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At the moment my band is blessed with the services of Helen, a most accomplished fiddle player. But Helen's on her way, she has long had an ambition to sail round the world and she'll be making a start on her plans in the new year. We will be sorry to lose her, but we know she is doing the right thing. So we're faced with the task of replacing her.
This isn't going to be easy. Helen has a quality of playing that makes you, as a performer alongside her, feel comfortable no matter what the size of audience. This year we played Glastonbury and actually it was a piece of piss, due in no small amount to the strength of the fiddle. That and the fact that we're pretty well drilled, peddling our act once or twice a week, every week. Large or small stages, over the years Helen has strutted her stuff and the engine sat alongside her rarely misses a beat. We are close, and we rely on one another to come across well.
One thing's for sure, the incoming person will have to be a strong and confident character. Yes, of course they have to be able to play, but a large part of being in a small tight group of people is the ability to be a good fit, to get on with those around you. I'd trade that quality plus competence any day for a virtuoso tosser. So step up Mr / Ms X fiddle.
We have a couple of candidates at the moment, and will be checking them out over the next couple of weeks. Exciting times. It should knock us nicely out of our comfort zone.
Week 3 of my MA. Getting to know the ropes a bit more now. I've had a good look around the campus and located all essential services (well, nearly all), successfully attended another week of lectures and handed work in on time. This is annoyingly unlike my experience of industry, where you could hold a meeting either in order to delay anything you didn't like, or mask anything you hadn't done.
Today we saw the Bolster film we had made in Week 1, a truly heroic effort which we toyed with entering in the local film festival. It brought the week back to me, and I'm so glad I was a small part of it. Perhaps I will be able to purloin a copy - I hope so.
I'm having to make Herculean efforts with my work this week, as over the weekend I'm off to the Isles of Scilly with my band, the Sex Slaves from Hell. No work will be possible except reading. So all aboard the good ship Scillonian III (whatever happened to I and II?) from Penzance for a three-hour sail. The Scillonian is flat-bottomed and draws about three inches, because the harbour at St Mary's - principal of the Isles of Scilly - is very shallow. Hence all but the calmest passages are guaranteed to induce vomit. I shall take Quells before I embark, but I won't tell anyone.
We have a couple of gigs lined up at the New Inn on the island of Tresco. You can't beat the location for beauty but the place is for the seriously well-heeled, so an opportunity to visit all expenses paid, and earn some money as well, isn't to be sniffed at. And the inn allows us a tab.
At the moment my band is blessed with the services of Helen, a most accomplished fiddle player. But Helen's on her way, she has long had an ambition to sail round the world and she'll be making a start on her plans in the new year. We will be sorry to lose her, but we know she is doing the right thing. So we're faced with the task of replacing her.
