Rossini's Silken Ladder Overture received the requisite amount of sprightly bounce from him and he took delight in the Neo-Baroque inventiveness of Stravinsky's Pulcinella Suite. Enormous fun both of them.
I need to do a bit of catching up.
First up, a concert. Once more, not the announced conductor. We had Joshua Weilerstein in place of Vassily Petrenko, who was travel blocked somewhere in Mother Russia because of Covid restrictions somewhere along the line. The pianist remained Boris Giltburg and this had presumably been a planned concert so that the orchestra, pianist and conductor could continue recording their Naxos series of Beethoven piano concerti. Best laid plans and all.
I had been uncertain about having Joshua Weilerstein as the conductor for our first concert at the beginning of the month. I was still wary but I need not have worried.
Rossini's Silken Ladder Overture received the requisite amount of sprightly bounce from him and he took delight in the Neo-Baroque inventiveness of Stravinsky's Pulcinella Suite. Enormous fun both of them.
The revelation though was Beethoven's Piano Concerto No4. Maybe it was something to do with the partnership: maybe something to do with the reduced number of performers. Nevertheless, the chamber-like quality of the performance was ideally suited to this most inward looking of the five completed concertos.
Once again, a performance worth attending and one which made the restrictions irrelevant.
On the way, much to Roland's consternation, I side-tracked our route to take us down Lime Street so that I could get a quick look at the filming set up for The Batman which rolled into town earlier this week. I was entertained: Roland was perplexed.
Tonight's concoction in the Kimberley Kitchen will be a seafood risotto which may require the use of the word "piquant".
In among all of the markings on the high altitude Nazca plateau in Peru, scientists believe that they have discerned a 2000-year-old representation of a cat. The cat had been reclining in full view looking at everyone for over 200 years but had gone unremarked. Typical of a cat that.
Just when you think 2020 can get no weirder...
This parade of oiled, buff men is a celebratory parade
from the graduation ceremony of the Egyptian Police Academy.
Egypt!?
So, nothing remotely gay about this presentation, then.
Then Amazon suggested from my previous purchases that I might like to read some Paranormal Romance. I feel that present day culture is passing me by. Who knew that there was a genre of fiction substantial enough to warrant such a title?
Mark, who I used to work with at Connect, informed me that he has a friend who is a published author of Paranormal Romance. I explained that I had envisaged a sort of unholy melange of Barbara Cartland and Anne Rice. He mentioned that they vary from Anne Rice but with a bit more romance to Anne Rice with a lot more explicit detail than Barbara Cartland would ever have included. Shape changing human/dragon into stuff way past Fifty Shades of Grey was how one book was described to him. I remain aghast.
Then FaceBook sought to access my spending power with the sidebar advert below.
I wonder if they've linked me to a particular market.
I organised for mum to have her flu jab done. It was all very well sorted by the surgery and we were through and out in about 10 mins. I stood behind mum miming the answers to questions about allergies and such like. It helped speed things up immeasurably. Ross had his done at our surgery in the afternoon and that was just as efficient.
The RRS Sir David Attenborough (the ship formerly known as Boaty McBoatface) set sail from the Cammell Laird shipyard to across the Mersey to the Liverpool cruise terminal before departing on a prolonged and arduous series of sea trials to ensure the huge boat is ready to travel to Antarctica.
Bon voyage to all who sail in her.
We had Merseyside Central Heating in to do us a quote for a new boiler. Don't know if there'll be time before everything closes down again.