I'm glad to say it didn't present as much more than a heavy cold.

I completed the recommended five days of self isolation (which I quite enjoyed by the way although I missed playing in my concert and attending a social engagement) just in time to honour a commitment to perform in some simulation role play at Napier University.  I was the father of a cerebral palsy afflicted daughter who had just had an operation to lengthen an Achilles tendon.  We were at a hospital discharge meeting with a group composed of Physio, Occupational Therapist and Social Worker discussing after care.  We did it with six different groups of students over the course of the morning.  It was good fun.  The daughter was cast as an awkward uncooperative besom and me as a long-suffering dad.  I bumped into one of the students at the bus-stop on my way home and she reported that it felt really authentic so I guess we fulfilled our mandate.

I was most impressed by the set up for simulation.  They have what looks to me exactly like a small hospital ward, an intensive care unit (with a dummy at death's door in situ) and a "house" with kitchen bathroom etc.  It may seem daft but NASA came to mind when I saw all this.  It's just that at Napier they're not simulating zero gravity.  At least not in that department.

Before I knew I was stricken with Covid (the day after the fateful dinner in fact) I went to Edinburgh's Hidden Door festival.  This annual event started a few years ago.  The idea is they take over disused premises (in this case the old Royal High School on Calton Hill whose history of possible re-use is novel length but that's another story) and run music, theatre, dance and art events etc over a couple of weeks.  They didn't take up the offer of Rock, the play about climate change that I'd been in in Princes Street Gardens in May, which would have suited both the site and their ethical outlook but there was a lot of good stuff.  I saw a particularly good piece by two young women which like so much good theatre started off all fun and laughter before subtly letting its serious intent reveal itself.  How do you find the right thing to say to help a friend with misfortune, in this case miscarriage.

The art on display was, as I find is often the case, a mixture of the baffling and the beautiful.  The music similarly didn't always appeal to me but it would be remarkable if it did.  A poetry session in one of the building's most beautiful rooms was excellent.  The poets (I'd be surprised if any of them was a day over twenty-five) were drawn from a number of ethnic and geographic backgrounds and the focus of the work was on celebrating the generations that had gone before.  Mind you one young man's poem revealed a less than celebratory relationship with his father.  You felt for him.  What more could you ask from poetry.

 

The other older festivals will be with us shortly.  Boo to the Film Festival for having reverted to August thus adding to the clash conundrum.  Tomorrow I'll be booking Book Festival events.  I've got a little list that has been carefully checked against commitments already made. 

The view from the Ross Bandstand before the audience gathered for our performance of Rock.  The show went very well and we, the three bits of rock on the stage, had a very good view of the imaginative and well choreographed scenes that were played out at ground level in the area that the council have christened the terrazzo (sic).

As you can see from the photo the weather was relatively benign as it was throughout the StagEHd festival, which is a mercy since the casts not lucky enough to have the shelter those of us on stage had could have been very uncomfortable.

Plans are already afoot for StagEHd 2023.  See the website.

The week before Rock went up I paid a visit to the Saturday market on Castle Terrace.  It's something I've been meaning to do for some time especially since the bus home from my Saturday morning sax lessons passes conveniently close.  But there always seems to have been something that got in the way.  Rain for example or some pressing engagement or just a desire to get home and put my feet up.  

Not a patch on the market held outside my flat in the Boulevard Auguste Blanqui twice a week.  Or was it thrice?  A poor cousin even to the market in Guéret but not bad for Scotland and the fare on offer was very good.  I loaded up my bag with a pig cheeks and black pudding lunch, dressed crab, venison in various forms and a loaf of tasty bread.

I'll go again but not on my way home from a sax lesson.  Rocio has decided to stop giving regular private lessons.  Mostly it's in response to her husband's change of job which means they are both working full time.  Quite a change after twelve years but I'm in no rush to find another teacher.  I can still have the occasional lesson with her or I may just settle into playing what I fancy when I can be bothered.

We had a sort of farewell Sunday lunch but being a Spanish lunch the invitation was for 4pm, later postponed to 5pm because of her nine year old's attendance at a cello workshop. (Her six year old declares loyalty to the sax but we shall see.) In the event it was 6pm when lunch was served.  I had a very pleasant few hours with them and it was really nice to spend some time with the kids whom I've only seen in the passing over the years.

I missed the RSNO's performance of the Symphonie Fantastique which was a shame since I like it but have never heard it played live.  I've forgotten why I didn't get there but I did get to their season ending concert the main work of which was Beethoven's 9th Symphony.  The last movement of it is great with the chorus giving it laldy but I'm not a great fan of the rest of it.  For me the piece of the evening was a brand new flute concerto by the young Scotttish composer Jay Capperauld.  The piece is called Our Gilded Veins and in essence begins in chaos which gradually over the twenty minutes it lasts resolves into order.  It was absolutely beautiful and I look forward to being able to get a recording sometime.  It's worth reading what Jay has to say about it so I've copied his programme note:

"Our Gilded Veins is inspired by the ancient Japanese art of kintsugi, the mending of broken objects in order not only to repair them but to highlight their previous damage in a special and positive way. If a plate is broken, instead of throwing it away it is glued together with gilded lacquer to emphasise and celebrate the break as part of the object's history.

Essentially, as a human concept, Our Gilded Veins is an honest reflection on damage, failure and scars, with the intention of embracing the necessity of life’s negatives while attempting to forge a positive existential outcome. The concept of cultivating a positive state of mental health is at the crux of the work’s  concerns. The most positive step forward in  recent years is the gradual societal change in  attitudes towards the stigma surrounding  mental health, particularly where mental  illness is concerned. As attitudes change, a  deeper understanding of more sophisticated  practical techniques that nurture positive  mental health has developed alongside a  collective empathy and desire to help others  (and ourselves) maintain a balanced state of  mind. 

Musicians know more than most that  music plays a demonstrably powerful role  in the recovery process as well as the  safeguarding of our mental health - to the  point where the phrase 'Music saved my life'  has become a recurring theme in the stories of  those who have faced the various harrowing  circumstances in their lives. As a composer I also have an avid interest in  psychology - to the point where I would have  pursued a career as a psychologist had my  path towards music failed - and I am  particularly intrigued by how our internal  worlds are shaped by and, conversely, reflected  in the external world around us. In this way, I  often think of my music as having its own  independent consciousness and psychological  agenda, which is representative of specific  emotional states that attempt not only to  portray 'how' certain psychologies manifest  themselves, but to explore and highlight 'why'  these states of mind develop and why the  music might 'act' in the way that it does.

Therefore, the concept of kintsugi acts as a  fitting metaphor for the human experience,  which is an undeniable reflection of how we  must interact with the external world as well  as how we negotiate the various knocks that  life throws our way. It is through this metaphor  that Our Gilded Veins attempts to explore,  highlight and champion the message of  positive mental health in a musical context, as  well as the idea that broken objects ought to  be celebrated and nurtured, not discarded." 

 © Jay Capperauld 

By coincidence mental health lies beneath the plot of The Scandal at Mayerling with which Scottish Ballet bestrode the Festival Theatre stage to great acclaim by the audience including myself.  Crown Prince Rudolph going nuts (syphilis?) as he spirals down through a torrent of sex, violence and alcohol to a dramatically conclusive murder/suicide with his besotted young lover.  Some very strenuous dancing by the principals and great ensemble work against a grandly imagined Hapsburg Empire set.  I loved it.

I've never been a great fan of the style of humour found in the days of the silent film which persisted through at least the early years of the "talkies".  Some of that features in Laurel and Hardy by Tom McGrath that the Lyceum has revived with the same cast who played in its world premiere in the same theatre 17 years ago.  They do those snippets very well and I found myself amused despite my reluctance.  The play though is not simply a recreation of their work but a presentation of the origins and development of their partnership and of aspects of their personal lives.  It's extremely well put together, staged and performed.  A treat for fans and non fans alike.

Andy Ellis, an erstwhile stalwart of the Grads and of the SCDA, with his wife Sue was on a visit to Edinburgh and I went with others to say hi at a meal at Pomegranate just up the road. It was a good evening with excellent Middle Eastern nosh.  I'd taken a bottle of wine but the restaurant is no longer a BYOB establishment so we forced to drink from their rather tasty list.

The place I'm going this evening, the unique Konj Cafe, also provides Middle Eastern food, in their case specifically Iranian.  The food is lovely and this time the bottle I take won't come home with me because they are still BYOB.

Summer seems a long time coming to Edinburgh this year.  We had a few nice days in March, fewer in April and it seems to me almost none in May.  The last day of May wasn't too bad and got better as morning turned to afternoon so I determined to make a little excursion and set off along the East Lothian coast.  Not very far along because I got off the bus at Fisherrow and walked along the sands to the mouth of the Esk and then upriver to Musselburgh town centre and a bus home.  But it was a beautiful walk and I clicked away with my camera.  I leave you with one of my artistic shots - Inchkeith and the coast of Fife glimpsed through gorse.