Into the New.....

Into the New.....
It'll be clear to any blog-followers that I've been away from this site for a while!
For that, my sincere apologies.

Since last posting, many miles have been travelled, songs played, and paintings and poems shared; from Kernow to Wales and through England - and even, last June, to Sicily (which is a kind of 'off-Italy';
Italian-greco, but also so much more deeply Mediterranean, existing for millennia at the cross-roads of national/ethnic currents, an island full of wonderfully beautiful, fading grandeur & populated by a fiercely proud, but friendly, people - living beneath an active volcano! Returning is necessary - one visit is hardly enough).

Writing:
Several poems found favour in competition in 2015 - notably with the Fire River Poets in Taunton, who invited me to a reading where I met their poetry judge, Lawrence Sail; and with the Charles Causley Festival in Launceston, judged by Alyson Hallett.
Also the Poetry Society (Les Robinson) liked another poem enough to publish it on their web-site & have it read out at a local poetry-day jamboree in the Royal Festival Hall.
I'll post these poems on the Writing link on my web-site, for anyone interested in reading them.
Currently I'm working on groups of new poems for various magazines - necessarily an on-going process....but being acknowledged by other really good poets is quite a boost.

Art:
Last September, my good friends Pepe & Daphne Turner were genorous enough to invite me to show at their new gallery in Newlyn.
Called the RIVERBANK GALLERY, it's situated by the bridge in the heart of the town.
It's really Pepe's brain-child, and after an encouraging autumn & winter season, he's now re-vamping prior to the Spring - when I've been asked to be one half of a two-person show at Easter!
And they would like me to play/read at the opening...this will be in late March,
so watch this space for details of the dates.
The Penwith Gallery, St. Ives, chose my work for their Christmas Show again which was pleasing, (but Pepe beat them in sales of my work).
Elsewhere, I have fresh work with Paul Longthorne at Market House Gallery, Marazion, & its sister gallery, the Fernlea, St.Ives, as well as with Sarah Stoten at the Stour Gallery in Shipston-on-Stour.
Also coming-up in 2016:
I plan to show again at the Rock Institute at Whitsun: dates to be announced.

All of which means I have much work to do, in order to fulfill people's faith in me!

Music:
Before Christmas, Pete & I performed at a number of private parties which were great fun.
We look forward to more this coming year!
With the Gumbo Flyers we also played a rather storming set at the Red Lion in St. Columb for their 'Xmas do'. Praise is due to Samantha, the landlady, for organising.
We also look forward to playing in April at Simon (sometime heavy-duty Gumbo roadie!) and Carly's Wedding at Bedruthan Steps Hotel.
Should be one for the scrap-book.....

As I write, I'm feeling a lot of sorrow at the passing of David Bowie.
(Ironically in passing, 'Sorrow' was a big hit for him too).
His career was quite extraordinary, and we shan't see his like again.
While he was eleven months older than me, so many of us of that generation explored blues, folk, soul, dance, theatre, performance - but he took it ALL to such a high-level of extravagant, powerful and persuasive completion.
The telly is currently looping everyone's favourite bits of his work - and there was so much!
One of his final statements on 'Blackstar', 'Lazarus', shows us someone still creating full-tilt, in spite of a fading power-pack, & still 'kicking against the pricks'; we watch mesmerised/appalled/moved; it's like charting the trail of a comet as it burns out across the sky.
As has been spotted, Dennis Potter found deep resonance in the same symbolic persona with his final plays for television, where a writer's brain is wired-up so that he can speak from beyond death.
Bowie, however, short-circuited the operation and, as ever, instinctively got his message in first.
Like all great artists, his legacy will live on for generations to come.
DB- RIP.