Tony Fitzpatrick, UK. blog@tonyfitz.uk

Subtitled "The Watchmaker of Filigree Street #1.5" as the Japanese nobleman and future gazer, Keita Mori, gets a walk on part. It was brilliantly constructed and intriguing, although, as Natasha Pulley's books seems to be, often confusing and puzzling. Basically, it is 1859, and retired East India Company trader, Merrick Tremayne, is "encouraged" to accompany his former colleague, Clem, with Clem's wife Minna, to Peru. Their objective is to steal cuttings from Quinine trees as there is an epidemic of malaria in India, and Peru will not export the plants. The idea is daft - Merrick has a bad leg, and the Peruvian altitude and climate are hardly suited to his participation on the expedition. Also, smuggling the plants, if caught, carries a death sentence. There follows a long tale involving a community of invalids, magical statues, very old catholic priests, glass sided mountains, magical cities, the history of Merrick's father who came this way previously, a holy forest composed of lighter than air whitewood, explosive Phoenix like birds, and much more. There are also flashbacks, such as when a 12 year old Mori warns the East Indian trader Merrick of the danger many years into the future, and of Merrick's father on an expedition to Peru years before. Merrick befriends Raphael, a local Priest, who like others is destined to become petrified as a stone saint, with a role of protecting scared grounds for eternity. This is, as another reviewer wrote, a story of friendship, love, magic, different cultures, intrigue, tradition and adventure. It has marvellous descriptions and vivid images, and some subtle political messages about imperialism and religion. I enjoyed it very much, but had to persevere with much of the concepts and magical ideas.

Published July 2017. Read on Kindle.

Argentinian composer Martin Palimeri (b. 1965) composed a traditional Latin mass using tango themes and orchestration involving the bandoneon in 1995-96 for the Orquesta Sinfónica Nacional de Cuba, the Choir of the Law Faculty of the University of Buenos Aires and the Polyphonic Choir of the City of Vicente López in Argentina. It is good fun, and was a ambitious choice for the afternoon concert by this Solihull based amateur choir. The mass was the second half of the concert, the first was a collection of works by Piazzolla and other South American composers.

Pizzetti (1880-1968) was an Italian composer known as part of the "Generation of 1880", along with Ottorino Respighi, Gian Francesco Malipiero, and Alfredo Casella. The group were by repute the first major Italian composers for some years whose primary contributions were not in opera. He taught at the Florence Conservatory (director from 1917 to 1923), directed the Milan Conservatory from 1923, and was Respighi's successor at the National Academy of St Cecilia in Rome from 1936 to 1958. His Messa di Requiem was composed in 1922, following a sad period in his life when his wife had recently died, and his tenure in Florence had ended. He remarked that in his emotional state, he was "overwhelmed by the tremendous immensity of the text". The work draws on 16th century polyphony with Gregorian chant woven into late romantic choral textures. The Da Capo choir presented this rarely performed work as a reflection for All Soul's, interspersed with readings from the Psalms, John Donne, Elizabeth Barrett Browning, Paul Laurence Dunbar, and Kimberley Blaeser. A lovely piece, beautifully presented in the atmospheric surroundings of the St Mary's Warwick chancel.

This is regarded as one of the best travel books every published. Jan Morris's long (336 pages) love letter to "La Serenissima" originally published in 1963. Morris first visited the city of Venice during World War II as young James Morris, and lived in it for several months after the war. It is beautifully written, and conveys wonderfully the centuries long attraction of the watery city to it's many international visitors, with sections covering the city, the people and the lagoon. I especially liked the pages dealing with local colour - the habits and proclivities of ordinary Venetians as they go about their day to day business. However, to be honest I also found parts of the book a bit of a slog, with too many pages rather focused on lists of notable people, buildings, churches, and the like. Morris updated this book several times, and supposedly acknowledged at the end that her love affair with Venice had come to an end.

My favourite quotes: "One of the bells of St Mark’s Campanile was called the Trottoria, because when it sounded the patricians used to trot to the Council Chamber on their mules". And more prosaically... "Sometimes a Venetian housewife announces conclusively that there are no cabbages in the city today: but what she means is that the greengrocer at the corner of Campo San Barnaba, with whom her family custom has been traditionally associated since the days of the early Crusades, has sold out of the vegetable this morning." And this which is so accurate as to be painful... "There are 107 churches in Venice, and nearly every tourist feels he has seen at least 200 of them:"

It is a remarkable book, and regardless of the quality of her other travel writings, this one book stands to position Morris as one of the finest travel writers ever.

First published 1963. Read on Kindle.

Slightly confusing "comedy" Sci-Fi radio play by award winning author Adam Usden. Two scientists, Sam and Ian, have been in cryogenic stasis for nine hundred years along with 1000 others. They are deep below a planet's surface waiting for it to be terra-formed and able to support life. However after a technical malfunction, they are awakened early, are unable to go back to their hibernated state and proceed to live out their years, developing a romantic relationship, and filling their time with "useful activities". However, we also get flashbacks to an 21st century earthbound Sam who appears to be writing a sci-fi novel with the same basic set of themes. Her life is equally complicated, and includes a man, Michael, she meets on a park bench who clearly is romantically interested in her. All a bit daft and overly complex to be honest. Cast included Laura Aikman, Tom Rosenthal, Hamish Rush and Leah Marks. Director/Producer Gary Brown. First broadcast March 2020.

Described as a "hymn to the abundance of the rain forest", in 1958 Heitor Villa-Lobos was commissioned by MGM to provide the music for Green Mansions, a film version of the 1904 novel by WH Hudson, set in the Amazon rainforest and starring Audrey Hepburn and Anthony Perkins. It was more or less his last work, and the music wasn't much used, but he later reworked it to a 23 movement piece based on the score. Floresta do Amazonas is an 80 minute long oratorio/symphonic poem. Conductor Simone Menezes has extracted an 11-movement concert suite, omitting the choral music but including four of the sections involving a solo soprano. The suite was originally assembled for the Amazônia project, accompanying an exhibition of Sebastião Salgado’s photographs of the river and its peoples, and it has been performed in concert with projections of those images, some of which are included in the CD booklet. It is wonderful music, obviously in part intended for a motion picture, but that matters not a jot. Coupled on this September 2023 release with a movement from Philip Glass’s ballet Aguas da Amazonia. Camila Provenzale, Philharmonia Zurich, conducted by Simone Menezes.

CD by "Percussionist extraordinaire Joby Burgess", this is an album of contemporary electronic percussion and marimba pieces. Described as "a collection of specially commissioned ‘songs without words’ from John Metcalfe, Tunde Jegede, Dario Marianelli, Yazz Ahmed, Graham Fitkin, Dobrinka Tabakova and Gabriel Prokofiev." The pieces are inspired by an eclectic mix of sources, including the poetry of Robert Graves and Birago Diop, by Michael Ondaatje and Isaac Asimov, work by philosopher Michael Sandel and songwriter Peter Gabriel, United Nation population growth statistics and Saudi Arabian folk tales. Joby Burgess (percussion). CD released September 2022.

Aram Khachaturian composed his Symphony-Poem in 1947, and scored it for for fifteen solo trumpets, organ and large orchestra. Loud and powerful! It went into obscurity after it's premiere, unpopular with the Soviet authorities, but is now known as the third symphony. On this disc it is coupled with music from the ballet Gayaneh, which includes the much loved "Sabre Dance".Robert-Schumann-Philharmonie, conducted by Frank Beermann. CD released June 2023.

Fun idea, an album full of organ works by J.S. Bach, transcribed for the orchestra by Judith and Tineke Steenbrink. To quote "Holland Baroque is an original and innovative baroque orchestra that approaches baroque repertoire through a fresh and contemporary approach, with a focus on improvisation and collaborations with outstanding artists from different traditions". Includes three Chorale Preludes, the Concerto in G major, the Fantasia and Fugue in G minor, the Keyboard Concerto in D minor, the Passacaglia in C minor and the Trio Sonata No. 2 in C minor. Holland Baroque. CD released February 2023.

British rule in India was originally not a imperial conquest, but a commercial business. The East India Company was an English, and later British, joint-stock company founded in 1600 and dissolved in 1874, formed to trade in the Indian Ocean region. The company controlled large parts of the Indian subcontinent and colonised parts of Southeast Asia and Hong Kong, becoming the largest corporation in the world, with a private army of 260,000 soldiers. Originally chartered as the "Governor and Company of Merchants of London Trading into the East-Indies", the company rose to account for half of the world's trade during the mid-1700s and early 1800s, particularly in basic commodities including cotton, silk, indigo dye, sugar, salt, spices, saltpetre, tea, and opium. This BBC radio play described three scenes from the origins of the East India Company, firstly with the arrival of a privateer in Dartmouth in 1594 loaded with spices attracting the interest of the Queen and traders, secondly the initial meeting to discuss the formation of the Joint Stock Company held by Sir Thomas Smythe in London in 1599, and then the story of the companies first profitable voyage on the Red Dragon under Sir James Lancaster. Lancaster however preferred to fight Portuguese and Dutch ships laden with cargo rather than bothering to trade himself. The short drama was well done and interesting, with some human interest stories to the fore - the Dartmouth greengrocer who provided lock up space for the first spice cargo, the janitor in Leadenhall Street who invested his worldly savings of 7d in the company at it's formation, and the Vicar, Hickson, who chronicled the first meeting and voyage of the company, and whose pious concerns about the morals of Pirates were pushed aside at the prospect of 1000% returns on investments! Written by Fin Kennedy. Cast included Holly Atkins, Kyle Abdullah, Nigel Barratt, Dario Coates, Lucy Phelps and Ben Turner. Other parts were played by Ardeshir Alexandre Sefre, Abraham Popoola, and Salem Zayed. Producer and Director Boz Temple-Morris. First broadcast October 2023.

The 1946 film "A Matter of Life and Death" starred David Niven as Squadron Leader Peter Carter. Carter is returning from a bombing mission over Germany in 1945, when his Lancaster is badly hit by enemy fire over the English Channel. His crew have all bailed out, but he has no working parachute left. He prepares to die, has a brief radio call with an American radio operator, June, and dictates a final letter to his mother. Carter however doesn't die, but finds himself washed up on the beach in Kent. He is able to locate June, and romance ensues. Up in heaven (or the "other place") panic has ensued - Carter should have died, but the Angel sent to retrieve his soul couldn't find him in the thick fog over the channel (!). The celestial records are now all wrong, and the accountants want it corrected. The heavenly messenger/bureaucrat goes down to earth to meet Peter to explain the mistake and ask him to accompany him back to the after life. Peter, not surprisingly refuses, saying he now has a future ahead of him with June. Peter is allowed an appeal in front of a jury up in heaven, with his advocate the doctor who has been treating him on earth (who has in the interim died in a road accident!). He is up against a jury and barrister who all have hatred for the British empire, and use Peter's war record to argue that his no right to ask for longer life - his country and he have denied it to so many for so long. June is called as a witness, and offers to take Peter's place in heaven - the jury convinced that this is true love uphold his appeal, and he and June live happily ever after. In 1999, A Matter of Life and Death was placed 20th on the British Film Institute's list of Best 100 British films, and it ranked 90th in The Sight and Sound Greatest Films of All Time,

This BBC radio adaption of the film had a few changes to the plot - for example the original advocate for the prosecution was an American killed in the war of independence, however on radio he was a victim of the Indian Raj. It was however well done, and I enjoyed it. The depiction of heaven as an accountants paradise was lovely, and the challenge of war - namely too many people dying overwhelming the celestial book keepers and causing queues at St Peter's gates was very amusing.

Cast included Will Tudor, Lydia West, Geoff McGivern, Miles Jupp and Jonny Weldon. Other roles played by Alix Dunmore, David Benson, Jack Lane, Dan Starkey and Justice Ritchie. Written by Ben Cottam, and adapted from the film by Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger. Produced and directed by Simon Barnard. First broadcast in two parts in October 2023.

The world premiere recording of Ivor Gurney's (1890-1937) delightful Sonata in D major for Violin and Piano, written about 1918-1919. Coupled with Elgar's very popular Salut d'amour, Op. 12, and his Violin Sonata in E minor, Op. 82, which was one of his last completed works. Rupert Marshall-Luck (violin), Duncan Honeybourne (piano). Disc released January 2023.

English author Edward Morgan Forster OM CH (1 January 1879 – 7 June 1970), particularly known for his books A Room with a View (1908), Howards End (1910) and A Passage to India (1924), lived mostly at Kings College Cambridge from 1947 until his death, writing little in the final 45 years of his life. Roger Keith "Syd" Barrett (6 January 1946 – 7 July 2006) was an English singer, guitarist and songwriter who co-founded the rock band Pink Floyd in 1965, but left the band in 1968 possibly following excessive drug use, and retired from music making in 1972, doing little until his early death. This entertaining radio play imagines a situation where Barrett calls on Forster in his rooms in 1968, ostensibly trying to buy back an early painting that Forster bought of his several years earlier. Although of different generations and vastly differing ages, they share the pain of having their creativity "dry up" early in their careers, and of the challenge of having found fame and success in their chosen fields very young. Forster, of course, has never heard of Barrett or his music (although his young college servant has!), but over several glasses of sherry they bond, discuss the challenges of creativity, and Forster councils the younger man in deciding what to do with his life. They each reveal the pain of their pasts, Forster his homosexuality, and Barrett, the early loss of his father. A gentle tender well paced play which I enjoyed very much. Starring Simon Russell Beale as E M Forster, Tyger Drew-Honey as Syd Barrett and Madeleine Leslay as a college bedder. Sound design by Giovanni Sipiano. Directed by Willi Richards. Produced by Roger James Elsgood. Dramatization by Roger James Elsgood of Haydn Middleton’s novel of the same name. In life, of course, they never met. First broadcast May 2023.