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. 

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.

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. 

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 80^th 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. 

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. 

New Art in Birmingham

Birmingham is great, you can find yourself encountering new and interesting art without too much effort. Today we did it by popping into the Waterhall Gallery, which is part of the main Museum and Art Gallery in Birmingham and discovering their Salon 2015 exhibition which is on until the 23^rd December. The other day it was done by going for a bit of a wander and encountering the street art in the Digbeth area, around the Custard Factory.

The Salon exhibition is a selling exhibition organised by New Art West Midlands. It features work by a number of artists including well respected ones such as Vanley Burke and Boyd and Evans.

The range of styles is wide but the exhibition hangs together well and does not appear too overcrowded.

One can certainly enjoy without buying. Although if you are seriously interested in collecting interesting new art which may rise in value this is probably a good way to do it.

There were some really interesting pieces in the exhibition, but unfortunately I did not take a note of their numbers and artists. So apologies for those I cannot credit for their work as I describe it.

The first piece to catch my husband’s eye was of an Afro-Caribbean child surrounded by white dolls. It was one of the deeper pieces of the exhibition.

There was a film of a train journey taken from the cab of a train at various points in the year. This captured my husband’s attention too.

We were both enthralled by a swing which stood as a sculpture. The seat had somehow been suspended in mid swing and it was interesting to think about how that might have been achieved.

One of my favourite pieces was a small picture of Malala which was in paint and had three blocks of colour within it. The reason that I loved this was that unlike many pictures and photographs of this amazing young woman the artist had captured her youth. There was something within this which captured the teenager rather than the stateswoman.

There were also a couple of play houses where the entrances had been boarded up and windows blocked, but this was done in the same kind of plastic the houses had been made of. It was really effective and fun.

Finally there were a couple of limited edition fabric bags – costing far less than the main art. Buying one of these, which captured my sense of humour, as a part of my Christmas present was as far as our budget would go. Yet even that is still art, we are intending to hang it in our lounge.

This really was an art fair which catered for a wide range of interests and budgets and is well worth a look. Another way to buy art in Brum is to support the City of Colours Winter Jam which is a fundraiser happening on the 5^th  December.

There is a great deal of street art around especially in Digbeth. A couple of weeks ago after going to see the Punk Rock!! So What? exhibition at Birmingham City University’s Millennium Point Campus Parkside Gallery. I went on a wander round looking at some. I went wandering on my own but I am aware that there are Birmingham Street Art tours available. (The Mockingbird Theatre within the Custard Factory is where I think I picked up a flyer about it them).

This varied from the strange to the very moving; the small to the massive and the amateur to the professional. Some of them worked well because of their location, some seemed out of place being placed in the midst of urban decline. Some reflected the way the arts are regenerating the area others didn’t.

There were a couple of pieces which really struck me as I wandered round, including the image at the top of this post. As is the nature of street art I don’t know the artists and so cannot acknowledge them but as I say they really moved me. with the depth of what their work was saying. 

 

The angel particularly resonated with me and I regard it as one of the most spiritual images I have been able to engage with. In the unlikely event the artist ever reads this all I can say is thank you for your work. You are incredibly talented and I hope it is ok with you that I will be using this as a worship resource in coming months and probably years.

 

The Road to Little Dribbling - Bill Bryson Reviewed

Back in the day Bill Bryson wrote Notes from a SmallIsland. It was the tale of an American travelling around Britain and sharing his experiences. Twenty years on he has revisited the project in The Road to Little Dribbling: More Notes from a Small Island.

As co-incidence had it I re-read Notes from a Small Island for a book group I am part of immediately before setting off on The Road for Little Dribbling.  I had enjoyed the first book but been had been forced to re-evaluate my opinion of Bryson a little when somebody pointed out he was a little bit rude and not always politically correct. I was a little taken back by this criticism of Bryson at first. After all I had been a post-grad at Durham and for part of that time Bryson had been chancellor and to suggest he was anything less than a minor deity was really not the done thing. It was probably a good thing I came to this book ready to more objectively examine the nature of what was being written a little more.

There are points when Bryson’s opinion is biting and put forward in a way which is close to cruel. There is also an honesty about his speech which is not curbed by concerns about what might be politically right to say. That said it is part of the fun of Bryson and he is now a fully-fledged grumpy old man I would argue plays up to that in this book.

However, I disagree with the Telegraph writer Clive Aslet who says this is a made up account of Britain. With regard to Durham Bryson does admit fully to having a knowledge of the city and he does not for a moment suggest that his knowledge of the cathedral, which he does say he has visited often, comes from this visit. I would also say as a frequent train traveller who holidays in the UK rather than abroad I recognised much of what he said as being true. That said I do agree with the Telegraph writer that Bryson feigns ignorance on occasion for the benefit of the laughs. One example being I have no doubt that he understands the role that the Aldeburgh festival and it’s long association with Benjamin Britain, together with its close proximity to London play in making it a sea-side destination that has thrived when others have struggled. It was where the arty types of the mid-twentieth century chose to escape to before the younger generation discovered Whitstable.

The distain he feels for British service is sometimes justified and sometimes not. I would say one only needs to watch the Mary Portas programmes where she goes in and teaches customer service as an example of why much of what he says is correct.

In terms of the changing nature of the country and the way in which some areas are being revitalised whilst others are decaying that is also not deniable. What I suspect the Telegraph writer dislikes is at various points, as when he discusses Birmingham, Bryson lays blame at the door of the government for forcing huge cuts onto local councils.

That is not to say Bryson is a rabid socialist, he is way too politically incorrect for that. No, he is quite simply a middle of the road bloke who is taking a look at what is going on and making the same kind of comments many are when they take the time to look at the impact of the policies being pursued at the moment.

One of the comforting things I found about this book is I could imagine my father, who is of a similar age to Bryson making many of the similar observations.

It is not all doom and gloom though. Bryson is very careful to give credit where it is due, on occasion naming specific individuals who have served him well. He also makes, I believe, a fair assessment of the National Trust which he does join on route.

So do I recommend the book? Yes, if you like grumpy old men mumbling on and if you want an accurate snap shot of part of Britain at the moment. No, if you are too easily offended by men of a certain age being at various points rude, transphobic and generally miserable.

On that last point and referring to page 313 of his book it did disappoint me that he displayed so much of a lack of understanding about trans issues. In the unlikely event that (a) he should ever read this & (b) he should not dismiss me as another one of those book reviewers he dislikes I should like to invite him to find out more about what it is like for transsexual people. Preferably by sitting down and just chatting to somebody who is trans and finding out why referring to “Bruce Jenner in drag” is not a cheap laugh but really deeply unhelpful and problematic. 

Gadding about on a Budget in Brum

As regular readers will know I have recently found myself living in Birmingham on a somewhat limited budget. My husband is a student presbyter which means we are now living in a vicar factory. He is becoming trained whilst I am learning to be a “clergy spouse”.

I’m discovering there are a range of strategies one can engage for surviving this.  Mine is to escape the environment as much as possible and to enjoy this city fate, God or the Methodist Church (take your pick) has landed us in – on a budget.

This involves looking for a mix of free events, cheap events and ways to save money over the year. Birmingham is the sort of city which enables this. Here are some of my tips of what is coming up and what you might be able to enjoy as well as good ways to find things.

Visual Art and Galleries

In Birmingham many of these are free. You can look round the main Birmingham Museum and Art Gallery for free as you can the Barber Institute of Fine Arts and the Ikon Gallery.

The Ikon’s current exhibition Fiona Banner’s Scroll Down and Keep Scrolling is free to access and is one of the things you can enjoy on October 30^th if you take advantage of the Art Bus between 5 and 9pm. It will be going between the three galleries already mentioned and the mac Birmingham. There will be introductory talks and refreshments at each gallery. The Art Bus is part of Galleries Night where a range of galleries up and down the country will be opening their doors late. In Birmingham visitors can also visit the Parkside Gallery which will be hosting Punk Rock So What. It is on until 13^th November. Really looking forward to this exhibition and the art within it. Not sure if it will have any textiles or not, but Punk produced some great art.

There are also various bits of public art you can find in the city. For example outside Snow Hill Station there was a range of photographs I saw when wandering about last Saturday.

The Custard Factory is also worth discovering to see what they have going on, at the moment it includes a giant mural I believe.

Whilst much of this is free, encouraging you to give the donation you can afford and so allowing all to enjoy there are some things going on which make a charge.

The Birmingham Museum and Art Gallery currently has Enchanted Dreams: The Pre-Raphaelite Art of E.R. Hughes. This beautiful exhibition which has a range of late Victorian and Edwardian art is on until the 21^st February 2016. The entry charge for this is £7 for adults (full price and free for children), but if you are going to visit the gallery regularly you can get membership for £25. This gets you into everything for the year, and £42 for a joint membership. You also get 10% off in the Edwardian Tea Room within this as well as entry to a range of other galleries owned by Birmingham Council including the Museum of theJewellery Quarter which has a £6 adult entry.

This means that you can find the money to pay out for the pass you are going to get a number of good days out from it.

Music and Laughter

There is so much going on in the city from big venues to small pubs that there is something for everybody, whatever the budget.

If you are on a budget look out for open mic nights, which there are now web sites specifically advertising. The Crescent Theatre has a range of affordable shows on offer and on November 2^nd they have a free night offering a range of music. You are advised to book in advance for this one.

The Glee Club in Birmingham has a range of music and comedy acts for a range of budgets. On November 1^st they have a Rough Works showcase of local comics which is £4 entry.

If you are into classical music then it is possible to see some really high class stuff on a regular basis if you can get to the Friday lunchtime concerts at the Barber Institute.

The Birmingham Conservatoire also has a range of affordable high quality jazz and classical events including Monday lunchtime show cases.

Festivals

I am learning to keep my eyes open for festivals in Birmingham. Some like the Birmingham Weekender are free whilst others like theBirmingham Literature Festival involve a cost.

Now, this is where you have to make a judgement call about what you can afford and what you are likely to want to attend. I invested the £60+ in a ticket for the literature festival because there was lots I wanted to see and I knew with my limited budget I could just about manage this outlay and for it I could see far more of the festival than I would have been otherwise done. I know not everybody has this option, but if you can it is one worth considering.

The upcoming festival in November I am looking forward to is Shout: The festival of queer arts and culture which goes on from 12^th – 22^nd November. Some events are free whilst others have a cost involved.

Amongst the free events is an afternoon at the mac on 14^th November between noon and 5pm. There will be music, film and more going on. The thing about these festivals is they have a range of stuff going on and you pick what meets your budget.

Other Stuff

Birmingham Cathedral has been celebrating its 300^th anniversary this year. As part of this they have been putting on a range of lectures. We attended one on Saturday where Dr. Kate Isles was talking on Women in Birmingham during the 18^th century. These lectures cost £4 but are of a really high standard. Again the Cathedral also has odds and ends of free stuff if you want to keep your eye open.

If you are a film buff on a tightish (but not really low) budget I really recommend the Cineworld Unlimited Card to you. For £16.90 you get the chance to go and see any standard 2D film and get 10% off food and drink. After the first year you are upgraded to Premier membership and get a higher discount off food and drink. This means if you go for the £1.50 flavour of the month of the ice-cream (which you still get a discount on) things become a lot more affordable, especially if you take your own drinks, etc.

Then there are public spaces like the Library of Birmingham you can go and enjoy, as well as borrowing books in. These provide spaces you can sit and chill in which get you out of home. There are also loads of parks and public spaces to enjoy in Brum.

Travel wise work out what your travel will be per week to sort out the cheapest forms of travel for you. For me, because of my job, it is a zone 1 and 2 West Midland travel card. This enables me to get in and out of town from where we are but it also enables me to pay £1 for my husband to get in and out of town with me because we have a travel card.

A final idea is join a reading group and if there is not one nearby start one. I have been one as part of the last few churches I have been part of and have started one up for my neighbours in the vicar factory. If you choose books which have been out a while and which libraries will have too you can make these affordable.

 

 

 

There are loads of other things which people could tell me about and I hope they do. These are just a flavour of the things I've found out about whilst I've been here through keeping my eyes and ears open. I've really found out how the internet is your friend when you move to a new town.

As you can tell I am enjoying myself in Brum. My advice on how to survive becoming a “(trainee) clergy spouse” is to go and enjoy yourself. A new location is the gate way to a new adventure and getting out by yourself doesn’t mean being by yourself. 

BLF 5 - Final Review - Ahlberg, Coles & Maconie

Saturday saw the end of the Birmingham Literature Festival2015, with the final event being Stuart Maconie in the Studio Theatre talking about The Pie at Night.

Maconie, author and BBC Six Music presenter, gave a short stand up performance based on his book before moving into the q&a section. What I really liked about the evening and about Maconie’s style is the way he essentially takes ethnography and the anthropological approach and turns it into something fun rather than academic. He is an intelligent interpreter of the wold around him with a wonderful sense of what is funny and what is not. In The Pie at Night he has been using this to look at leisure.

The observation in his work is brilliant and he understands it because he is essentially an insider. Like many great artists he is truly declass having crossed the barrier between classes and deciding on one hand it is nonsense but on another it should not be forgotten because he knows what life is like for those who suffer as a result of it. This is why he is so clear on the danger of a London centric approach to culture dominating.

The sponsor to this event was Walter Smith a Birmingham based butchers. They gave away pork pies at the end of the event which tasted wonderful.

The audience was large for this event as it was for the Richard Coles event earlier in the evening. Now I have to admit the queue for the Coles event caught me by surprise. I did not realise the guy was so popular, having not listened to his Radio Four show and having only really come across him as one of the “celebrity gay Christians”. That I realise says much about the world I inhabit.

The Coles event was introduced by the Very Reverend Catherine Ogle, dean of Birmingham Cathedral. This made the dynamic quite interesting because as we heard early in the evening Catherine had been a priest Richard had been on placement with when training for the priesthood. I think it was good because it firstly made the event more relaxed because it really was two friends chatting and secondly I think that it meant that Coles may have camped it up less because of who he had interviewing him.

As somebody currently living as in a theological college, as spouse of a trainee, I found what he was saying about his time at theological college particularly interesting.  The idea that part of the process is intended to get you to find your own limits so you can get out of the way and let Jesus work in your context was really interesting.

The book which was being discussed and promoted in this event was Fathomless Riches: or how I went from Pop to Pulpit. When I’ve heard it referred to by others the sexual elements have been focused upon somewhat. They weren’t in this presentation. What was discussed in a moving yet not emotionalist way were his experiences of mental health difficulties and of living through the 80’s when AIDS appeared. He made an important point that many gay men who lived through that time have repressed a lot of grief which needs to be dealt with. His own experience of writing the book was such that it was not cathartic but rather opened up issues which he needed to deal with.

There were also discussions within the Coles set about the role of Christians in broadcasting and the way in which he refuses to separate his religious self from his broadcaster self whilst not inappropriately using a secular space to push Christianity and so on. He views his role in that context as missional and about taking Christ into the world.

Overall I think this was the event I was most surprised at and pleased by. It was a wonderful example of how faith and life more generally can be discussed in a normal way and how secular and sacred can mix in a way which does not have to be a parody of itself.

The other event I went to at the BLF which I have not covered on this blog yet was author Alan Ahlberg, author of over 150 books, mainly children. His event was also incredibly popular and fun. It was also slightly poignant because it showed how age can catch up with us in ways we don’t expect. The readings from his work he did were excellent and it was a privilege to hear him talk although I do wonder if a more intimate venue may have been more comfortable for him.

So overall what did I make of the BLF? Well, I thought it was an amazing event which I was overjoyed at having been able to attend so much of through my purchase of a festival pass.

My main criticisms or suggestions for improvements may have been (i) to perhaps have small events going on in the foyer between evening events when people were just hanging about for ¾ hour, (ii) have a paper information pack for pass holders with events, etc for them detailed which they would be given with their festival pass, (iii) brief ushers to signpost pass holders to get pass if they were just using normal tickets, (iv) try to get venue doors open a little earlier and (v) to perhaps have more evening events for want to be writers rather than just daytime workshops.

However, as I say it was a really great programme of events. I loved it and am thankful for everybody who worked and/or volunteered on this event in whatever capacity. 

BLF 4 - Stella Duffy Reviewed

On Wednesday night twenty three people, very predominantly women gathered in a suite of The Rep Theatre to hear a great writer, director and activist speak. She was Stella Duffy, not to be confused with Carol-Anne Duffy the poet.

Why it was such a small number, I don’t know. I suspect that with a variety of other Birmingham Literature Festival events on offer people opted for one of the other events on offer. That was a shame they missed a really useful session.

The evening sponsored by the RLF, a worthy organisation I think from the event introduction, was billed as a lecture but was more akin to a seminar.

To gain a response from the audience and to introduce us to one of the things she wanted to talk about she introduced us to the five principles of open space. One of the effects of this was that any embarrassment amongst us about the small number of people present was removed.

This technique which also aligns with her Buddhist believes also serves to inspire and empower the audience by making believe them that their being there is not an accident.

As with the other times I had heard Duffy speak at Greenbelt she taught as she spoke and shared something of her own background. It was explicitly made clear last night that part of her role is to show that people from working class people can engage with the arts and to show there are people like them in there working.

Some reoccurring themes came out throughout the talk such as the need to be generous. This is a woman who is tremendously generous giving her time for things she believes in whilst working very, very hard.

It became clear through the talk though that one can only succeed with such generosity if you allocate time to tasks and are willing to collaborate. This came through most clearly when she was talking about the Fun Palaces, which seek to provide temporary places where arts and sciences come together the local community.

She is a woman who has large following on social media and during her talk recommended a range of Apps which can help you with time management.

Time was clearly something important to her that she believed should not be wasted and also was something which should not be used as an excuse.

Listening to talk she discussed spirituality and religious heritage in a way which made me smile. She was brutally honest whilst being affectionate about so much that she spoke of. This reality laced optimism was something which shone through when she spoke of her own experience which has included serious cancer and reconstructive surgery as a result. She described the relationship between the darker sides of life and what she has done to help others, sometimes as a result, as the relationship between destiny and mission.

As one of the founders of the Women’s Equality Party she talked about the hard work behind the scenes which has underpinned this movement.

She also, as a thread through the hour long event, kept returning to giving tips to writers. She detailed the classic western story structure and talked of the need not to plan slavishly according to this but to bear it in mind when drafting and redrafting your work.

I found this whole session really inspiring. From hearing her speak and reading her work previously I had admired her, last night I learnt so much from her that I was even more grateful.

I need to make clear that I think hero worship is unhelpful, but role models are not. I am under no illusion this woman is as human as the rest of us and will have her faults yet she also has an incredible gift of inspiring you to move forward with your dreams. That is what she generously does and continued to do last night.