Back to the day job

These last few weeks have been almost nothing but practicing song accompaniments for a recital which I gave with a superb tenor a couple of days ago. You'd never believe just how much time and energy goes into an hour of music which seems to be over before you've started. Your body immediately goes into free-fall afterwards as all the postponed fatigue and stress finally force their way in under the portcullis and you're well advised to take an early night and late morning for fear of going down with whatever plague du jour is. I had about fifteen people in (including Fingernail I) and they've all been in touch to say how much they enjoyed it. Even though it was about recital n° 400 since I started this music lark a few decades ago it never ceases to amaze me how a voice and a piano together can move people. Long may it continue. Mozart's back on the agenda in the next couple of days and then it's the long, slow countdown to Christmas with its copious operetta performances.

I had a lot of funny little anecdotes to relate but can't recall any of them at the moment. There's a student party going on next door, the Brazilians downstairs have finally turned off their hi-fi and the Syrians appear to have gone for an early night, not before apparently pushing all their infernal furniture about the flat for two hours just after the Fingernails' light went out. Honestly, you'd never believe this was the best part of town: we've got South Central LA conditions with Bel Air prices. The only thing missing is wanton gunfire, but I'm sure the credit crunch will eventually take care of that little absence.

The only way to deal with noise pollution is become ridiculously philosophical about the whole thing. Forgive me if I've mentioned that before in a previous post, but agonising about other people's incapacity to live considerately and sociably only leads to one eventual loser: you. The Germans have a wonderful saying: In der Ruhe liegt die Kraft - Strength resides in peace; a positive result will only come through long-term investment and a cool head, a dictum our buy-now-pay-later society could well have heeded in the light of the current international financial melt-down, too.