Threads

Difficult Conversations. Embrace them!

Through difficult conversations I have reached peace, insight, revelation, and inspiration!

My Best Friends don’t have difficult conversations with me, not really. They love me and they tell me and they support me no matter what. I love them dearly for it of course.

BUT… the “difficult conversation” is where it all happens in terms of my creativity and the way I express myself. The friends I have that ask tricky questions, or ask me to clarify what I’m saying, that make me squirm a bit, hum, and errrr, and welllll, ummmm, they are the stuff art is made of. It is in the difficult conversation where I feel awkward that I nudge my way through the cloudy thoughts and the woolly thinking and the ill-conceived. To have a conversation where you really have to listen to what the other person is saying, where you frown, because they come at things from a completely different angle. The end of these sessions are marvellous, and send me away buzzing with ideas. Don’t walk away from that sort of chat till you get to the bit where you’ve reached the top of the hill and can lift your feet off the pedals and go WHeeeeeee all the way down the other side.

I’ve arranged to spend a day at The White Tree Studios in Chapel Ash, Wolverhampton next month. Belinda Longsden has very kindly said I can use some of their space. I have about 3 or 4 music/sound ideas muddled up in my head and can’t get them sorted because there are too many distractions here at home. I find the music is the one aspect of my work I can’t do when there are distractions… a messy room, the cat, the postman, the ironing, whatever!

So it will be interesting to see if I can take myself and my stuff elsewhere and be musically productive on my own. It works when I go to Dan’s place to record and work stuff out, because he makes me do it, and his level of input is huge. But I have never tried doing it by myself yet. I feel that I can… I know the ideas are there, I have words, I have sounds recorded, I have a bit of a hum in my head, and some chords Dan recorded for me a while back… I have all the ingredients, question is, can I cook up something tasty without help? I’ll let you know.

http://belindamarialongsden.com/

http://www.whitetreestudiosandgallery.com/

I have spent a lot of time recently contemplating doing a PhD. Today I had a couple of meetings which brought me closer than ever to deciding. I wrote lots of notes about what I would have to do before I even wrote the proposal, let alone the amount of work I would have to do after. The project I had in my head was the Bulgarian idea… of which more later probably. I could do it. But afterwards, sat in Starbucks with a cup of chai because they’d run out of Earl Grey, I looked at these notes and a little light bulb came on. I’m too old for this. Well no, I’m not too old, but I don’t want to spend my time doing research, reading, filling in forms and talking arty bollocks. I want to spend my time sewing, drawing, making things, looking, listening, thinking, talking to people, collaborating, making music, listening to stories. I want to make connections of my own, go off on ridiculous tangents and come back again. I want to have shows, with friends, on my own. I want to load my shed into the back of a van. I want to stitch till my hands ache and laugh till my cheeks hurt. Bollocks to the bollocks, I’m going to stitch buttons to a sock, and put it in the post.

Contentment is comprised of a sunny autumnal day, a pot of glue and some fabric. Tea helps too. I decided that being admin fixated and formfilling monster were doing me no good. So this is what I’ve been doing this afternoon. It is an old idea, not re-visited as much as visited… when I did the first ones, it was just a trial, then I got distracted and never took it anywhere. So a little exploration is in order today, while I get the chance. I like the idea that it will change as the leaves change and fall… one of them fell while I started to glue, so I won’t have to wait long.

I have also felt frustrated that I have musical ideas in my head that aren’t going anywhere either. I can’t seem to do these when there is ANYTHING else to do. I don’t know if this is because I hold such projects in such high regard and delight that I need to show them deference and give them the time they deserve; or if I am still so new at them that I have to concentrate fully; or that I’m so crap at them that the first attempts have to be done in secret and worked on for ages before I want anyone to hear them. My strangled attempts to sing or make any kind of tuneful noise at these early stages are dire, pitiful, embarrassing. So maybe the last one then… mostly.

I’ve been burning the candle at both ends this week. And now I’m paying the price, so having a lie in with a cup of tea. Yesterday was spent at an open day for university, with my youngest son. Too early a start for a Saturday, but very informative, and can see him thinking very seriously about what he wants… course/campus/distance from home/finance/social life issues to be balanced…time will tell! I can’t believe he is so big and old and making these decisions already.

Went to see my friend Dan play at the Hare and Hounds, King’s Heath on Wednesday – school night! Some of my colleagues were horrified that I went to a mid-week gig. But if I didn’t go to things I wanted to see, just because it was on a Wednesday, I wouldn’t be working to live, I’d be existing to work. Not a Good Thing. Dan was supporting Carina Round, who I felt I owed a proper watch and listen, as last time I saw her it was a few days before a knee operation and I went home half way through her set in pain. She was really good, amazing voice…think Joan as Policewoman with a bit of Jesca Hoop thrown in, but much tougher and rockier, so much rockier, I feared the escape of her bosoms from her gorgeous dress, which certainly added tension to the performance, and elicited a proposal of marriage from the audience.

Dan’s performance was well contained within his clothing. But his songs escape him and affect the room in a very different way… he wins them round every time. He has a modest, dry/dead-pan, funny way of addressing the audience, which is very endearing. I have heard him sing those songs so many times now and they are always different. Sometimes he is alone with his guitar, Wednesday he had Simon Smith on double bass with him. He has a collection of musicians that play with him in all sorts of combinations at different times, and occasionally all of them. The songs always work, have a life of their own. The lyrics are deceptive, seemingly simple and straightforward, but carrying such depth of meaning and conversational style. I am, as you know, a big fan. I get angry that the world has so many talented musicians and writers that get such scant acknowledgement. If you want to see Dan in the venue he deserves, he has a pre-Christmas celebratory gig on 15th December in the Recital Hall at Birmingham Conservatoire. The collected friends of his band will be there, and June will be playing the grand piano… I can’t wait!

Friday was the preview night for all sorts of wonderful stuff at New Art Gallery Walsall. My friend Zoe took pity on me and introduced me to all sorts of lovely folks, as I was on my own. Despite myself, I quite liked some of the Damien Hirst, sat amongst the gallery’s permanent Garman Ryan collection. Jodey Carey’s work was interesting too… stepping away a little from the crafty, but with a solid work ethic, plenty of studio time evident in it still. Fiona Rae’s paintings were curious, and I’m going back to have another look when there aren’t dozens of people milling about them. I loved Harminder Judge’s installation of a huge edifice of shed-like materials, with geometric protrusions. It sat so well in that high fourth floor gallery, both the installation and the gallery being constructed with naked, honest materials, used to such grand effect. Going back to that too. I loved the sprinkled debris on the floor… I could almost imagine a pair of very sparkly red shoes sticking out from underneath it…. Walsall certainly ain’t Kansas, Dorothy.

I apologise for the extra long post with no pictures, it’s been a busy week!

http://thenewartgallerywalsall.org.uk/whats-on

http://www.dan-whitehouse.com/