[Elements] 070806

[pleiades at centurytel.net]

ELEMENTS		MONDAY, AUGUST 6, 2007

[M-C's Notes]
[David Bedford turns 70 on Saturday]
[Changeling]
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Greetings!  You may wish to visit the news section at Tubular.net @ 
http://tubular.net/forums/ikonboard.cgi where you will find the track 
listing for Music of the Spheres, as well as its artwork. Also over 
there under "Tubular Talk" ----> "General Discussion" is Tubularman's 
account of meeting Anita and Greta over the weekend. He has also 
posted some pictures!

Best regards,

M-C
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Date: Mon, 30 Jul 2007 12:23:58 +0930
From: Matthew Sorell <matthew.sorell at adelaide.edu.au>
Subject: [Amarok] David Bedford turns 70 on Saturday

Greetings fellow Amarokers

Mike's friend, collaborator, to some extent mentor, and current tennis
partner David Bedford turns 70 on Saturday.

David's personal influence on Mike during their time together with Kevin
Ayers and the Whole World is well known - not only encouraging Mike to
pursue his composition ideas for what became Tubular Bells, but also
recommending that he listen to such classical and avant-garde composers
as Delius, Terry Riley, Stravinsky and Carl Orff.

Their collaborations are the stuff of legend - Mike's virtuoso talent on
guitar, with long sustained notes in Bedford's trademark style of
harmonic stasis is no better illustrated than in "First Excursion" and
"Instructions for Angels".  Their most recent collaboration was some
time ago, the Killing Fields soundtrack, but David tells me that they
still meet up regularly and play tennis together.  I understand that
occasionally music comes up as a topic of conversation :)

Against a background of snobbery in classical music circles, David has
been tireless in promoting the merits of popular and rock music, acting
as an ambassador between the old and the new.  His orchestration of
Tubular Bells, for all its flaws, was the first notable orchestration of
popular rock music and follows a long tradition of classical music being
commissioned by a wealthy patron.  In this case, "The main reason for
orchestrating TB was that Richard Branson offered me a large fee!"

David is a musical educator and the instigator of some truly inspiring
musical education programs including "Seascapes" and "Frameworks", in
which he leads students through the composition process for performance
by a professional orchestra.

On a personal level, I have spoken with David a few times in preparation
for the Adelaide Symphony Orchestra's performance of Tubular Bells,
primarily to ensure that my pre-concert talk was as accurate as
possible.  I have found him to be warm, engaging and genuinely enthused
about music.  He sent a greeting to our pre-concert get-together and
another personal message offering encouragement to the conductor of the
concert.

When asked about the ASO's arrangement before the concert, his comments
were "feel free to make any changes you fell are required. It's not
sacrosanct, indeed I would probably make changes if I were to revise the
orchestration."

His response to the recording was "The performance is stunning, please
pass my congratulations on to the conductor if you get the chance."  He
then passed a copy to Mike, who wrote "The arrangement and performance
sounds the best I have heard.  If you are in contact with the people
there please send them my highest praise."

To celebrate his 70th year, a number of concerts of his orchestral and
choral works will be held around the UK.  While I don't have the details
to hand, if you have the chance to go to one of these concerts I'd have
to say that you won't be disappointed.  And if you have the chance to
purchase "Instructions for Angels" or "Twelve Hours of Sunset" you'll
hear some amazing music.  It would be fair to say, on the other hand,
that "Variations on a Rhythm of Mike Oldfield" is perhaps not the best
introduction to David's music!

I'll be speaking with David on Saturday.  If anyone would like to send
him birthday greetings I would be happy to pass them on.  In fact I'd
really like to be able to wish him a happy birthday on behalf of
everyone on this list if that's alright with you.  After all, if it
wasn't for his influence, Mike might have just been another virtually
unknown, albeit very talented, session guitarist.

Cheers
Matthew Sorell
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From: Philip Bendall - Segway NZ <philipbendall at mac.com>
Date: Wed, 25 Jul 2007 21:34:16 +1200
Subject: [Amarok] Changeling

I finished reading Changeling a couple of weeks ago. I enjoyed it, a
great read for fans. If only it was longer, with as much detail about
the 80s thru 2000's as there was about the 60s+70s.....maybe there'll
be a volume 2 someday.

No doubt I'll post various comments and thoughts from time to time
about points of interest arising from reading the book. Todays
thought is about Discover and 1984. I always wondered why this album
was almost completely ignored by music writers in the UK, and by the
UK public and album charts in general, yet was a quite successful in
many European countries. Even down here in NZ, To France and Tricks
of the Light got a significant amount of radio play.

I suppose some part of the answer to this is that Mike was absent
from the UK throughout much of this time, as a tax exile. I'm not
sure what the UK tax laws were at the time, but probably he could not
spend more than 90 days in UK during that tax year, possibly for that
year and the even the next (with royalties from Crises and Discovery
flowing in). So I guess he just wasnt around during launch time to do
interviews, promotion, etc?

Philip
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