Allen Ginsberg - Sunflower Sutra

The Healing Power Of Music.

Isn’t modern technology amazing. It is Friday afternoon and I am writing this on my laptop and at the same time listening to music pouring out of the same machine. The music I am listening to is a recording of two concerts by Van Morrison at Loughborough University in 1987. Van isn’t the only one on the recording, Robin Williamson of the Incredible String Band is there as well. Robin and Van were good friends back in the day. The concerts were part of a weekend course that Van organised in collaboration with The Wrekin Trust. The course was called The Secret Heart Of Music, (An Exploration Into The Power Of Music To Change Consciousness) As well as the concerts there were talks and discussions. During the 1980’s Van was interested in music being more than just entertainment. He knew that music had healing properties and could benefit the health and well-being of the listener. He is one of the greatest vocalists but in the 80's his albums contained long instrumentals which weren't there as fillers but as aids to meditation and contemplation. I would have loved to have gone to this conference, not just for the music but also for the talks. One of the talks was called The Effect Of Music On Hormonal Secretions In The Endocrine Glands. I find that fascinating because I have often wondered why music induces a feeling of well-being and makes you feel better.

Van Morrison & Robin Williamson.

Somebody recently put the recording of the music on youtube and I have shared it below if you want to hear it. There has been a lot of chat about it on a Van Morrison fan page and apparently there is another version which includes a recording of one of the discussions. A fan called Christian produced a photo of the art work for this. I was particularly pleased to see that among the people taking part in the discussion was Pir Vilayat Khan. He was a great Sufi teacher. The Sufi’s are a peace-loving Islamic sect who have suffered a lot of persecution in some countries in recent years. They believe in the universality of all beliefs. They say that all religions are rays from the same sun. 

When I first moved to Bradford On Avon in 1977 I had a friend who lived with some Sufi’s at Barton Farm. Through him I read some books by Pir Vilayat Khan and also by his father Hazrat Khan who founded the Sufi Order In The West. I found those books very interesting, especially because music plays an important role in the Sufi tradition. I just looked on Wikipedia and found this. ‘His message of divine unity focused on the themes of love, harmony, and beauty. He taught that blind adherence to any book rendered religion devoid of spirit.  In his various written works, such as The Music of Life and The Mysticism of Sound and Music, Inayat Khan interlocks his passion for music with his Sufi ideologies making a compelling argument for music as the harmonious thread of the Universe’.

Pir Vilayat Khan

Once a classical musician, Hazrat Inayat Khan let go of his greatest attachment-his musical career- to become a Sufi Master, as is the tradition in Sufism. Immersing himself in the Sufi ideology, he found a link between his former life as a musician and his new journey along the spiritual path. Khan saw harmony as the "music of the spheres" which linked all mankind and had the ability to transcend one's spiritual awareness. His most influential and well-known book, The Music of Life, is the definitive collection of Hazrat Inayat Khan's teachings on sound, presenting his vision of the harmony which encompasses every aspect of our lives. He explores the science of breath, the law of rhythm, the creative process, and both the healing power and psychological influence of music and sound.

"What makes us feel drawn to music is that our whoIe being is music; our mind and our body, the nature in which we live, the nature that has made us, all that is beneath and around us, it is all music. We are close to all this music, and live and move and have our being in music. The mystery of sound is mysticism; the harmony of life is religion. The knowledge of vibrations is metaphysics, the analysis of atoms is science, and their harmonious grouping is art. The rhythm of form is poetry, and the rhythm of sound is music. This shows that music is the art of arts and the science of all sciences; and it contains the fountain of all knowledge within itself." "Music should be healing; music should uplift the soul; music should inspire. There is no better way of getting closer to God, of rising higher towards the spirit, of attaining spiritual perfection than music, if only it is rightly understood." – Quote from The Music of Life.

That will do for today, but I hope any music fans will listen to the Loughborough recording because it is great.

Van Morrison Live 1987 Loughborough University UK

Racing Cars (Jet Spotter Of The Track)

Magenta Devine & John Otway (Centre, back Row) at Aylesbury Friars.

I saw on the news yesterday that Magenta Devine has died aged 61. That’s very sad. In case you haven’t heard of her she was a popular television presenter in the 1980’s who presented youth programmes such as Network 7 and The Rough Guide To series. She was famous for always wearing her trademark sunglasses. I wasn’t a fan of hers, but I was a fan of John Otway and that’s how I first heard of Magenta Devine. I think it was 1977 that I bought the first album by Otway & Barrett which I love to this day. Magenta is name checked on the song Racing Cars (Jet Spotter Of The Track). Jet Spotter was a nick name of Otway’s friend and chauffeur Jeff Potter. ‘I'm over the line with Magenta Devine’. Also, in the song if you listen carefully you can hear a female voice but I don’t know if that is Magenta. I think the reason for the song was so that Wild Willy Barrett could run amok with his homemade guitar and make it sound like a racing car. 

Magenta was born in Hemel Hempstead and Otway In Aylesbury. In both the Hemel Gazette & Bucks Herald John Otway paid tribute to her by saying this-  "This is really sad. She was a few years younger than me and we all used to hang out at the Bell Hotel at the bottom of Market Square. "At that time in the 70's there were a few people that made Aylesbury a bit special - and she was one of them." He added: "She was a wonderfully enigmatic person who helped me an awful lot. We both moved to London around the same time after I'd had a hit record and she was doing her journalism work and we always used to bump into each other.".

Magenta Devine.

In Memory Of Mikhail Bulgakov.

Mikhail Bulgakov

I said yesterday that I would read one poem by Anna Akhmatova a day. Well, this is today's poem that caught my eye. I think it is a powerful and very moving poem. It is called In Memory Of Mikhail Bulgakov. I chose this one because a friend of mine thinks that The Master And Margarita by Mikhail Bulgakov is one of the best books ever written. He even went all the way to Moscow to visit Bulgakov’s grave.

This, not graveyard roses, is my gift;

And I won’t burn sticks of incense:

You died as unflinchingly as you lived,

With magnificent defiance.

Drank wine, and joked – were still the wittiest,

Choked on the stifling air.

You yourself let in the terrible guest

And stayed alone with her.

Now you’re no more. And at your funeral feast

We can expect no comment from the mutes

On your high, stricken life. One voice at least

Must break the silence, like a flute.

O, who would have believed that I who have been tossed

On a slow fire to smoulder, I, the buried days’

Orphan and weeping mother, I who have lost

Everything, and forgotten everyone, half-crazed –

Would be recalling one so full of energy

And will, and touched by that creative flame,

Who only yesterday, it seems, chatted to me,

Hiding the illness crucifying him.

(Written at the house on the Fontanka 1940).

Here is a recent photo of Brian Leahy at Mikhail Bulgakov's resting place in Novodevinchy Cemetery in Moscow.

Iris Dement Wasteland Of The Free

Listening to Bonnie Dobson.

At the moment I am listening to an album that is simply called Bonnie Dobson. It was originally released in 1969 and re-issued in 2006. I bought it last summer because I liked one song called Morning Dew. It is Bonnie’s most famous song which she wrote in 1961 when everyone was paranoid about the Cold War and the threat of a nuclear holocaust. I think it was seeing the film On The Beach based on the book by Nevil Shute that inspired Bonnie to write this song about a dystopian post-apocalyptic future. (I thought we had got over all that, but Trump & Putin seem to be doing their best to bring it back) Anyway, after hearing the album a few times I have grown to like a lot more of the other songs as well. I’m Your Woman and Winter’s Going both written by Bonnie are also great, as is her version of Jackson C. Frank’s song called You Never Wanted Me, Fred Neil’s Everybody’s Talkin’ and Let’s Get Together written by Dino Valente but I first heard it on an early Jefferson Airplane album.

Bonnie isn’t very well known, even in Canada. She was born in Toronto in 1940 and I was surprised that a Canadian friend of mine hadn’t heard of her. I think the reason might be that she moved to London in the late 60’s and gradually retired from the music scene. It was Jarvis Cocker who persuaded her to return to performing a few years ago when he was curator of London’s Meltdown festival at the Southbank. Bonnie took part in a concert called something like ‘The Lost Women Of Music’. She also appeared at a tribute concert to Bert Jansch who I have been listening to and writing about a lot recently. The concert was at the Royal Albert Hall and she sang Morning Dew with Robert Plant who I have also seen and written about in the last couple of weeks. I have put the video below. In the video you might spot Johnny Marr on guitar who I mentioned in my piece on Morrissey last week. Also, you can spot Danny Thompson on bass who was in Pentangle with Bert Jansch. This proves to me that everything is connected. Anyway, since then Bonnie has returned to recording and her legend continues to grow. It would be great if they put her on the Acoustic Stage at Glastonbury this year. I’d love to see that.

Me proving everything is connected. At Yorkshire Sculpture Park.

Bonnie Dobson & Robert Plant – Morning Dew

Mary Gauthier: Mercy Now.

I won’t be going anywhere today. Sitting in the kitchen on a grey rainy Sunday morning I gaze out of the window at the gloomy sky. In the garden I can see the birds ripping the linings out of my hanging baskets to use as nesting material. They are quite welcome. It would be nice if a pair of them set up house in the bird box on my wall. That hasn’t happened for about three years now. Inside my kitchen window I’m pleased to see that some sunflowers are already poking their little heads up. I only potted the seeds a few days ago.

I am listening to Mary Gauthier. I had never heard anything by her until last week when I was listening to a folk sampler album and was quite taken with a song called Our Lady Of The Shooting Stars so I looked her up on Wikipedia. What a life she has led. Born in 1962 to a mother she never knew, she was placed in an orphanage and adopted. Mary ran away from home at 15 and spent her 18^th birthday in jail, struggled with drug and alcohol dependence until 1990 and never wrote a song till the age of 35. She opened a restaurant which she ran for eleven years until selling it to finance her recording career.

I thought I ought to buy an album, but I wasn’t sure which one was the best. In the end I opted for Mercy Now which was released in 2005 and I’m glad I did because I’m on my second listen on this rainy Sunday morning and I really like it. The opening track is Falling Out Of Love, It reminded me a little bit at first of Robbie Robertson’s Somewhere Down That Crazy River. She has a very southern kind of drawl in her voice which I like. I’m not very good at thinking of adjectives but the words Southern Gothic come to mind, or maybe not. The second track is the eponymous Mercy Now which is a very poignant heartfelt song and features the likes of a cello and pedal steel guitar. Wheel Inside The Wheel is more upbeat with banjo to the fore and is quite catchy. I Drink is very introspective. I thought of John Prine or Steve Earle during this song, Lucinda Williams sprang to mind on some tracks as well. I’m pleased to see that the late great Ian McLagan of Small Faces fame plays Hammond organ on some tracks on this album. Just Say She’s A Rhymer is a very nice song written by the late Harlan Howard. I really like the fiddle playing on this song. Prayer Without Words is driven along by the drums of Rick Richards. The viola of Eamon McLoughlin is also to the fore, as is Mac’s organ playing. Your Sister Cried has some fabulous doom-laden guitar playing by Gurf Morlix. After two listens I think this is my favourite song on the album. It is written by Fred Eaglesmith and is great. Empty Spaces features Patty Griffin on backing vocals and is a very sad study of desolation and loneliness. The cello of Brian Standerer adds to the pathos of this song. Drop In A Bucket is another sad story of lost love and the loneliness of life on the road. I think it must be quasi-autobiographical because I don’t think you can write songs like this if you haven’t experienced it yourself.  It Ain’t The Wind, It’s The Rain sums up the weather today. A great song to bring this album to a close.

I have really enjoyed listening to this album today. I think you would enjoy it as well. The wind is getting up now, I think there is going to be some heavy rain soon, I might go back to bed for the afternoon. See you later. If you would like to hear Mary sing Mercy Now live you can find it below.

Mary Gauthier "Mercy Now"