by julia | Nov 3, 2019 | Uncategorized
Preparing for november 22, I’m getting my tongue around the language my grandfather brought to this country. Strange. Strange because his first (and much loved) language was German, and that was what they spoke at home; but the other language they had spoken for...
by julia | Dec 7, 2018 | Diary, Front Page, Singing, Uncategorized
In a dingy Viennese coffee house, the woman behind the bar isn’t just enjoying her playlist on the PA system – she is joining in, her grainy voice (Austrian accent fully Americanised) rising above the whoosh of the milk frother, ‘So rockabye, rockabye…’ I admire...
by julia | Dec 7, 2018 | Diary, Front Page, Singing, Uncategorized
I’m on holiday in Argentina. A steamy day in Buenos Aires and I spot a beautiful girl wearing headphones and little else shimmying down the street singing ‘I’m in love with the shape of you’. I am struck by the incongruity of the carrot-top Brit Ed Sheeran inveigling...
by julia | Jun 2, 2018 | Diary, Front Page, Uncategorized
Like many family members, Michael regards it as his job to encourage his wife’s singing with exuberant vocals of his own, in his case out of tune and at a belt. He is paying extra for these singing sessions on top of tens of thousands for 24 hour care at home,...
by julia | Jun 1, 2018 | Diary, Front Page, Singing, Uncategorized
It was her carer’s idea: at the day centre she could see that Paula became extraordinarily animated in my singing sessions – clapping and stamping and surging out of her wheelchair with pleasure. The worry was that soon enough her hat-trick of disasters...
by julia | Mar 2, 2018 | Diary, Front Page, Uncategorized
The lowest period of the year, when all the kids seem to have colds, and people my age have been in bed for weeks with a flu that the vaccine-makers hadn’t anticipated. Argh. A young lass in Scotland has died of pneumonia that set in as a result of all these...
Recent Comments