Time To Dance

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Time to Dance, music comes into being when the air is made to dance. For me, the most inspiring composer from this point of view is Bach. His music is infused with the spirit of dance. He must have been a great dancer – just look at the pedal parts in some of his organ works! Even in the most deeply felt movements of the great Passion settings, his music sets the spirit dancing. And for me, the measure of great Bach performers is the way they make the music dance. That’s one reason why I feel so privileged to work with Ex Cathedra’s inspirational conductor, Jeffrey Skidmore. So yes, I spend quite a lot of time both singing and dancing around when I’m composing, although I make great efforts not to disturb the neighbours. The descriptions - though at their best in doing so - don’t always cover the sex and love between the couple but also incorporate the narrator’s (and I presume Bragg’s) love of the Lake District. So why 3 stars? The story gripped me and I couldn't put it down. I appreciate that kind of writing in fiction. Vivaldi to mind, and I couldn’t resist incorporating a few references to his music, although I now regret mentioning it in my notes for the CD booklet. Vivaldi is a generous composer, his musical ideas ripe for further development, as Bach so often demonstrated. My Vivaldi references vary from a short snippet of melody, to a quite sizeable, much re-composed section, but they have no “deeper significance”, and you haven’t missed anything if you don’t recognise them. Meh. This was a Christian cheating story with very little physical cheating (kissing - witnessed by wife!!), but full-on emotional cheating. I haven't lived through infidelity, so I can't accurately predict what my own red line would be in such a situation. In this relationship, the H had all but admitted to falling in love with the OW and the couple was actively pursuing a divorce. Plans were in place for the H and OW following the divorce. Their public interactions were drawing suspicions, gossip, and frequent phone calls to the weary wife. The H's status as a Christian married man (and waiting on his perfectly pure, innocent, and devout Christian daughter's wedding) seemed to be the only barrier from turning their emo love story into a physical one. I understood how and why his wife turned into a shrewish harpy. There's quite a bit of Christian scripture-based monologue, so if that's not your thing, this isn't your book. I didn't buy the ending. I don't think there's a chance in hell that the wife could move past her H's lusting and pining for the OW.

Charlene was there when he needed his ego boosted, she always hanged on to his every word, making him feel he was important, and wanted! John’s body wanted Charlene in a way a married man just can’t express. And fighting this want was almost impossible for John, until he took the time to read his youngest son’s SA on Eagles. Here God really opens his eyes to what a marriage should be, and why he could not leave his wife. The influence of Bach arose from the simple fact that the new work was to be premiered alongside a performance of Bach’s Magnificat, and so it was a given that I would compose for the same forces: soloists, choir, and an orchestra of two flutes, two oboes (each doubling on oboe d’amore), bassoon, three trumpets, timpani, strings and a small ‘continuo’ organ. The only change I made was for the percussionist to put aside Bach’s timpani in favour of a pair of handbells to toll the passing hours, and an array of unpitched instruments to add a dash of colour where appropriate (such as the obbligato parts for desk bell, washboard and dinner gong in No 16). Composing for ‘period instruments’ was a fascinating challenge (most noticeable in the valveless trumpets with their limited range of notes), and I am most grateful to the members of the Ex Cathedra Baroque Ensemble for their advice. Alec Roth’s new cantata is a celebration of times and seasons, and a joy to hear. Also included are new settings of the Magnificat and Nunc dimittis and of George Herbert’s Antiphon ‘Praised be the God of love’. But at the family meeting where they plan to tell their children, Nicole shares a surprise of her own: she's getting married. How can they spoil her joy with their announcement? They can pretend a little longer—until after the wedding.I found it one of the most emotional and compelling dramas I have ever seen and I still remember it fondly & vividly today, some 18 years after being shown on TV. When people in Marion think of the perfect couple, John and Abby Reynolds automatically sprang to mind. After twenty-two years of marriage, everyone who knows them laud their idyllic relationship. But John and Abby have a secret – they can no longer stand each other. And when they bring their children together to break the news, their daughter shares news of her own – she’s getting married. Reluctantly, John and Abby decide to keep their problems to themselves so as not to ruin their child’s special moment.

Here young Nelson is in the first year of secondary school - or would be if he turned up. Much of the time he is skiving, a continuation it seems of his primary school avoidance where his mother almost went to court over his absences. The story doesn't make much of this avoidance, but we can glean from it that Nelson is a solitary child with poor sight, who has to wear a patch to protect his eyes. MacLaverty doesn't tell us the disease but we can work it for ourselves based on the name of the patches he has to wear: Opticludes which are worn when people have amblyopia, weak vision in one eye, or basically a squint. If Oedipus blinds himself late in life realising that he has slept with his mother and killed his father, Nelson has poor eyesight early in life but, in a way, this is Oedipus Rex retold. People who enjoy reading religious books would enjoy this novel, as it explores ones’ own sense of religion, making the reader question oneself about how they had treated their religion. Also, people who enjoy romance novels would enjoy this book. Instead of it being a book about two people falling in love, it’s about two people having to learn how to fall in love again to make a good example for their family. People who enjoy reading a long, slightly more challenging read would also enjoy this book because it makes a person question their own morals on multiple levels. Generally anyone who enjoys a good book that challenges their mind would thoroughly enjoy this book. profit has the worker from that in which he labors? 10I have seen the God-given task with which the sons of men are to be occupied. 11He has made everything beautiful in its time. Also He has put eternity in their hearts, except that no one can find out the work that God does from beginning to end.This is a well-written, beautifully evocative story of an illicit, thinly veiled relationship between a retired bank manager and an 18-year old young woman in the North of England in the late 1980s. Musically this is a gloriously eclectic piece, with milonga-inspired movements sitting along Philip-Glass-esque polyrhythms, all set within the mould of Baroque-derived instrumentation. What would you say are the most significant influences on your compositional style? For his anger endureth but a moment; in his favour is life: weeping may endure for a night, but joy cometh in the morning. One of the things I most enjoy about performances at Shakespeare’s Globe on London’s Bankside is that when the play is over, the actors and musicians cap it with a celebratory after-dance or ‘jig’ in the Shakespearean tradition—a wonderful way of bringing performers and audience together in a communal letting-down-of-the-hair. After spending fifty minutes singing about dance, I thought it would be fun to have my singers lay down their music scores (I ensure they have to do this by giving them some hand-clapping to do), and actually dance. My After-dance sets words by Shakespeare’s contemporary John Davies, in which the very creation of the world itself is accomplished through dance (and, of course music).