Tag: singing

‘the Christmas life’

So, this has to be one of the weirdest things I’ve seen this Christmas. “The true spirit of Christmas: Turkey panini and chips”. I mean, what? Who wrote that, and why? And why are they still working in advertising??

There’s something about how adrift things have got, here (unless of course this is so achingly post- post- modern and ironic that it should come with paracetamol) which inclines me either to laugh, or weep. I’ve decided to laugh, and (more…)

‘Everyone Sang’, Siegfried Sassoon

You can read this poem, and hear the poet reading it, here.

The simplicity and beauty of this poem silence me. It captures an experience of ecstasy, release and hope—an access into eternity—which all who have shared it will recognise. ‘Delight… beauty… tears… horror… song’… In his autobiography CS Lewis defines joy as ‘an unsatisfied desire which is in itself more desirable than any satisfaction’. This quietly, profoundly moving poem makes me think of that.

thing 5: ‘delightful to nature, and good to preserve the health of man’: singing together

Like many things, not all choir-practices are created equal.

Some are frustrating and tiresome; some irritate and enervate; others simply feel as if they’ll never come to an end. You’re singing a piece which isn’t to your taste and, as you listen to another part (it’s always another part, of course, never the sopranos) sing their line over and over and STILL make the same mistake, you look at your watch and realise there are still 57 long minutes left to go till tea time (and the word has gone round that it’s not even chocolate squares tonight, only oat crunches). The church heating’s set either (more…)

thing 4: ‘world enough, and time’: a water-pilgrimage (part ii)

So: we walked the 25ish miles from Frome to Bath, stopping to swim, eat and pour water at various points along the way.

Sounds like a kicking weekend, huh? But this turned out to be one of those experiences where time seems to expand to accommodate all the stuff its brings. I think of this as herniated time—time which bulges sideways and intrudes into eternity, or timelessness, or both (if they’re not the same).* All this to be obtained merely by putting one foot in front of the other.

The morning’s walk on day one took us across fields, past poplar-copses (we stopped to listen to the wind in the leaves) (more…)