Around six weeks ago we went to see Oscar D’Leon at the Roundhouse in London. Aged 65, he’s one of the top salsa stars in the world. Which means that despite living in Oxford UK, hardly the home of salsa, I have now seen:
Oscar D’Leon (London)
Charanga Habanera (London)
Manolito y Su Trabuco (London)
Maikel Blanco (Havana)
Pupy y los que Son Son (Havana)
Septeto Santiaguero (Santiago de Cuba)
Los Van Van (London)
Buena Vista Social Club (London)
Afro-Cuban All-Stars (London)
Celia Cruz (London)
Jose Alberto (London)
If you’re not a salsa fan this won’t mean anything to you. But it’s roughly equivalent for an indie-rock/pop fan to have seen the Rolling Stones, David Bowie, Blur, Oasis, Arctic Monkeys, Green Day and whatnot.
Damn I feel lucky. Oscar D’Leon, what can I say? He’s an amazing performer, a formidable dancer and bass player; he sang and elegantly danced his way through a two-hour set without a break, almost without pausing between songs. He can improvise in the most amazing way (but so can all the best soneros I’ve seen).
And he can do reggaeton. Maybe not like a young hipster. But man, he gives it a go.
Here’s a video I recorded that evening – quickly risen to be my Youtube channel’s most popular video. It’s distant – we were far away, but you can sense the energy in the audience. The camera work is a bit shaky for the first 30 seconds because I literally couldn’t stand still, I was so excited.
I mean. OSCAR D’LEON!!!! Jess – espero que te gusta pero MUCHO!
Well, there’s just the present wrapping to do and we’re done!
Very tempted to go to midnight Mass. But not sure I can handle a third late night! We were all out yesterday at a friend’s house where we got together with mutual friends for drinks and munchies. At around eleven we had the idea to get our children (eight between us) to entertain us by playing their musical instruments. We tried this last year and they all grumpily refused. But this year they were happy to do it! We sat around for two hours, dazed and proud watching as the kids aged between 9 and 15 played piano, violin, recorder, trumpet, guitar and bongos – all from memory – the clever little poppets. It ended with a jam session on ‘Take Five’.
“This is what I dreamed it would be like to live in Oxford,” cried London-born Jane in delight.
That’s what I’m talking about. Make those music lessons pay!
Luckily they didn’t ask the grown-ups to perform.
Blog readers – I hope you all have a lovely Christmas break with your families and/or friends.
Here’s my favourite Christmas carol, sung by those fab choristers from King’s College.
For me, Christmas always begins with the Physics Department Carol Service in the Church of St. Mary the Virgin. Organised by atmospheric physicist, my old pal Jim Williamson and the former Secretary of the Bodleian Library, Charles Mould (who played organ at my wedding!), the impromptu choir consists of Jim’s friends from the Christ Church Cathedral Voluntary Choir, people from St Cross College like Becs and I (and indeed, Jim and Charles), and some physicists. We get together at 2.45pm for a very tightly managed rehearsal and the carol concert starts at 4.30pm. Afterwards choir and audience troop upstairs to the wood-panelled upper room and have wine and warm mince pies. It’s very seasonal!
The service is traditional style Lessons and Carols, like at King’s College Cambridge (but we have only two lessons). The Vicar of St. Mary’s takes the service, which always reminds me of my great affection for the Church of England. (I went to very High Church Anglican schools until I was 16.)
Thankfully I’ve been singing in this choir for about 19 years now…since I was a graduate student at St Cross. Only the fact that I’ve sung most of the difficult music before saves me, because as a sight-reader I am terrible!
This year though, Jim managed to pick a bunch of pieces I hadn’t sung before, or not for many years. Including the motet Hodie Christus Natus Est by Poulenc. I think we did it once before and I barely scraped through…
We also sang the motet O Magnum Mysterium by the sublime Spanish renaissance composer, Tomas Luis de Victoria. Victoria is one of my very, very favourites, in my opinion he’s better than Byrd, Tallis and even Palestrina. In fact, when I die, I want Victoria’s Requiem sung, with the deliciously gloomy Taedet, please, thank you very much, and lots of tears from my grieving relatives, okay?
Here’s the Taedet from Victoria’s Requiem sung by the brilliant Gabrieli Consort, including my friend the Chilean tenor Rodrigo del Pozo…who appears as a character in Joshua Book 2! (bringing some important and very surprising news to Josh and his mother…)
And here are the wonderful, sorrowful words in which someone asks of God – “What the heck do you know about our suffering? And who are you to judge?” – a thought that even the most devout believer will have at times of difficulty. I admire the lyric for its brutal honesty.
(translated from the Latin)
My soul is weary of my life;
I will leave my complaint upon myself;
I will speak in the bitterness of my soul.
I will say unto God, Do not condemn me;
show me wherefore thou contendest with me.
Is it good unto thee that thou shouldest oppress,
that thou shouldest despise the work of thine hands,
and shine upon the counsel of the wicked?
Hast thou eyes of flesh? or seest thou as man seeth?
Are thy days as the days of man?
are thy years as man’s days,
that thou inquirest after mine iniquity,
and searchest after my sin?
Thou knowest that I am not wicked;
and there is none that can deliver out of thine hand.
And for another treat, here’s the O Magnum Mysterium performed by a Spanish choir.
Foxboro Hot Tubs – another Green Day experimental outing, like ‘The Network’?
So everyone’s wondering about whether the new, free EP by mystery band Foxboro Hot Tubs is really by those US punk pop boys, Green Day. I just downloaded it listened to the whole thing twice.
“Ruby Room” is very similar in sound and structure to “Hitchin’ A Ride”, that’s for sure.
Billy Joe Armstrong has a versatile voice, pretty distinctive too. There’s a slight difference – Foxboro’s singer sounds a little milder, softer than recent Billie Joe. But it’s hard to disguise that tenor twang of Billie Joe’s. The song “Mother Mary” really does sound a heckuva lot like him.
Tre Cool, the Green Day drummer is extremely proficient. I saw him play at Milton Keynes in 2005 – awesome rock drummer! If Foxboro have a rookie drummer then he’s darn good…
Finally, Mike Dirnt the bass player…Green Day tracks are notorious for their heavy, leading bass line. “Red Tide” has the right sort of feel for a Mike Dirnt bass line.
My verdict? Yeah, go on. I’m totally taken in. And I think I like “Mother Mary” best, so far.
Somehow, we’ve never been to Ronnie Scott’s. Been upstairs @ Ronnie Scotts to the old Club Latino, which back in the day was one of the diviest yet best salsaclubs in London. Thought about going on the night of Rachel’s hen night when we poured out of the Japanese karaoke bar opposite and I noticed that Irakere were playing…
So the visit we made to celebrate Nathan’s 40th birthday, was well overdue, as well as being pretty epic.
Epic in the sense that here’s a place that is SO iconic that it’s impossible to be there and not think ‘This is me at Ronnie Scotts. Here I am applauding and whistling each improvised solo, just like on the records. Here I am sipping wine whilst a guy pounds a bass and another wears a cap to jazz it up on a grand piano.’
I’m sure Alfred will shortly post photos so we’ll all be able to see just how cute he and Nathan looked in their designer shirts and sleek leather jackets.
I committed some kind of London faux pas by wearing items of colour. I wore a lime-green silk frock with a lilac linen jacket. Nosirree! In London they are all wearing grey, black and cream. Billboards for clothes shops sternly announce this fact. Not having enough money to shop at designer stores is not a valid excuse – even the posters for Matalan provided clear instruction.
I’ll get my coat.
On another note, one of Nathan’s friends was able to advise me on the top 3 chocolate desserts in London. He’d never been to Maggiore’s though, where they used to have a truly withering warm chocolate soup with pistachio ice-cream. At Ronnie Scotts I had a very yummy chocolate fudge pudding – two fudgy, shortcakey rounds squidged together with whipped cream. Damn fine.
