I am in love! (Ft. The best 15 seconds ever)

Yes, it’s Valentine’s Day. Actually by the time I’ve got round to finishing this it’s the 16th Feb. Valentine’s Day is a day I tend to try and avoid, mostly because I don’t feel I need a particular day to dedicate to my husband, not least when we’re both working and I am out on Tuesdays. Today, I am in love with a piece of music. Always, I am in love with this piece of music.

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A bit of a change

I feel a bit foolish that I haven’t posted in a long time. Ironically, I have started listening to the radio more recently as I am now back to an irregular commute. However, with an irregular commute comes a feeling of massive disappointment when that precious time you have to listen to your favourite pieces is taken up with more Bach, Mozart and Haydn than you would like.

FINE. I like late 20th century minimilism.

The other day I was driving, idly listening to the radio, when suddenly I turned up the sound. This was a piece I didn’t know well, but definitely knew. It had to be Hans Zimmer film music (but I knew it wasn’t); the soloist sounded like Lisa Gerrard (until she didn’t). It was moody, it was soaring, it was magical. I knew it. I recognised it. But at the same time, I didn’t know it. I’d heard it before but it could have been any number of things.

Knights of the Holy Grail

Last night, I was driving home from a busy couple of days catching up with friends and family in Somerset and found myself listening, for the first time in ages, the film music show with Andrew Collins on Classic FM. As you’ll probably know, film music is one of my favourite genres. Hans Zimmer is probably my favourite film composer, and I’ve already spoken about the music he wrote to the film “King Arthur”.

Every piece of music will move someone to tears, for some reason.

Two months ago, I got married. No biggie. After a year of waiting due to the Covid-19 pandemic, we finally made it official in a rather splendid venue – a very stunning Gloucester Cathedral. Whilst the whole day had been planned around us and our favourite things – our favourite foods, memories of holidays, the beautiful cathedral we attend services at and feel so lucky doing so – I had two particular desires. My wedding dress, which my now husband wasn’t allowed to be part of the discussions about; and the music, which he could be (and was), but there were certain things I desperately wanted.

17 years of Hans

I’ve decided today – after enjoying a hundred pages of a particularly beautiful book – to tell you about the first time I fell in love…with Hans Zimmer.

Vangelis, really??

First of all, whoops. I don’t think I’ve written anything for a while. What’s my excuse this time?

Merry Christmas

I haven’t been listening to classical music the last few weeks, hence the silence. I’ve been into podcasts and Spotify playlists. But yesterday I was in my car for a fair amount of the day and was able to listen to some lovely pieces on the radio.

How do you make Karl Jenkins even better?

Make his music symphonic!

Mostly.

Fire dance!

I was relatively uninspired today, after my extremely uninspired day yesterday. Yesterday was not a good day music wise for me – I couldn’t enjoy anything. I probably needed an entire day of foot-tapping, heart-racing music to accompany my work. I didn’t get it – barely anything. And today was almost as bad, but I did get three things to particularly enjoy. Tchaikovsky’s “Marche Slave” – talk about multiple buses coming along at once – and a double bill of Arturo Márquez.