Sir Peter Maxwell Davies and Sir Paul McCartney

Since my last post Robin has been busy.
He performed his second concert on the Queen Victoria and was very pleased with the result.
As I have said before, he doesn't often say that he is happy with a performance, so this must have been quite a concert.
He has had many lovely comments from members of the audience which always helps when dealing with time away from home.
But he is now at approximately 30 000 feet, flying from Istanbul to Manchester, and is expected home later today.

So whilst I prepare for his return, and tend to a sick son number one, you can read about a new piece of music composed by the Royal composer, Sir Peter Maxwell Davies.
The piece, 'Liber Pulsationis Fabulatoris', has been dedicated to another Sir, Sir Paul McCartney.
Maxwell Davies appears to have a sense of humour as the first three letters spell, 'Lib Pul Fab'.
To find out more, read this article by Mike Wade, in The Times.

Teaching Children....A word from Sir Peter Maxwell Davies

As I mentioned a few days ago, Sir Peter Maxwell Davies was giving a speech at the annual conference of the, 'Incorporated Society of Musicians. To read a transcript of the speech go here. It's long and interesting, but one point that jumped out at me, was the problems our children face when trying to get even a basic musical knowledge from school.
He talks about working at the Royal College of Music, as part of an outreach programme, where he met teachers who thought that, "teaching standard Western music notation was to indulge in extreme elitism", would "inhibit children's creativity", and was "alien to the working class values of ordinary people".
What....
Surely by not teaching them you are 'inhibiting their creativity'.
As Davies said, 'imagine not teaching them how to write the alphabet...'

Davies recognised the need for children to understand music many years ago and back in 1959 was Director of Music at Cirencester Grammar School. Here he vowed to give the children the musical childhood he hadn't had.
He made them sing sounds before writing them down so that the sign on the paper represented a meaningful sound to the children.

All sounds very sensible to me.
Especially when you read it alongside an article in 'The Daily Telegraph' by Graeme Paton, about, 'Tone-deaf teachers 'killing off' singing'. Apparently, primary school teachers are too embarrassed to sing in front of the class.
Maybe some of the budget allocated to 'promote singing in the classroom', to 'improve self confidence and language skills', should be redistributed to employ those people who actually know how to do it.

New York Calling and Trouble Brewing in the Arts World...

Robin has now docked in New York and talked me through the sites he could see as he walked around the deck. We started with the Statue of Liberty, then Brooklyn Bridge and Manhattan. Not bad.
He then went off to pack. That concerned me as he told me he was starting it yesterday. Considering he hasn't had any clothes for most of the trip it made me wonder what he needed to do.
I was quite looking forward to the prospect of only a few pairs of socks and the 'M*I*A*M*I' t-shirt to wash.
He has since informed me that once his case arrived he took great joy in wearing most of its contents.
Oh well.
Back here in the UK, I read an article by Martin Beckford, on the state of funding in the arts world.
Sir Peter Maxwell Davies, Master of the Queen's Music, is to express his views at the annual conference of the 'Incorporated Society of Musicians', on Thursday.
Sir Peter, another northerner as he was born in Salford, Lancashire, adds to the list of musicians from this part of the world.
It seems serious problems could develop unless there is an increase in funding prior to the 2012 Olympic Games.
Watch this space.