STAR-SPANGLED SENTIMENTS

My piece today will be heavily influenced by my presence for some weeks in Charlotte, North Carolina, a booming transport, banking, technology and healthcare hub in South East USA. This is a prosperous city with a population of about 880,000, ignoring its large, well-settled suburban hinterland. The population is 40% White, 32% Black, 16% Latino, 5% Asian and 7% Other. A typical melting-pot.

One of the first things to catch the eye here are the trees. This is my second visit and in summer the area looks densely wooded, the dominant species being the long-leaf pine. The long leaf is a very tall, thin tree creating its green canopy at about 30 feet. It is to a degree wild-fire-resistant, thanks to its thick bark. It is less commercially useful than say, the iconic and massive Californian Sequoia or Redwood as the wood cannot be easily fashioned and is more suitable for wood-pulp. But in the sub-tropical summer the shade it provides is blissfull

        The Long-Leaf Pine                            The Sequoia/Redwood

        

Every nation has its distinctive tree. My Scotland boasts the modest, craggy Rowan tree or Mountain Ash, once worshipped by the Druids (and of course celebrated by scurvy socialists to the tune O Tannenbaum as they wail The Red Flag.) My adoptive England is justly proud of the Oak - long-living (at least 250 years), solid and dependable – the English ships at Trafalgar (1805) were all built of oak (6,000 tress to make a ship-of-the-line). The British Navy’s ceremonial anthem is still Hearts of Oak.

 Do landscapes heavily influence their inhabitants? You bet they do!

            The Scottish Rowan Tree

The English Oak

…………………………

Sometimes I feel that we in the West are swimming through a pool of glutinous liquid, occasionally sweetened with a coating of caramel, but certainly bearing a huge burden. We are assailed by Wokery, we fight culture wars but also hot shooting wars, and our hands are tied behind our back. We need to break free, tell our people the straight truth and scatter our enemies to outer darkness.

Wokery comes in all shapes and sizes. Suddenly, it is deemed insulting to ask someone about their ethnic origins. 83-year-old Lady Susan Hussey and an unpaid former lady-in-waiting to the late Queen was vilified for asking, at a charity reception hosted by Queen Camilla, Ngozi Fulani, leader of charity Sistah Space, where she came from? When she said “from Hackney”, Lady Hussey persisted and unwisely asked “where are you really from?” A media storm broke, Fulani claimed to be insulted, the race relations industry got into top gear, Lady Hussey was criticized by the Palace and she resigned her honorary position. Hussey and Fulani have since made up, but the whole incident reeks of wokery. Née Marlene Headley, Ngozi Fulani is an adopted name – she is British-born of Barbadian parents – with a strong interest in West African history. Frankly Lady Hussey’s “interrogation” was very mild – for a stranger operating under a false name, I would have required a mug-shot and finger-prints too if she were entering my palace! Lady Hussey has been treated abominably.

            Ngozi Fulani and Queen Camilla

I will not expatiate upon Wokery in the Civil service or in business – compulsory attendance at “workshops” on Inclusion and Diversity, refusal to use the word “Christmas” when exchanging seasonal greetings, TV adverts giving a totally false view of normal life in the UK and its racial balance, history being rewritten always to emphasise the evils of slavery and fine authors “cancelled”. Our intellectual elite is terrified of the woke gang.

The monarchy is not much help. Prince Harry and Meghan Markle are doing all they can to pose as victims of institutional racism and neglect. Both whining complainants have breath-taking arrogance and an overdeveloped sense of entitlement. Meghan is a consummate actress and can “emote” convincingly if her masters at Netflix so require. The couple are being invited to the Coronation but are said to be demanding an apology first. I do hope the King and Prince William tell them where to stick it, and this greedy duo disappear from all our lives.

                                                                Washed-up Royals

Our admirably inclusive government including Rishi Sunak, James Cleverly, Dominic Raab and Suella Braverman are well equipped to break the spell of inaction and assert our independence.

                                ………………………….

Let us turn away from the difficult present and remember happier times this Christmas. Hollywood produced excellent shows in the 1940s and 1950s and I celebrate with two examples. The first features Bob Hope (as Eddy Foy) dancing with James Cagney (as George M Cohan) in The Seven Little Foys of 1955. Bob Hope’s tap-dancing was a revelation, while Cagney was a famous hoofer since his hit film Yankee Doodle Dandy. What fun, what exuberant talent!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZP0KD82t8WA&ab_channel=Dr.LanceBoyle

 

A little earlier in 1948, we were treated to the film of Irving Berlin’s Easter Parade. It featured Fred Astaire and Judy Garland and its most memorable song, to a 7-year-old me at least, was A Couple of Swells. What memories, what a nostalgic wallow!

https://www.tcm.com/video/307925/easter-parade-1948-movie-clip-a-couple-of-swells

How I hope we can recover some of the colour, the laughter and the optimism of those joyous days!

 

SMD

18.12.22

Text copyright © Sidney Donald 2022

SOME RANDOM THOUGHTS

 

It is probably a feature common to the older generation, but recently some lively melodic phrases came fleetingly through my mind, which I could not quite place:

And the jocund rebecks sound, and the jocund rebecks sound

To many a youth and many a maid

Dancing in the chequer’d shade!

In time, the penny dropped; I was remembering a song I had to sing aged 10 at a schools’ choir competition in Edinburgh in 1952. I recall our choirmaster snorting dismissively at the “jocund rebecks” – obscure words indeed (a rebeck is a 3-stringed, pear-shaped medieval bowed instrument)! To my surprise, the lines come from Milton’s L’Allegro (1645).

Singing this kind of stuff in 1952, though I was unaware at the time, was a reflection of the Folksong Revival which had gripped the UK in several waves of varying intensity from the early 20^th century. The early enthusiasts included Cecil Sharp, Ralph Vaughan Williams, Delius and Holst. “Traditional” airs were hunted down and collected (quite a few bogus, I would guess) while Scotland was a folksong factory, creating songs with decidedly tenuous connections with Rabbie Burns and Walter Scott. The world of academic music was all fiddlers, peasant ditties and Morris dancing, satirised uproariously by Kingsley Amis in his 1954 novel Lucky Jim in the role of Professor Welch played by Hugh Griffith in the 1957 Boulting Brothers comedy film version starring Ian Carmichael.

                         Ralph Vaughan Williams

…………………………

Some of our most treasured institutions are being undermined by our enemies, who well know just how treasured they are. There is a daily roll-call of idiocy. I think of the QAA (Quality Assurance Agency for Higher Education) which is urging all universities to “decolonise” the mathematics (sic!) curriculum. According to the QAA, maths is biased towards Western world-views, excluding the rest of mankind. Since mathematics originated in Chinese, Indian and Mesopotamian civilisation and developed greatly under the Arabs and Moors, this argument is hard to credit. But why even discuss it? The QAA is just another woke quango, with too much power, infiltrated by the enemy.

At Oxford, Oriel College’s dons readily agreed to topple their statue of Cecil Rhodes, their generous benefactor but Woke’s bogeyman, to appease a noisy mob. Happily, more senior bodies have blocked this absurd demand. In Cambridge, the vice chancellor Stephen Toope, a super-woke Canadian, had from 2017-22, led this great University into what many see as a surrender to Chinese “soft “power by accepting large donations for research in return for offices promoting “dialogue” with China. This dialogue often involved supporting the suppression of Western values in Hong Kong and Taiwan. Jesus College, Cambridge, with its China Forum, has been a particularly egregious supporter of China. Mind you, Cambridge gave us the 5-man nest of traitors comprising Burgess, Maclean, Philby, Blunt and Cairncross who betrayed secrets to Russia last century, so expectations are low there! Our enemies are not just fanatical Muslims or murderous Commies but also “the enemy within”, the 5^th column deeply embedded in our Establishment and State.

                        

                       Stephen Toope

……………………..

I was much struck by a recent article in The Spectator about the sophisticated classical musical tastes of our new King written by Damian Thompson. Charles learnt the cello in his youth, for which he was probably bullied at philistine Gordonstoun, and has been patron of several orchestras and choirs. His favourite music includes the, to me, utterly obscure piano concerto of Julius Benedict (1804-85) and the only opera of French violin concerto composer Jean-Marie Leclair, Scylla et Glaucus (1746).

   

                                    King Charles III

 The Windsors have not been notably musical – the late Queen much enjoyed George Formby’s cheeky songs on the ukulele (so do I!) - so King Charles will be untypical. As a prince, he had oddball passions and he may have been unwise as both a husband and a father, but he can consign most of that baggage to history. I suggest his role-model might best be Edward VII, Victoria’s notorious Bertie, who had a taste for gambling and an eye for the ladies, who became a diplomatically astute monarch performing his duties with exemplary dignity. Whatever, may the King prosper!

                                    ……………………………….

SMD

17.11.22

Text copyright © Sidney Donald 2022

REDEEMING FEATURES

 

With the rain teeming down outside and the temperatures falling with British persistence, it is easy to feel a trifle gloomy. My esteemed Greek friends are clever but also prone to strike a plangent note, and I note that the so-called Seven Wise Men of the ancient Greek world, who gave us some brief words of rather banal wisdom, include a certain Bias of Priene (he doesn’t sound neutral to me!), who declared Most People are Evil…(Pleistoi anthropoi kakoi).

This is a scandalous slander of course but, as is usual, it contains a grain of truth. The saying is often loosely translated as “most men are evil” and that is a trigger for certain types of woke “wimmen” to launch into a furious denunciation of historic and contemporary macho deeds and attitudes. But Bias did not distinguish between the sexes and our delightful sisters are tarred by the same brush as we males. The grain of truth in the slogan revolves around the fact that all people have a dark side, a concealed mental sub-world, skeletons in the cupboard we would prefer not to resurrect.

Just how dark that “dark side” is naturally varies a great deal from person to person. The spectrum of evil is a broad one. At one end, there are the monsters so familiar to us from history and, alas, the present. Then the darkness lightens from those with criminal propensities, chips on the shoulder, family schemers, compulsive liars down to those who bear grudges, harbour inappropriate erotic thoughts or are simply a regular pain-in-the-neck.

If you had to create a League Table of evil, contenders for the top spot would alternate between Stalin, Mao Tse-tung, Hitler and Putin, followed by Pol Pot and Nero. To include the ladies, there is always Lucretia Borgia. History also gives us Vlad the Impaler (aka Dracula) from 15^th century Romania, with allegedly 80,000 victims dying messily – our Charles III confesses he is a cousin, 16 times removed, of Vlad, through his great-grandmother May of Teck, Queen of George V. We can only hope 16 times removed is far enough!

                        

                                                                 Lethal Vlad the Impaler

Many political figures have an ambivalent reputation, demonised by some and admired by others, like Napoleon Bonaparte of France, Franco of Spain, Ataturk of Turkey, Peron of Argentina or Mussolini of Italy. Then there are lesser very controversial figures like Donald Trump and even Boris Johnson, who hardly feature on the evil-meter, and, (OMG!) both could easily return to office, just like Benjamin Netanyahu. Yet each country has her plaster saints and I suppose Churchill, de Gaulle and Franklin D Roosevelt are our contemporary icons – for the time being at least!

But ranking evil deeds is not a healthy nor an uplifting occupation. A riposte to Bias’ ancient dictum comes from a rather OTT Shakespeare:

What a piece of work is a man! how noble in reason! how infinite in faculty! in form and moving how express and admirable! in action how like an angel! in apprehension how like a god!

 Humanity has demonstrated these qualities through profound thinkers like wide-ranging Aristotle in Athens, the father of logic, enlightened David Hume in Edinburgh, founder of empiricism, or idealist Immanuel Kant in Königsberg, who fortified ethics with his “categorical imperative.” 

  

 

The philosophic trio, Aristotle, Hume and Kant

More accessible in the search for beauty and poetry are Shakespeare, Goethe, Hugo, Tolstoy and Keats – all men of genius. But the goodness of man is maybe best expressed in music. What could be more uplifting than a Bach cantata?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gBfHemeJTfg&ab_channel=Bachstiftung

How lovely shines the morning-star.

As Remembrance Day looms, we will be inspired too by Elgar’s Nimrod

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sUgoBb8m1eE&ab_channel=medpiano

The ancient Greeks rather favoured short philosophic slogans, like Know Thyself, inscribed on the portal to the Oracle of Delphi. But gateway slogans uneasily remind me of Arbeit macht frei at the entrance of Auschwitz. So, forget about slogans and luxuriate in profound literature and contemplation.

Whatever the temporary setbacks, our benevolent human spirit will overcome all evils and the sunlit uplands beckon!

 

SMD

6.11.22

Text copyright © Sidney Donald 2022

FAINT HEART NEVER WON FAIR LADY

As a firm believer in the music of the spheres, in the curative powers of cheerful dance and song, and as an enemy of dissonance and discord everywhere, I wish to celebrate the Savoy Operas of Gilbert and Sullivan, which gave late Victorian England and the whole world a wonderful abundance of melodic music, rib-tickling comedy and innocent pleasure.

Gilbert

Sullivan

W. S. Gilbert (1836-1911) was a formidable dramatist and poet noted for his Bab Ballads anthology of comic verse. Arthur Sullivan (1842-1900) was more self-effacing but he was a musical child prodigy, who had already written incidental music for 2 Shakespeare plays, a ballet, a cello concerto and much church music. They were brought together by the dynamic impresario Richard D’Oyly Carte (1844-1901) who believed the London theatre would be receptive to English operetta rather than the risqué French fare then familiar to the West End.

Gilbert and Sullivan (“G&S”) collaborated, with some interruptions, from 1871 to 1896, They produced 14 Savoy Operas, named after the Savoy Theatre which D’Oyly Carte built and opened to house them in 1880. The Savoy Operas were immensely successful, most notably HMS Pinafore, The Pirates of Penzance, Patience, Iolanthe, The Mikado and The Gondoliers. Indeed, so substantial were the profits they generated that D’Oyly Carte was able to acquire the land adjoining his theatre and erect the palatial Savoy Hotel which opened in 1889, for long London’s best luxury hotel.

                                       Richard D’Oyly Carte

Sullivan was often berated by the snooty music establishment for “wasting” his talent on the popular genre of operetta, when he might have rivalled Brahms in composing concertos and symphonies. Yet he had a great lyric talent as can be seen in his Overture to the Yeomen of the Guard.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vv7plNo0j18&ab_channel=AcademyofSt.MartinintheFields-Topic

Gilbert was renowned for his “topsy-turvy” plots, the more far-fetched the better, involving fairies, peers, pirates, long-lost children, executioners and emperors. Typical is Faint Heart from Iolanthe where the Lord Chancellor is steeled by fellow-peers to propose to a pretty ward of court.

 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WQqgoHklUs4&ab_channel=FriendsofthePeccadilloPlayers

From the same opera is the mock-patriotic song, When Britain really ruled the waves parodying the House of Lords:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uyimj8CEypU&ab_channel=D%27OyleCarteOperaCompany-Topic.

Gilbert gloried in alliteration and word-play – this from The Mikado:

To sit in Solemn silence in a dull, dark dock

In a pestilential prison with a life-long lock

Awaiting the sensation of a short, sharp shock

From a cheap and chippy chopper on a big, black block!

Gilbert’s speciality was the patter-song, a satirical song with an ever-rising tempo. Now I am the ruler of the Queen’s Navee from HMS Pinafore is a typical example. WH Smith, bookseller and Tory MP, became known as “Pinafore” Smith when he was appointed to run the Admiralty.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Kfao1s3Tiek&ab_channel=StratfordFestival.

Sometimes Gilbert contented himself with a comic song attacking contemporary targets, constantly updated by new generations of singer – famously, I’ve got a little list from The Mikado

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1NLV24qTnlg&ab_channel=OperaAustralia

G&S have a wry look at equality with the delightful There was a king from The Gondoliers:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ie4OwwmFj8o&ab_channel=Gilbert%26SullivanAustin

One could go on forever selecting one’s favourites, so let me sign off with two lovely songs from The Gondoliers and The Mikado. - Take a pair of sparkling eyes and He’s going to marry Yum Yum!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5FMldbPNZzg&ab_channel=stevethetenor

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HnaHqL4bkX8&ab_channel=jlf180

Both Gilbert and Sullivan were deservedly knighted. Sullivan produced an opera Ivanhoe which was a moderate success but the Savoy Operas were their apogee.  D’Oyly Carte retained the copyrights and their touring companies delighted audiences in the UK, USA, Australia and elsewhere for generations. Schoolmasters and many “Savoyards” could recite the operas backwards but fashions change and expensive touring ended when the UK Arts Council withdrew their grant in 1982.

 G&S’s Savoy Operas were for many a highly agreeable stepping stone weaning them to Grand Opera and opening up the world of music to much larger audiences. Their influence on the American musical was considerable with patter-songs from Rodgers and Hart (Zip) or Cole Porter (Anything Goes) widely enjoyed.

Let’s lift our glasses in gratitude to Gilbert and Sullivan!

 

 

SMD

1.11.22

Text copyright © Sidney Donald 2022

RISHI'S ROAD TO REDEMPTION

 

Whoever said that British politics were dull and boring is surely eating his words today after 6 months or so of lurid melodrama. Remember the decline and fall of “Neronian” Boris Johnson, when scandal followed scandal and heedless Boris uttered porkie after porkie pie until the supply ran out? Perhaps Nero is not an apt analogy, we might prefer Heliogabalus, a rather later Roman Emperor, (218-222), who passed his time among the rose petals, feasting with his glamorous ladies and neglecting his urgent duties, ignoring both the plague and the people (cf. Bojo).

                     The Roses of Heliogabalus (1888) by Lawrence Alma-Tadema

Anyhow Boris was deposed and then an excruciating Tory leadership election ruined our summer. There were at the start 11 candidates and they were whittled down at an agonizingly slow pace to two, Liz Truss and Rishi Sunak. Broadly speaking, Rishi was a favourite among the well-heeled and cautious but Liz was favoured by the poorer but more adventurous Tory Party members. They both toured the country, exhausting their audiences with their well-crafted, but naturally self-serving pitches. Liz won. She made a complete Horlicks of the job. Although her direction of travel was quite sound in the medium term, her Dash for Growth took place in the midst of an inflationary cost-of-living crisis and spooked the all-important gilts market, which had been inadequately buttered-up prior to launch. Rishi, an erstwhile Goldman Sachs and hedge-fund professional, had warned that disaster would derail her programme and, alas, he was right.

                   

Kwazi Kwarteng and Liz Truss got it all wrong

Events then moved quickly. Kwazi was fired and experienced Jeremy Hunt drafted in. Liz Truss was soon handed her red card and resigned and, to universal groans, another Tory leadership election was called. A high bar was set of 100 sponsoring MPs to get on the ballot. Quite inappropriately, given his record, Boris rushed back from a lavish holiday in the Dominican Republic, to throw his hat into the electoral ring to join Rishi Sunak and Penny Mordaunt. Mercifully Boris took the hint he was not wanted after a few days and dropped out and on 24 October underpowered Penny realized she could not muster her 100 sponsors and, at the very last minute, withdrew. Rishi was the last man standing and was rapturously crowned by hordes of sweaty flatterers as Leader of the Conservative Party.

Rishi was asked to form a government the next day by the King, with all due dignity and protocol, and spoke as Prime Minister in front of No. 10, vowing to rectify Liz’s mistakes and get the nation’s finances on an even keel

He spoke well, but he knows it is action not words, that will butter his parsnips and he had better get on the buttering job pronto. He is believed to be clever and energetic but the wider public does not know him well and needs to be convinced. His in-tray is overflowing with difficult decisions:

-          Are there significant economies possible in departmental budgets like Transport or overseas Aid?

-          Can hitherto sacrosanct Defence or NHS budgets be cut sharply?

-          Can the triple lock on pensions be dropped again and only rise with average earnings?

-          Is the welfare budget affordable?

-          Should a windfall tax on energy companies be imposed?

-          Can a deal be done with the EU on the Northern Ireland Protocol?

-          Should the net zero pledge be delayed to ease the energy crisis?

-          How far can we go in defending brave Ukraine?

Rishi will need top-notch advice on these matters and dozens of other less urgent ones. But the buck stops with him. There may be some cheery tune he can whistle, but perhaps he should try instead the solemn Victorian song The Lost Chord by Sir Arthur Sullivan!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ToBxsZKrUQU&ab_channel=BigTezza12

No, enough gloom! We are behind you, dishy Rishi!

                                            Rishi, your big chance is now

 

SMD

25.10.22

Text copyright © Sidney Donald 2022

A POLITE TORY BLOODBATH

It has been an extraordinary week or so in British politics. Liz Truss, the duly elected (by the Party only) Leader of the Conservative Party, and Prime Minister, thanks to the healthy majority bequeathed by deposed Boris Johnson, found that her “Fiscal Event” or mini-budget, was comprehensively rejected by the gilt-edged bond market, the Bank of England and everyone embraced by the expression “The City”. Ms. Truss sacked her loyal friend and Chancellor Kwasi Kwarteng and appointed as Chancellor Jeremy Hunt, a competent former senior minister, who had twice failed in attempts to become Tory Leader and whose star had otherwise apparently faded. Hunt had been given surprisingly wide powers by Truss and rapidly cancelled almost all the tax changes in the Truss mini-budget, calming the City, the gilt-edged market and the value of the pound as he focused on “financial stability”. We can at least give thanks for that efficient deliverance / ruthless hatchet job.

                 Jeremy Hunt - old face, new broom

A complete change of direction has been signalled. All ministers have been told of impending cuts and encouraged to volunteer their own proposals. Defence spending may be slowed down, the triple lock on pension increases may be abandoned, infrastructure projects may be delayed and even the sacrosanct NHS may see drastic economies. All this spells electoral unpopularity, however necessary the process is, and a period of deep retrenchment. All the exciting expansionary policies most Tories (me included) were looking forward to, have been consigned to the deep-freeze, if not the dustbin.

The future of Leader Liz Truss is a matter of the closest, hourly study. She has owned up to past mistakes (“I tried to do too much too quickly”) and her programme should have been more carefully prepared in the absence of an OBR review, but apologies do not butter many parsnips. She is not a warm media communicator and can often seem robotic. She has lost the confidence of her colleagues, many of whom want her to step down. But how can that be engineered and who would succeed her?

                           Liz Truss – a forlorn figure

Even if her defenestration can be organized, in itself an undemocratic manoeuvre, the field of candidates is hardly problem-free. The obvious runner is Jeremy Hunt but he does not want the job, nor does admired Defence Secretary Ben Wallace. Rishi Sunak has his supporters and is energetic but his immensely rich Indian background is far from helpful. Penny Mordaunt is probably too lightweight. The return of Boris Johnson is even mooted – You can’t be serious! So, it may be some time before Sir James Brady of the 1922 Committee hands Liz her red card. Meanwhile we may have to endure an uneasy regime of Hunt in charge and Truss a PM without real power, an unfair humiliation for Liz Truss but much preferable, from the Tory viewpoint, to a general election which would surely produce a massacre of the innocent (?) Tories without precedent.

Divine intervention is currently the Conservatives’ best hope!

 

SMD

18.10.22

Text copyright © Sidney Donald 2022

UNPOPULAR VIEWS

 

It is in the nature of my kind of journalistic commentary that many readers will disagree strongly with what I write. I would like to explore some of these issues, so that the controversy can be kept alive, if it deserves to be, before disappearing permanently below the horizon.

(1)    King Charles III’s Coronation.

I am delighted we now have a date (6 May 2023) for this special event but I am dismayed that the Palace plan to have a truncated version, and are not even sure if there should be a Bank Holiday to celebrate. I am old enough to remember Queen Elizabeth II’s 1953 coronation (wet, but wonderful) and of course it must be up-dated, but forget about “cut-price coronations” – we need a glorious and glittering occasion followed by lavishly memorable celebrations, from which we will require a Bank Holiday (or 2!) to recover.

I well understand that the public do not want an expensive display of privilege and we live in economically dicey times but a Spartan approach to the Coronation is entirely misplaced.

The ceremony itself could be drastically trimmed of some ancient formality without any great offence. I doubt if anointing Charles with holy oil is in keeping with the modern spirit, but he should be invested with the Crown, if not with all the other regalia. The now irrelevant peers can be banished entirely with their ermine and coronets, as can the judges in their silks and wigs and most of the lawn-sleeved, mitre-topped bishops. In the Abbey, the music of Handel, Purcell and Vaughan Williams should resound from the rafters competing with the Vivat Rex of the scholars of Westminster School and of the congregation. The congregation should represent the nation, all professions, and all condition of citizen. The King wants to be Defender of all the Faiths, so we must make room for Protestant sects, Catholics and Orthodox with a modest sprinkling of rabbis, imams and Hindu priests. The religious service is scheduled to take about an hour or so – plenty time. Receiving Homage from any quarter is redundant, as it is a given.

                                         The (uncomfortable) Golden State Coach

The public want to see their crowned King in his golden coach and a splendid procession to Buckingham Palace is a necessity. Ranks of servicemen, marching or mounted, military bands by the bucket-full, supplemented by a Pageant celebrating the past and present achievements of our great country, crowds cheering, bells ringing, canons booming, flags in profusion. Please spare us woke guff about the wonders of the NHS, immigrants and the transsexual community. Finally, a fly-past and a massive firework display will complete the official (tax-payer funded) ceremony.

 I would not expect the Exchequer to foot the bill for the subsequent feasting and conviviality but roast oxen, gallons of beer and the best Champagne would be on my menu. The people will be happy, London will rock, the tourist trade will be ecstatic and our friends and neighbours filled with admiration.

So, your Majesty, do not stint – make sure it is a truly memorable day!

(2)    André Rieu

I used to be sniffy about performers like André Rieu, who took pieces of popular classical music out of context and played them in a lush orchestral setting. But as usual, I was entirely wrong. There is a similar musical tradition in Britain, exemplified by the historic careers of Max Jaffa with his Palm Court Orchestra and Mantovani of “cascading strings” fame. Okay, they were never edgy or fashionable but they served up well-loved popular classics to a loyal and appreciative audience. André Rieu, the hero of Maastricht, in the Limburg province of the Netherlands is more ambitious and he is a ubiquitous presence on European TV.

                              André gets their feet tapping

André (now 73) has prospered mightily since his version of The Second Waltz by Shostakovich became a Dutch hit in 1994. His Johann Strauss Orchestra and singers have expanded in numbers and he gives lavish concerts globally and to audiences of 8,000 + in the town square of Maastricht (the Vrijthof) and its surrounding cafes. His concert stock in trade there is an entry to the strains of 76 Trombones, a selection of familiar Viennese waltzes, the stirring Limburg provincial anthem, operatic “lollipops”, as Beecham described them, often by Puccini, jokey business with the orchestra members, many guest performers displaying singing or instrumental talents and an extended finale with its rousing Adieu, meiner Kleiner Gardeoffizier ending the evening.

Multilingual André tours to, for example, Chile, Australia, Romania and Britain adjusting his programme to the native audience (he was recently in my home town of Aberdeen to the delight of my venerable brother aged 86, a great fan, who naturally attended). André is a flamboyant showman and I have to admit his polyglot entourage is a great advertisement for European unity and solidarity. He is one of the world’s life-enhancers and should be warmly cherished.

https://www.facebook.com/watch/?v=681186609354946 You’ll never walk alone

 

(3)    Hilary Mantel

Hilary Mantel, the mistress of historical fiction, passed away only a few weeks ago at the age of 70. She produced a wide range of novels but her greatest claim to fame was the Wolf Hall Trilogy, three novels (the first two won the prestigious Booker Prize) following the rise and fall of Tudor statesman Thomas Cromwell. Cromwell was at least partly responsible for the Dissolution of the Monasteries, the execution of Anne Boleyn, the protection of Lollards, the suppression of the Pilgrimage of Grace and Henry VIII’s disastrous marriage to Anne of Cleves. He paid with his head in 1540

Thomas Cromwell

                                                    Hilary Mantel                                                               

Hilary well deserves the accolades heaped upon her and few would disagree with the Observer verdict: The Cromwell novels are, for my money, the greatest English novels of this century. Fascinating, meticulously researched, intelligently written to be sure, but Hilary, they were just too long!

Wolf Hall                                             482 pages

Bring up the Bodies                              650 pages

The Mirror and the Light                       875 pages

I am presently on page 205 of the 3^rd title and am not even a quarter nearer the finishing line! As a decrepit 80-year-old I do not read quickly any more. I want a handy book, not a door-stopper. I think there should be a heavy tax on books over 300 pages – maybe that would help us all, Liz Truss!

 

SMD

13.10.22

Text Copyright © Sidney Donald 2022

JUST HANGING ON

 

Theresa May (remember her?) championed those who were “just coping”. Doughty Liz Truss, her Tory successor but one, appears to be “just hanging on”, an unenviable position for a newly elected Leader and Prime Minister of a government facing many difficult challenges, though normally able to rely on a united parliamentary party to support it. Sad for a Tory like me to relate, the Conservatives have instead fractured into several contrarian groups, each riding their own hobby-horse, not caring much about party solidarity nor the toxic effect they are having on the opinions of their electorate. Can the Tory spirit survive?

                               Liz Truss sets out her stall for her Tory government

Liz Truss won the convoluted leadership contest (7 July to 5 September and far too long) and one consequence was a group of disappointed candidates – Rishi Sunak, Penny Mordaunt et al, egged on by mischief-making Michael Gove, became unhelpful critics of parts of her programme. Much damage was done by over-confident Kwasi Kwarteng (dubbed wittily as “Kamikwazi”), who had not adequately prepared the gilts market for his proposed tax cuts, nor involved the OBR. Sterling fell sharply and interest rates soared disproportionately. The Bank had to intervene and panicky, spineless Tory members feared for their seats as the polls projected disaster. A large slice of parliamentary confidence in Truss disappeared in this collective hysteria..

The fickle media were full of dire predictions, auguries and prophecies which would do credit to Cassandra or to our entrail-gazing primitive forebears. Most of these predictions will prove to be wildly over-stated, but that is no help presently. For example, the National Grid said a certain scenario of gas shortages could lead to daily blackouts in the winter. The Press presented this as an unavoidable fact not as a theoretical prediction. Although Truss is not (yet) a practiced orator, her actual conference speech was a lucid and rational résumé of Conservative principles.

On the lunatic fringes, some advocated yet another leadership contest, others an interim Leader appointed by MPs only, and the names of Ben Wallace and Kit Malthouse (who’s he?) were bandied about. The LibDems’ answer to all our problems is a fantasy involving rejoining the EU! It is said that in the 20^th and 21^st centuries few parties stay in office for more than about 14 years. Certainly, my Tories look rather tired and maybe need to recharge their batteries but even a brief spell of Keir Starmer’s shambolic Labour in office is the stuff of nightmares – God save us!

 

Things may not be quite as desperate as some fear. The promised recession has not come. The supply side measures yet to be announced may alter sentiment. Kwasi’s tax measures may well stimulate sustainable growth. Overseas, a rapprochement with the EU on the N I Protocol may be attainable. Putin may have to retreat from or even quit Ukraine. In time, Russian energy may become available again. Luck may even bring us two relatively mild winters in Europe.

·         Perhaps Liz Truss has the courage of Marshal Foch; My centre is giving way, my right is retreating, excellent situation, I am attacking.

·         Or maybe Kwazi Kwarteng can emulate Manchester City’s phenomenal Erling Haaland and score a financial hat-trick or three to transform our fortunes.

  

                          

Foch
                 

                                        Haaland

Liz and Kwazi – your country needs you!

 

SMD
7.10.22

Text copyright © Sidney Donald 2022