Music

I've been listening to Gillian Welch's "The Harrow and the Harvest" in the studio. It is as beautiful as her previous album "The Revelator" which Trevor and I listened to everyday for a year when we first bought it.

There is some music that is only for certain times (like "How Bizarre" for the summer of 96) and other music that has kept me going through some very hard times. When the first measured, calm notes drawn across the cello strings of Bach's Cello Suites sound out I remember all the times I've listened to this music. I've listened when I'm upset, when I'm happy, I heard Trevor play it thousands of times on the trumpet as a warm up when he used to practice for gigs, I listened to this music single and now when I'm a mother. I love Bach's cello suites so much I hope I'm listening to them when I'm old.


Here is a list of some of the timeless, music that I carry with me for every occasion
"River" Joni Mitchell- for Christmas and anytime you need comforting

"Greetings to the New Brunette" Billy Bragg- for taking you back to the years of Doc Martins and vintage dresses.

"My Funny Valentine" Chet Baker- Reminds me of when I first saw Trev at a gig, singing his heart out with funny lyrics. Unfortunately as he is a mumbler no-one in the audience could understand them, but the band was laughing!

"Nadine " Chuck Berry- first heard the quintessentially American song when I was travelling around Europe.

"Gymnopedie -No 1" Eric Satie- this piece reminds me of water

37.2 Le Matin" Gabriel Yared

"I Dream a Highway" Gillian Welch

"Flamenco Sketches " Miles Davis

"Tracks of My Tears" The Miracles

"Sex" The Necks- for long summer afternoons just as good in bed as out.

"Heart of Gold" Neil Young- This is a song from my childhood . I love the yearning regret in Young's voice.

"My Baby Just Cares For Me" Nina Simone

"Only the Lonely" Roy Orbison

"Come on Up to the House" Tom Waits

"New Favourite" Alison Krauss

Vitrified Studio- Take a break........

Give yourself a big treat and check out Shelley Martin's blog Vitrified Studio. Shelley runs a small ceramics studio in Portland , Oregon and her blog is just the thing you need at lunchtime, when you have a lot of boring e-mails to reply to,or tax forms to fill out. DON'T DO IT!!!!! Take a break and browse through beautiful ceramics from around the world.
Shelley Martin's pots from Vitrified Studio

When the drawings stop

Working weekends and being a mother can just about make you want to drop where you are standing and not get up any more. I think the added thing on top of the physical hard work is that you have to remain calm so you are inspired. The minute you start to get that tight-at-the back-of-neck- frowny-feeling the drawings stop.

Is it a lesson in "letting-go" or holding on tightly and having everything going along to a highly sophisticated plan? ....a plan that involves a lot of last minute tweaking, and numerous unplanned addendum....and some hysterical hyperventilation style breathing.

Issac Button can throw a ton of clay into pots a day!

Students of ceramics and the austere beauty of hard work will love this film. Made in the 1960's it features English potter Issac Button, a man who makes herculean tasks appear effortless. I like the way he smokes a pipe while throwing, I like his simple robust pots. Issac Button claimed that he "never left a pub the same day I entered it!"
As a country potter myself I admire the plain way he goes about his daily work. We are very lucky to have a visual record of something at once so amazing and so ordinary.
Thanks to David Neale for putting the film up on his blog.