“Time Sure Does Fly…”

And so another Christmas Day flashes by – and they sure do flash past when you reach the age of 82, as I did a few days ago…

I don’t usually wax lyrical or philosophical, but I thought – what the heck..! – at my age, I’m entitled to a little nostalgia.

So when, a few minutes ago, someone mentioned a certain John Wilson Orchestra, which performed on the telly for us Brits on Christmas night, I certainly felt a lyrical and philosophical mood drift over me.

You see, John Wilson’s Orchestra was performing an evening of ‘my’ music.  In other words, swing music – the kind of music that was composed by such greats as Cole Porter, Jerome Kern, Sammy Cahn, Ray Noble, and all the others that my antiquated memory can’t drum up at the moment.

As a youngster, I loved swing music.  Well, it was my music, wasn’t it?  In fact, my generation would go so far as to call it ‘our’ music.

We don’t get ‘Swing’ any more as a popular broadcasting subject, and when we do get these rare occasions, I find the music has such therapeutic contrast to that which is termed ‘popular’ music, these days.

Well, it has for me, anyway…

As a youngster, I played the piano in a small combination of what we called a ‘band’ in those days.  And it was the swing music of such composers as Cole Porter, George Gershwin, Jerome Kern, Sammy Cahn, Ray Noble, etc. that we played – not to mention our futile attempts at trying to copy the so listenable renderings that came from our musical heroes of the day – Glenn Miller, Tommy Dorsey, Harry James, and, of course, our own British Eric Winstone, Cyril Stapleton, Joe Loss, Sid Lawrence, to name but a few.

The four members of our little band were rank amateurs, each one of us self-taught on our various instruments.  But we hired the local church hall for practice, and we rehearsed and rehearsed until we decided: ‘Yeah. We’re OK. Let’s do it…!’

So we flung ourselves onto the community and plied for hire…

We did alright, too.  First time out, we found ourselves pictured with a write-up in the local paper.  And the height of our achievements came when I found, as the pianist, that I was required to note down every tune we played – for ‘copyright’ purposes…!

I, personally, practically floated and wallowed and swam in the very concept of ‘swing music’; the music of the Forties and the Fifties; the music of my era.

But then came Calamity!

Some geezer by the name of Bill Haley gambolled into Great Britain and sent us all rocking round the clock.

Bill Haley started the trend in Great Britain of a completely different sort of music –  a sort of music whose lyrics weren’t rhyming poetry; a sort of music that became something called ‘Rock’.

Along with these developments came an avid acceptance by the youth of the day, who wildly embraced this new kind of music – a kind of music that required its exponents to shout the words of the ‘lyrics’ rather than sing them; a kind of music that carried with it undertones of violence and aggression; a kind of music the words of which, most of the time, I cannot decipher…

I swear it is ‘rock’ that causes the outbreak of many fights and brawls outside night clubs at closing time.  After all, these kids have been dancing all night to a sort of music that reminds me of that which accompanies tribal dances in Africa before primitive warriors go on the rampage…

Anyway, when ‘rock’ came on the scene it was as if an iron curtain had clanged down in front of me. I didn’t like it.; I didn’t want it; I couldn’t – and wouldn’t – play it.

The same went for my mates in the band, so we packed up.  In any case, the demands of my daily job had changed somewhat and I was called upon to work on some Saturday nights  -which, of course, is the most popular night for which a band might be required.

I still play the ‘piano’ occasionally, but, these days, it’s one of those new-fangled musical keyboards on which I find it impossible to use the syncopation technique I used in the old days…

‘But, I can honestly say about the days of swing music: “those were the days” – and I’ll never forget them.  And thank Heaven for orchestra leaders like John Wilson, a new acquaintance whose music I shall certainly be chasing up from now on…

Happy New Year, everybody.!

Hang In There…!

Here we go again – A Hung Parliament…

Mind you, there’s a difference.   When we had Hung Parliaments in the past they were visited upon ‘great’ men – such as Herbert Asquith, Stanley Baldwin, Ramsay MacDonald, Harold Wilson.

Today, and for the last month, we have had, strutting around the UK constituencies, political pygmies such as David Cameron, the young public school whipper-snapper, who has swaggered through the last few weeks as though he was already carrying the keys to No. 10 Downing Street in his back pocket.

Then comes fledgling Nicholas Clegg, the new kid on the block, who’s performance at the first Leaders’ Debate won him an idolic following for his acting ability, and who has decided he can lick anyone daring to challenge his newly-discovered popularity.

Lastly, we have Gordon Brown, who petulantly believed for twelve years that he should have been elected leader of the Labour Party rather than the popular choice of Tony Blair. And Gordon waited…and waited…and waited… until Tony finally stepped down and allocated his prime ministership to Gordon – until it was time for the next election….

Poor Gordon.  He, neither, has ever been able to transmit an aura of prime ministerial “greatness…”

Cameron and Clegg are, as yet, unproven.  and the unfortunate Gordon Brown – who was a pretty shrewd Chancellor under Tony Blair, and who has been the respected advisor for the rest of the world’s currencies during the recent World Currency Crisis – now finds himself the target of the British public who blame him for the state of Britain’s borrowing deficit.

Yet – if only an indignant British public would understand – Labour’s deficit has gone only, and sympathetically, towards supporting not only jobs, but the jobless, and the needy of this country.  In fact, Gordon unloaded billions onto the very people who caused the trouble – the bankers – in the mistaken belief that they would start to lend… and lend… and lend, to keep British Business afloat and jobs available.

But what did the bankers do?  Why, they hogged it to themselves, of course – even to the extent of paying out massive bonuses to failed executives!  It beggars belief…

In fact, Gordon Brown has caught for ill winds of one kind or another ever since Tony Blair stepped down to jump onto the lecture-circuit band-wagon, and now the British public –  needing someone to blame for their trials and tribulations over the last couple of years – have decided to make Gordon Brown the whipping boy.

The fact that it was the virulent greed of the world’s financial institutions – closely followed by Britain’s own money-grabbing bankers – that caused the avalanching collapse of Britain’s own currency, goes unrecorded by the stupified British voter, baying for blood.  ”It’s him”, they cry.  ”It’s that Gordon Brown and his damnable Labour Government that’s the cause of it all…”

“Rightly so”, agrees young David, nodding wisely as he confidentally contemplates the swingeing cuts his new Conservative government will be planning.

“Labour’s finished as the party of opposition”, says Johnny-Come-Lately Nick.  And he wonders how he is going to get his request for the end of the electoral ‘First Past The Post’ set-up OK’d by young David -should David become the new Prime Minister.

Meanwhile, the world’s currency markets have become ‘volatile’, apparently.  Why so?  It’s only a British General Election…!

Or maybe the villified Gordon Brown’s correcting influence on the economic outlook is having more effect on the world than he was given credit for…?

There are interesting times ahead – especially for the British public.

And if young David finally commits himself to leading a minority Conservative government, God help the poor, old, working-class.

Yes…  The  ’Poor’, and the ‘Old, and the ‘Working-Class’…

Just like me.

“It’s Been A Long Time…”

I just hadn’t realised that I had not done any blogging since August, last year!  It’s this Ancestry caper.  As I have already explained , a relative – who I had no idea existed at the time – wrote to me with a family query.  That’s what started it all, and I seem to have been probing away at all sorts of ancient documents in a sweat-inciting effort to find out who and what I am, and where my genes may have originated…

And now, on top of all this comes a General Election to contend with!

Well, I’ll do my best.  But  think my blogs are going to be – for a while – much like they were when I first started, way back in 2007: just  concoctions of  mashed potatoes, with a few bits and pieces thrown in to give them some kind of palatability.

Family History is arduous enough, (it’s a good thing I’m intensely interested in the subject!), but when you add the fact that I now, for a few weeks, have to contend with the politics of the day as well, in order to sort out which party is deserving of my precious vote, it’s going to get a bit much.

But I’ll try…

As regards the coming election, Gordon Brown and David Cameron have been pecking away at each other for weeks, knowing that the political jousting was due to start on the sixth of May.  Now that the campaign has started in earnest, they are both up on their feet taking bites out of each other, the House of Commons echoing to the two men’s gibes and insults.

And adding to the Commons commotion, of course, come the strident tones of the leader of the Liberal Democrats, Nick Clegg, who is busy taking bites out of whichever of his opponents offer the tastiest morsel of the moment.  Boy O’ Boy, the coming battle for my vote is going to develop into some confrontation.

Well, there’ll be a month or so of these protagonists sallying forth to do battle on Britain’s streets and doorsteps – not to mention the telephone and the Internet!   But, I’ll tell you this: every one of them is going to have to fight very, very, hard for my vote – because I ain’t giving it up all that easy; not when I consider that all of  Great Britain’s political parties have, in the past, made it very easy for this country’s greedy financial institutions to join with the rest of the world’s greedy financial institutions to produce what they call – The Credit Crunch.

Even now, I still can’t get my head around government strategy that dictated that it had to offer help to the very institutions that had caused the financial world to collapse.  And then let the chief executives of those same institutions  - resigning to spend more time with their families – walk away with million pound bonuses…!

Maybe one day, I’ll catch on…

This Family History Thing…

It’s been a while since I wrote anything.  It’s this family history thing.  You start off nonchalantly with a shrug of the shoulders and a “So what?” and before you know it you’re immersed in dates and times and statistics so magnetic that you find yourself wallowing in a quagmire of history you were never quite aware existed – and you are having a helluva time trying to extricate yourself…

A “second cousin” ( is that the same as being “twice removed”?) started it all off – although I had been quite attracted to the TV programme “Who Do You Think You Are?”, wherein various celebrities trawl back through their ancestries, sometimes coming up with something worth noting, both by themselves and by the viewer.

But when this second cousin of mine sent me a pile of her research , which showed me that my paternal grandfather had enjoyed a few more brothers and sisters than I had ever been aware of, it made me curious.  It made me even more curious when I discovered that even my Aunt Florrie – Grandad’s youngest of eight children, and the only one left living that I could consult – didn’t know that she’d had so many aunts and uncles..!

I couldn’t leave it there so I started digging.  And before long I found myself digging deeper and deeper.  Suddenly, I was hooked.  I began to understand why chasing up your ancestors becomes an addiction.  So now I’m addicted…

My wife complains that she has become a “computer widow”.  I appear to be spending far more time on the computer than I used to spend  in front of the goggle-box.

Excuse me.  There’s a slight alteration I have to make to my family tree on the “Ancestry” website…

“Well, It Had To Come, Didn’t It…?”

Well, it did, didn’t it?  Ever since Tony Blair resigned from New Labour – having been constantly nudged by Gordon Brown – the party has been in a state of flux and it was inevitable that some kind of collapse was on the cards.

 ”New” Labour was Tony’s creation, not a bad one considering that when he took over, the Labour Party was unelectable.  And the “new” political philosophy did rather appeal to the middle classes after the shambolic, break–down efforts of the collapsing Conservative machine, after Thatcher was booted out – especially since Tony set-to with his Labour love affair with British Business, and privatisation.

He did this, even though Thatcher’s wholesale transfer of our national assets such as Water, Gas, Electricity, British Steel, etc, etc, etc, were eventually transferred into greedy, grasping  private hands, which lost no time in raising prices that were invested fast into private pockets .  And Tony left them there…

 Later, improvements to our erstwhile national assets’ superstructure during Tony’s reign, had to be paid for by even higher prices.  I should have suspected something when, during his first week as Prime Minister, Tony invited Thatcher  around to Number 10…

However, ten years later, Gordon takes over.  Gone was the cheerful, toothy grin of Tony Blair’s presence on the political stage.  In its place we received Gordon Brown’s dour, sombre, “too busy for pleasantries” countenance. 

From the beginning, it is a fact that Gordon had not the aura of a Prime Minister.  Gordon Brown was a brilliant Chancellor who, for the sake of the Party,  should have been Tony’s, supportive, stalwart buddy.  But there was that  constant, nagging belief that he should have been chosen as the PM ten years earlier, not Tony.

Well, Gordon finally made it and moved into No.10.  But Gordon couldn’t take Tony’s place as the showman, the popular presence on the political stage…

And so it has been proved. Now, today, after the three-week debacle of MP’s expenses being exposed, comes the test of New Labour’s “popularity” – the European and County Council Elections…

The British public have very short memories and - in spite of the Thatcher years, and the Major years, and the Hague years, and all the other short-lived Conservative Leader years – I garauntee there will be a Conservative landslide all over the country.  I believe it will be exactly the same come the General Election…

Then listen to the howls of anguish from protest and floating voters who had decided that “Labour needs a lesson…”

And – believe you me – the howls will come as Tory “cut this” and “cut that” merchants go to work…

Ah, well…