Old Music.

The Government party-gate reports are in, and the votes on ‘did Boris Johnson break the rules the government set for us all?’ were cast. 354 ministers said yes, 7 puffed no while a few slippery ones went missing. It is too much all too foolish and for this moment I am closing my eyes and ears. 

Where can we retreat to? In May a visit to The Hague in the Netherlands took us to meet the Dutch artist Theo Jansen who in the 1990’s began – using PVC, bits of nylon robe and old cloth sails – to make creatures – huge toys collectively known as Strandbeests that when caught by the winds run along the beaches, sometimes galloping into the surf if Theo is not quick enough to catch them. Luckily the afternoon was very windy – as well as cold. Watching the play between Theo and our grandson David – the silent wonder of the boy child and the magician’s twinkle in Theo’s eyes it is clear that magic and bewitching sorcery remain a reality.

Our artist friend Carey Young has an exhibit in Oxford at the Modern Art Museum entitled Appearance. Carey has a steady and persistent eye on women and the law and the Modern Art Museum – built in a repurposed brewery – is where her show has been for over three months and I really want to see it. The Sunday train was full of students returning to university from a weekend in London. I look at those in our carriage and – catching them at this mid-point of leaving late adolescence and entering adulthood – I’m a little chilled. Are there world leaders, scientists, artists or teachers among them? They are young and we are old and so far I see absorption, self-interest and timidity. A girl sits on her case in the middle of the aisle and nobody can – or even tries to – get past her. She seems supremely unconcerned but maybe holding herself steady with a steel will. I wonder again why Boris Johnson bought his castle – the one with only three-quarters of a moat – here in the outskirts of Oxford.

All three of Young’s videos focus on women’s lives. The first – ‘The Vision Machine’ follows the preparation of lenses for the Sigma corporation in Japan. Though Young wants us to imagine a factory run and maybe owned by women – the grey black and white tones took my thoughts in the other direction. That the women were subservient to whomever owned the factory – and could never be free. Then Carey brings us fifteen British female judges who come to sit and look into the camera for minutes at a time. Where are they looking? At us, beyond? Do they become as reflective in front of the camera as we become to the screen? These images make me deeply conscious of the weight of appearances, on each of these robed women etched into beauty by their lives and work. It is a sobering piece of film that follows on her 2017 Palais de Justice, a key-hole look at Belgium female judges at work. I ponder their power and then their ordinariness. Surely they too go home to cook and care for families.

Two days later as dusk was claimed by night we arrived back at Victoria Station on the almost longest day of the year. Walking along the platform, we were still surrounded by those who have pilgrimaged to Lewes in Sussex and surrendered to the music of L’Elisir d’Amore at Glyndebourne. In Herman Hesse’s short story ‘Old Music’ 

I – Herman Hesse – left my desk, blew out the candle and closed the cottage door behind me. I walked through the woods to the edge of the forrest and caught a tram that took me to the heart of the city. Another short walk to the cathedral where Master Bach raised up his voice to God. And when it was over I returned back through the city to the forrest and home. 

Did Hesse then pick up his pen for the short story ‘Old Music’. Spurned on by the urge to escape the political clamor and noise of the city – our journey was in reverse. 

Glyndebourne Festival Opera began in 1934 only closing for the war years of 1941-1945. The festival is a fixture of the English summer season and for the first time we are going. Glyndebourne House sits in the countryside of East Sussex and those of us traveling by train watch the fading elderflowers give way to the blackberry bushes brimming with white blossoms pass by – heralding a fine harvest – if one can reach the vines. At Lewes Station the train is met by huge double-decker coaches that packs us and our picnics inside like well laid out sardines and swish us through the village. The villagers may grumble but are proud that their country estate has turned to art while providing jobs close to home.

The whole planning and preparation are new to us. My husband declines his old tuxedo opting for his black and brown assembly. But like all the women I opt for a gown – with bling. A friend has gathered six of us together and we lay our picnic contributions on the table for the English way of outdoor dining when the time is right. And the beginning of summer is right. Strawberries are blushing and the peaches softening. The traditional English picnic will find smoked salmon alongside of a bottle of good champagne in almost every hamper. There are other old favorites and a sausage roll or two can be seen. Our table is laid with the smoked salmon, bread and butter, a vegetarian quiche and a giant salad to be followed by fresh strawberries, a fruit salad and cream – with a touch more – there must have been a second bottle of Champagne – all of which disappears during the long interval. The gardens lead to an orchard, the lawns to the lake, meadows and farmland beyond. They are deeply Edwardian and remind my heart of my childhood home.

Tonights performance is of L’Elisir d’Amore by Gaetano Donizetti. ‘Composed in a hurry’ says a note. Well Donizetti composed everything in a hurry, knocking out over 70 operas plus other works before succumbing to the lover’s disease at the age of 51. L’Elisir d’Amore is that old story of love yearned for – thwarted and then after many plot twists and turns – requited – and we loved it.

On Monday the government has gone to ground hiding behind a heart-wrenching headline accident, the cricket match and the shock- horror – of interest rates being raised – again. 

But our King is working. A book of portraits celebrating the arrival of the first of the Windrush generation in June of 1948 was quietly celebrated at Buckingham Palace. In the forward the King writes, “Thank you. … It is, I believe, crucially important that we should truly see and hear these pioneers who stepped off the Empire Windrush at Tilbury in June 1948” Many of their daughters became nurses and my bedside sisters where they remain forever in my heart. 

This has been A Letter from A. Broad. Written and read for you by Muriel Murch.