Thursday 24 December 2015

Favourite Music, Books and Exhibitions from 2015 Revisited


So we’re coming to the end of 2015 and I am rounding off with a list of my “favourites” of 2015.

Best Live Act

Skinny Lister – saw them at Cambridge Folk Festival and absolutely loved them, as detailed in my review of the festival. Also really enjoyed their Down on Deptford Broadway album.

Best Album

This was a hard category. I was very tempted to go for a Skinny Lister double, but The Young ‘Uns Another Man’s Ground gets it primarily for the track “You Won’t Find Me on Benefits Street” but is overall a great album, which I reviewed here.

Best New Act

This year I have encountered loads of great new music. This has to go to Lady Sanity though. As this post on the Radio Six Music Introducing event at the Hare and Hounds says I was blown away by her. However, I have to say that Finch and the Moon were great too. Note I am not including Skinny Lister because whilst they were new to me Down on Deptford Broadway was their second album.

Best Festival

Cambridge Folk Festival was wonderful this year. Absolutely loved it. The Birmingham Literature Festival came in very close to this one and I was unsure whether to go for this one in first place. This post links to my review of my favourite Lit Festival Event.



Best Non-Religious Book

The Mistresses of Cliveden by Natalie Livingstone. This one was a bit of an impulse book and it really caught my imagination, as I made clear in my review.

Best Religious Book

Mission on the Road to Emmaus: Constants, Context and Prophetic Dialogue edited by Cathy Ross and Stephen Bevans. This was a deep book which is well worth more than one reading. This is my review from my other blog.
 

Best UK Exhibition

At Home with Vanley Burke at the Ikon Gallery. This was a full installation and it really caught my imagination, as the obligatory blog review shows. This category was a very close run thing with Provincial Punk by Grayson Perry which was on at the Turner Contemporary in Margate coming in as a close second. This was again reviewed on my other bin a post which also gives mention of Leonie Dawson's Life and Biz workbook which if it had a category would be my best self-improvement tool of the year.

Best International Exhibition

This has to go to the John Paul Gaultier Exhibition in Paris which was amazing. The post where I reviewed this is placed at the bottom of this page and again originally appeared on my other, personal, blog.

The Jean Paul Gaultier exhibition at the Grand Palais is both stylish and innovative, as one might expect from an exhibition this designer has a hand in. It mixes media involving photography and music as well as textiles.

It’s not your average exhibition, unlike the neighbouring American Icons. That exhibition which is on in another part of the same venue until 22nd June 2015 describes itself as “60 emblematic works from the SFMOMA and the Fisher collection (one of the world’s largest private modern and contemporary art collections, now curated by the museum).” To be fair it’s not bad containing some works by both Andy Warhol and Roy Lichtenstein which I hadn’t come across in their retrospectives at the Tate Modern but it is distinctly underwhelming compared to the Gaultier exhibition which is an experience designed to draw the visitor into an experience.

There are photos and artifacts which reference Gaultier’s early life and influences but this is minimal because the focus is on his haute couture.

The sailor suit stripes are part of the designers own trademark look and are shown in a variety of ways, most strikingly by a manikin in a  jumper and neckerchief. This was no standard manikin though, as with several others it was an android programmed to speak to you as it displayed Gaultier’s face.

There was a Dr. Who feel to these manikins which, on occasion, were ready to make eye contact with you which Karl found unsettling.

As I said the clothes were the central focus of this exhibition and you were reminded of this as you moved into a room with a revolving catwalk. On one side sat a range of guests he’d dressed including Nana Mouskouri and Conchita Wurst. On the other stood a range of London Punks alongside Bowie and Boy George. This was pure beautiful art.

Wedding dresses, corsets and Madonna cones mixed with bondage style wear and more as you worked your way through an array of beautiful and challenging style.

The architecture of the building housing the exhibition was also used to maximum affect as you made your way up a sweeping stone staircase which was lit and had pumping music to a space where you could watch a film illustrating the sheer diversity of the models Gaultier used.

My one criticism was that on the whole the manikins did not reflect the diversity and inclusion the designer is famous for.

Would I recommend a trip to this exhibition? Certainly, indeed whilst we discovered this quite by accident whilst wandering through the city towards the Champs Elysees and Arc de Triumph I would say that for the true love of fashion and spectacle it may worth a trip to the French capital. This was one of the best curated exhibitions and certainly one of the most innovative I’ve encountered. Also in France you get the benefit of being able to take photos of these exhibitions if you wish, although this wasn’t the case for the David Bowie Is exhibition on at the Philharmonie De Paris  until the 31st May 2015.

The Bowie exhibition was what had initially prompted our trip, having missed it at the V & A but having been memorized it via event cinema. It was a good exhibition with a number of original song lyrics and videos of Bowie’s classics as well as costumes and other memorabilia but after the Gaultier exhibition it had neither the impact or wow factor it may otherwise have done. Indeed whilst technologically advanced in many ways it seemed dated compared to the manikins at the Grand Palais. The venue for the Bowie exhibition in an outlying part of Paris was interesting, yet it required a specific visit. Unlike the Gaultier this was never going to be one of those wonders you unexpectedly come across. 

Tuesday 22 December 2015

Pioneering Sprituality ed by Cathy Ross and Jonny Baker Reviewed


Pioneering Spirituality: Resources for reflection and practice edited by Cathy Ross and Jonny Baker, published by Canterbury Press, is the latest work from the CMS stable.

Whilst distinctly different from its predecessor last year ThePioneer Gift it still has the familiar format of having a range of chapters from practitioners in a range of contexts. The work that Baker and Ross do involves seeking to facilitate the hearing of voices which might not otherwise be heard. This has primarily involved seeking to ensure that it is those who would describe themselves as pioneers whose stories and theological reflections are heard.

The scope of contributors to this book seems wider than in previous texts of this kind. It seems that going beyond the traditionally recognised type of fresh expressions and pioneering projects they are engaging more widely with different types of pioneering. This includes hearing the voices of Harvey Kwiyani who is one of a group of Malawian pastors living and working in Nottingham and Berdine Van Den Toren-Lekkerkerker and Benno Van Den Toren who are originally from the Netherlands but have worked in various parts of the world. The former discusses African Spirituality in Western Contexts and the latter From Missionary Incarnate to Incarnational Guest: A Critical Reflection on Incarnation as a Model for Missionary Presence. There is also a chapter by anti-FGM activist Ann-Marie Wilson, who started 28 Too Many, on An Active Spirituality for Mission.

That said there are the familiar type of Pioneers in here too such as Gavin Mart of Engedi Arts who is a Methodist Venture FX Pioneer. Whilst Ross and Baker are careful not to speak with the voices of academics, rather presenting their introductory chapter in a more conversational form the academic voice is here too. Not only via Ross (and to a lesser extent Baker) but also through Stephen Bevans of Catholic Theological Union in Chicago. Bevans chapter Dancing with the Missionary God: Towards a Mission Spirituality seeks to identify six constant features of spirituality which provide a template for those engaged in pioneer mission.

The Bevans chapter is one which seeks to invite the practitioner to reflect on their own spirituality and seek to identify what both unpins it but also what sustains it. This concept of ensuring the pioneers own spirituality is sustained and the sharing of ideas and practices to help with this is the focus of the first part of the book. The most powerful chapters on this topic I believe are Kate Pearson’s on Angela of Foligno as a Model for Pioneer Minstry and Beth Honey’s Pioneers as Pilgrims. Both of these chapters were particularly useful to me personally as I seek to identify how to develop my own spirituality having moved into a lay university chaplaincy role – a role that in her chapter Pearson who is a chaplain at a different university describes as having “been a space for pioneers for a long time.” (p80)

Other chapters particularly in the second half of the book talk more about practice and how to help others develop their spirituality. Johnny Sertin’s chapter on Getting Dirty talked about doing this within a Church of England Parish Context whilst Tina Hodgett talked about it in relation to a group for young mums in her chapter on Doors in the Air: Baby Spirituality. These were interesting chapters telling the stories of what they were doing in a way which readers of the Ancient Faith, Future Mission series will be familiar.

Overall though this is more of a book to help pioneers themselves reflect rather than a book for those outside the system. It is a text to help understanding between different groups and to facilitate a conversation as illustrated by Kim Hartshorne’s We Are One Body Because We all Share in One Bread: Pioneering and the Eucharist. This chapter was focused on explaining to those from lower church backgrounds particularly why the Eucharist is so important to many practitioners from an Anglican tradition. This chapter articulated clearly why the rules matter to some people and why in finding new ways of doing things respect needs to be given to existing etiquettes. Again as somebody who doesn’t at times understand the need for the rules and restraints this was something I found particularly useful.

Overall this is a book which I would highly recommend to those who are seriously following developments in this area of pioneer ministry and mission because it highlights how maturing is now occurring. There is also more space being given to voices of those who have come from elsewhere to the UK which is good. I would also recommend it to practitioners who wish to reflect on their own practice and rootedness. Would I recommend it beyond that readership? I am not sure. Whilst it is a very good book and very readable and far less of a text book than some recent books I have read in this area it is still I believe quite specialist reading. It is clearly seeking to support the growing band of practitioners whilst developing some important conversations. It is a book of sharing ideas and also asking important questions of pioneers themselves.

Tuesday 8 December 2015

BBC Introducing in Brum New Music Review


Last night the Hare and Hounds in Kings Heath hosted a BBCIntroducing night in association with BBC Six Music with three local bands playing. The evening introduced by Tom Robinson was part of a series of events going on in Birmingham this week to coincide with the BBC Music Awards. The bands: Boat to Row, Lady Sanity and Hoopla Blue were chosen to represent different genres of music and to give a taste of some of the great music coming out of the Midlands at the moment.

Before I get going with the review of the night I just want to underline that this type of thing is a big part of what makes the BBC distinctive. This is why the licence fee is so important and why I hope in the current review of public service broadcasting the government don’t slaughter what is good about the BBC and also Channel Four. Our music industry and Film industry are what they are at the moment, in a large part due to these institutions.

Anyway rant over and on to the music. The first group on were a five piece folk outfit called Boat to Row. They were very accomplished and played a range of contemporary folk with a clear traditional feel to it. Their overall look together with the musical feel showed that for all the jokes people make about it that Hipster culture really has reinvigorated the British folk scene. I could see them working quite well at Cambridge doing an early afternoon slot.

They were clearly really accomplished musicians but in some ways they seemed to fail to fully connect with the crowd. I don’t know if this was because they were the first group on or whether it was their slightly melancholy material didn’t really lend itself to enthusiasm. In my mind I was struck with the contrast between them and the high octane energy of Skinny Lister the folk band who I have been most impressed by this year.

That said it was clear from the effort that Tom Robinson had to put into getting the crowd to sing along to Glad to Be Gay, one of two numbers he played during the changeover, that this were not an easy crowd to engage. He did, of course, get there but it was not without having to put in far more repartee than I’ve seen him have to do elsewhere.

The next artist Lady Sanity however, connected with the crowd amazingly and showed how she really is a star in the making. She is a poet, rapper and performer who is best described as having the lyrical ability of Kate Tempest, the stage presence of the early rap groups like Public Enemy and Run DMC and the style of singers like Sade and Mica Paris. In short she is the full package of looks, ability to work an audience, voice and lyrics.

Lady Sanity’s versatility and range of influences was shown throughout the set including when she covered Rage Against the Machine in her own style. Watching her engage the audience one was clear that the size of stage didn’t matter and you could as easily imagine her doing the same set and getting the same reaction on a big festival stage as she did on this one. Greenbelt might consider booking her before she gets way too expensive for them.

At the same time she seemed a genuine person. When I saw her standing at the back of the crowd just before the next band came on I asked if I could get her picture to include in my review. She had no problem with this, although I was slightly embarrassed when her friend suggested that I get in the picture too. Still I get the feeling it will be the sort of picture I will end up treasuring and I will one day use to say, “I have the evidence I once saw here in a pub in Kings Heath”.


Music is a subjective thing and we all have our own tastes, likes and dislikes. I have to admit that whilst I like rock and metal I have a real aversion to anything which sounds as if it might have been influenced by 70’s prog rock. Thus my opinion of Hoopla Blue was a subjective one.

They had enthusiasm and were good at what they did, yet they simply weren’t my personal taste.

That was the thing about this gig though, it was intended to showcase a range of styles of music breaking through in the region. Overall a great night which was thoroughly enjoyable. 

Monday 7 December 2015

Soul Food: More Art and Music in Birmingham


Pre-Raphaelite art, nativity trails, Martyn Joseph and soul boats have all featured in my most recent travels around Birmingham. I’ve been enjoying the soul food all of these have provided.

To give you a taste of this menu for the senses I start with a taster of what you can find just wandering around the city at the moment. The German Market is taking over most of the city centre and the stalls provide a picturesque walk down between Symphony Hall and Grand Central (New Street Station). At the far end by the Rep and the Library it stands under the shadow of a giant observation wheel and next to a seasonal skating rink. This all provides a picturesque wander around the city, particularly at night. Looking in the windows you can also find wonders such as the Teddy Nativity in the Cancer Research Shop. Then there is also the Bull in the Bullring which has been festively dressed.

The Nativity can also be found through art in the Birmingham Museum and Art Gallery. This trail through the free areas of the museum begins with a beautiful stained glass window Peace and Goodwill by Henry Payne. It was originally in the Methodist Chapel in Cradley Heath and as that place closed has since ended up in the museum. The sheet you use to guide you then takes you on to the work of Edward Burne-Jones, Arthur Hughes, Giovanni Bellini, Orazio Gentileschi and Adrien Isenbrandt amongst others. The Burne-Jones painting The Star of Bethlehem was particularly striking as was The Nativity by Arthur Hughes. The latter was the painting that most got me to stop and reflect on what insight the painting could give me into the bible passages which were familiar. Mary is very young in this picture and whilst not Mediterranean or middle-eastern in appearance there was something more earthy about her than in many other pictures.

Hughes nephew E.R. Hughes is the subject of the current headline exhibition at the gallery Enchanted Dreams. It focuses on his Pre-Raphaelite work and has a mixture of conventional portraits and more imaginative work which seems to mix the colour influences of the impressionists with the style of the Pre-Raphaelites.

Amongst his portraits of children one of Bell and Dorothy Freeman was particularly striking in its beauty. Another one of the portraits which was particularly beautiful was “Study of a Female Head”.  

The central part of the exhibition was Blue Phantasies, a series of paintings he made during the earliest twentieth century. There were three of these paintings which I found particularly beautiful. The first was “The Valkyrie’s Vigil” which was a wonderful mixture of purples and blues. The second was Wings of the Morning which was a beautiful woman flying in the nature of an angel. She represented the light which comes with dawn.  The final one which I loved was “Midsummer Eve” where a mixture of magical folk surround a fairy princess. This exhibition does cost if you don’t have a museums and galleries membership card, but as I have said before it is well worth the cost if you can get one. This was my second visit to the exhibition and no doubt not my last. It is a beautiful piece of calm amid a very busy city at the moment.
St. Phillip's Cathedral has completed their renovation work and has a great piece of community art by Jake Lever called Soul Boats in there. It is a piece which hangs from the ceiling and is well worth a look if you are in the area, and of course it is free to view.
Moving out of the city centre itself I have discovered the suburb of Kings Heath and the Hare and Hounds pub which is one of the significant smaller venues in the city. Tonight it hosts a BBC 6 Music BBC Introducing night, which we have tickets to – having been successful in a free ticket ballot – last night we paid to go and see Martyn Joseph.

This is not the first time I have seen this talented Welsh singer-songwriter (as detailed in my previous review of a gig of his) but there was something palpably different about this one. The anger and angst of the past was gone and seemed to have been replaced by an acceptance of himself. He was clearly aware of this change and at the end of the gig explained to the audience it is because he has moved into a new chapter of his personal life.

The importance of his Welsh identity continued to be central to his set. It was good to hear Please Sir as well as Cardiff Bay and Dic Penderyn (The Ballad of Richard Lewis) – that latter of which kicked off his set.

These older numbers were not the only ones which audience members were familiar with. He went back to the early days with Friday but Sunday’s Coming. There was debate amongst our group of when we first heard it. Having looked back at the sleeve notes in Don’t Talk about Love: Martyn Joseph Live ’92-02 it seems that that track goes back at least to the early ‘90’s.

Amongst the older stuff there was also Kiss the World Beautiful which was resurrected on last year’s album of the same name which was put together to support the Let Yourself Trust, which Martyn has founded to support small grass roots projects in the UK and abroad.

The Luxury of Despair was also a song on the Kiss the World Beautiful CD. This track has also made it on to the new CD Sanctuary. Much of the rest of the set was material from this new album. There was a moving track called Her Name is Rose which was about his mum and celebrating her 80th birthday and Girl Soldier was also very moving.

His current single off Sanctuary is called I Searched for You which had a catchy sing along chorus.

The venue was quite intimate and suited this type of folk gig well. That combined with there was a bit more music and less chat than in some gigs meant this was one of the best gigs I have seen him play over the last 29 years, and there’s been a few. 

Friday 4 December 2015

Fathomless Riches by Richard Coles and Beatrice by Fiona Joseph Reviewed

Fathomless Riches by Richard Coles and Beatrice: The Cadbury Heiress Who Gave Away Her Fortune by Fiona Joseph may not sound like the most obvious Advent reading. Yet, they’ve been what I’ve been delving into in recent days.

Why? Well part of it relates to the comments I picked up from one of the Queen’s lecturers whilst I was sitting in college communion (something I tend to do on Tuesday evening). He was talking about Advent being a time to examine our history and look for evidence of God breaking through. It is a time for looking back and looking forward whilst focusing on the difference Christ’s coming makes.

Both books enable you to reflect on the ways in which God’s kingdom breaks through and how this occurs in ways in which you might not expect. They also both, in their own ways, provide challenges for the reader because they show that ethics and actions are not simple.
Beatrice was a book I first heard about when the author gave a talk at Greenbelt a few years ago which I found absolutely fascinating. Somehow, though I never got round to reading the book until this week. It is a biography of Beatrice Boekes (nee Cadbury) whose Quaker roots and understanding of Marxist theory saw her adopt an increasingly radical lifestyle during much of her life. This included outdoors preaching which saw here frequently arrested and at one point giving up the use of money amongst other things. She was also responsible with her husband Kees for setting up a school and helping Jewish children escaping persecution in the Second World War.

This sounds admirable and it might be easy for one to get overly romantic about the world of Beatrice and her family. However, the book veers away from uncritical praise of her actions. Rather it details the difficulties this caused to her family and others who were seeking to ensure the welfare of the family.

Thus it shows that we need to think about our actions. God uses those who are willing to take risks and work beyond the status quo to help build his kingdom but those people have a duty of care towards those around them too.

Before I’d turned my attention to Beatrice and a Brum based book I had read Richard Coles Fathomless Riches or How I Went from Pop to Pulpit. This was a book I had pretty much avoided for a year. I suspect part of it was that I didn’t quite trust what I was going to get from it. I’m not entirely sure why but I didn’t. Then there was the fact the only comments I had heard about it seemed to focus on dogging, (suggesting people had not really gotten past the first few pages).

My view on the book changed in when I went to an event at the Birmingham Literature Festival where Coles was interviewed by Catherine Ogle, a Dean at Birmingham Cathedral. This previous post from my  blog explains something about why that evening changed things.
 

So it was I read the book, a memoir which does what it says on the cover and tells how a former pop star ended up training for ministry.

The book talks of his family and youth and then moves on to his life within the early 80’s gay scene in London before looking at his life post-fame and his involvement with the rave culture. It then moves on to exploring his interest in religion and the tensions he encountered between an Anglican and Catholic identity. Within this sex and drug use are a part but there is far more within this text.

First is one of the most moving accounts of the impact of the Aids crisis on the ‘80’s gay community I have read. This is something in the Literature Festival talk Coles had said he had not found cathartic to write. The pain within what he writes is clear and it is movingly described.

Scattered throughout the book are accounts of how he messed up and the regrets he has. It’s a book which seems scattered with references to repentance and gives some examples of what this might look like in practice.

I have to say I thoroughly enjoyed reading both books. They were both highly readable whilst subtly challenging. They also in their own way did show a real picture of God’s Kingdom breaking in on the margins as well as within the establishment.