HIT A WRONG KEY AGAIN.
Concerto Symphonique 2 and 4 played by Peter Donohoe who I am convinced has hit very few wrong notes in a distinguished career, then with Daniel Barenboim (Brahms Piano 2), who would probably regard any wrong note by anyone as a personal affront, and I may finish with Tchaikovsky's Piano Concerto No. 1 played by John Ogden (who I have on video playing Rachmaninov's 2nd and gently tutting at a spot where, almost imperceptibly, he touches an unwanted note). Now where was I?
Hit a wrong key!
Wiped the entire draft of this blog post. Nothing saved and no back up. Swore my soul to hell! It isn't the rewriting so much as the remembering what I was writing about. Nowadays my short term memory can seldom be found where I thought I'd left it. I do remember that it had something to do with fame again.
Oh...yes...
LOOKING
FOR FAME?
I'D SOONER RELAX.
The one thing you learn about fame on an island like this is that, whoever you are (actor, broadcaster, television celebrity, national treasure), you should not expect recognition.
Islanders have a very healthy outlook on the famous: ignore the buggers until they've proven they are something more than a giant ego. A few of them manage that right away and are popular. Given time, others scrape by and become reservedly accepted.
Those who envision awed respect are studiously ignored.
Two people unlikely ever to be burdened with fame, Mo and I, have only been in wordless proximity to two immensely famous people worth the mention: Years ago, waiting with friends outside a nightclub in London to board a black cab, we vaguely recognised the angry-looking passenger who disembarked from it.
We clambered aboard, chattering that we ought to know who that was, and the cabbie, taking pity on an obvious bunch of provincials, said:
“That was Mr. Andrew Lloyd Webber.”
When we remarked that, for all his success, he looked far from happy, The Knowledge said: “Oh that's because he's looking for his wife. He looks like that quite a lot nowadays.”
Andrew Lloyd Webber was married to Sarah Brightman at the time.
The other much lauded national treasure we came across was David Attenborough.
He was sitting at a table in a large bookshop on the main street in Edinburgh where it would seem his publishers had booked him to sign copies of the immensely expensive tome that accompanied his immensely popular television documentary of the time. Don't ask me which one: there have been so many of them.
Anyway, just for the record, he looked more determinedly disconsolate, more unapproachably lonely, more totally and utterly pissed off, than any world famous television presenter – national treasure or not – should ever look, in or out of the public eye.
So much for fame.
ANOTHER SAD VIEWING.
In Post 381 I mentioned the death of Mo's nephew Phil.
Last Wednesday we were afforded the opportunity to see his funeral service on a computer link.
In normal times the crematorium would have been crowded. With lockdown there was just a sparse family attendance, but the ceremony, free from religion, was affectionate and heartfelt, and concluded in a way that was so Phil Butler it brought tears to our eyes.
They played PLAY UP POMPEY
The entire Fratton Park crowd. Full blast!
Thank you, lovely family.
RIP, mate.
I'D SOONER RELAX.
The one thing you learn about fame on an island like this is that, whoever you are (actor, broadcaster, television celebrity, national treasure), you should not expect recognition.
Islanders have a very healthy outlook on the famous: ignore the buggers until they've proven they are something more than a giant ego. A few of them manage that right away and are popular. Given time, others scrape by and become reservedly accepted.
Those who envision awed respect are studiously ignored.
Two people unlikely ever to be burdened with fame, Mo and I, have only been in wordless proximity to two immensely famous people worth the mention: Years ago, waiting with friends outside a nightclub in London to board a black cab, we vaguely recognised the angry-looking passenger who disembarked from it.
We clambered aboard, chattering that we ought to know who that was, and the cabbie, taking pity on an obvious bunch of provincials, said:
“That was Mr. Andrew Lloyd Webber.”
When we remarked that, for all his success, he looked far from happy, The Knowledge said: “Oh that's because he's looking for his wife. He looks like that quite a lot nowadays.”
Andrew Lloyd Webber was married to Sarah Brightman at the time.
The other much lauded national treasure we came across was David Attenborough.
He was sitting at a table in a large bookshop on the main street in Edinburgh where it would seem his publishers had booked him to sign copies of the immensely expensive tome that accompanied his immensely popular television documentary of the time. Don't ask me which one: there have been so many of them.
Anyway, just for the record, he looked more determinedly disconsolate, more unapproachably lonely, more totally and utterly pissed off, than any world famous television presenter – national treasure or not – should ever look, in or out of the public eye.
So much for fame.
ANOTHER SAD VIEWING.
In Post 381 I mentioned the death of Mo's nephew Phil.
Last Wednesday we were afforded the opportunity to see his funeral service on a computer link.
In normal times the crematorium would have been crowded. With lockdown there was just a sparse family attendance, but the ceremony, free from religion, was affectionate and heartfelt, and concluded in a way that was so Phil Butler it brought tears to our eyes.
They played PLAY UP POMPEY
The entire Fratton Park crowd. Full blast!
Thank you, lovely family.
RIP, mate.
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