Month: November 2022

Martial Music

Benjamin Britten’s War Requiem was first performed at the consecration of Coventry Cathedral in 1962.

Wulff

I read a review of this last year and didn’t want to read what sounded like a shabby little shocker about Benjamin Britten seducing a teenage German boy in 1938.

Poison Ivy

The Ivy, like Langan’s Brasserie, was so hip no real people were admitted – like Mustique.

The World was my Oyster

The W was my O in the summer of 1976 when they were out of season and what I wanted was a job, not a mollusc.

Tommasino

This Gainsborough portrait is far from his most famous and you may wonder why it was the coda of a recent post, Sudbury’s Son.

Sudbury’s Son

Reading about the re-opening of Gainsborough’s House after a three year renovation costing £9 million I reflected.

Published
Categorised as Art

The Way We Were

It surprises me how ignorant I am about the 20th century history of the country where I was born and bred.

Goodbye to Berlin

Crowded bars, warm white wine, poor sight lines and uncomfy seats sum up an expensive visit to a West End theatre in the past. I used to game the system by ordering dry cider and ice for the interval.

A Place in the Rain

”Baroness Caterina de Renzis and her late husband, Baron Alessandro de Renzis Sonnino, first saw Castello Sonnino … in 1988. The estate with its 16th century villa had just been left to Alessandro by a childless uncle; in its 500 years of existence, it had been variously inhabited by Frescobaldis, Machiavellis and Strozzis, as well… Continue reading A Place in the Rain