At all across the arts we often speak of the synergy between poetry and comedy as one art form often feeds the other. We were pretty amazed though when we discovered more links in the chain: general knowledge and quizzing skills. We discovered this when laughter rang as punch lines were delivered with perfect comic […]
A ´playing out scheme´ recently devised by Alice (not Alex) Ferguson, a young mother, who wanted her own children to be able to play outdoors has produced benefits that surely should not surprise us. Now the scheme has been studied by health experts who suggest that some streets or roads should be closed occasionally to […]
Depending on your demographic, you know, like how old you are, your gender and whereabouts in the world you live, each reader will have a different mental image when asked to think about the phrase ´music festival.´ Perhaps for the younger ones among you and perhaps, too, for the oldest among you, a music festival […]
His name is Tiny Tommy Trotter and he is my new Bolton Wanderers FC mascot sitting here on my all across the arts desk as I write this issue of Sidetracks and Detours. He is the first guy I speak to each morning and we usually end up bemoaning the club´s current plight. Living over […]
The worlds of arts and of medicine do not overlap very often, despite recent interesting developments in the UK such as the Poetry On Prescription scheme and Clinical Commissioning Groups having some monies in their budget available for buying in therapeutic arts interventions to boost individual and communal well-being, Even with these initiatives now fairly […]
The director of the island´s music academy has recently delivered the first opera fully produced on the island, with students, staff and volunteers coming together to perform to more than 500 people at the El Salinero Teatro in the island´s capital city of Arrecife. And only last week Dee and I saw a live performance […]
According to The Mail On Sunday (11th August 2019) millions of us now listen in to podcasts. So well developed, now, is the podcast industry that the newspaper, in an article by Rob Waugh, included several pages discussing the current 100 podcasts most listened to. These specialist podcasts cover not only comedy, literature, film, tv, […]
Track listings Kodachrome by Paul Simon Borders by Just Poets Flash Bang Wallop by Tommy Steele Photographs And Memories by Jim Croce Two Thousand Feet by Lendanear The Boy In The Photograph by The Stereophonics Strange Fruit by Billie Holiday My Favourite Picture of You by Guy Clark Photograph […]
Track Listings Catcher In The Rye by Sammy Walker Five Get Over Excited by The Beautiful South For Whom The Bell Tolls by The Bee Gees Hemingway´s Whiskey by Kenny Chesney Islands In The Stream by Kenny Rogers and Dolly Parton Lady Writer by Dire Straits My Autobiography by Janis Ian New Biography by […]
It wasn´t that long ago that jazz was thought of as a musical genre that was only heard in hotel lifts or being sung by a lounge lizard in some pretentious cocktail bar or being played by a part time pianist in that posh coffee shop down in the shopping precinct. I have paraphrased the […]
