Euromania!

I've just noticed that Vicky Leandros is opening Birmingham's Frankfurt Christmas Market.

You can't beat a French-speaking Greek who represented Luxembourg in the Eurovision Song Contest and now lives in Germany to open a Christmas Market in England, can you?

Bill Bailey, SuperMusician

In an era of mass produced identikit synthetic "celebrities" lacking no talent other than, er, "being famous", it's wonderful to see someone with talent in spades: Bill Bailey.

Last night we watched "Bill Bailey's Remarkable Guide to the Orchestra" which originally went out last year on BBC 2. The guy is nothing short of a genius. Every time he opens his mouth you realise that he understands what he's talking about and his ability to dissect pieces of music and notice things you'd never otherwise see is a joy.

Highlights?

Proving to us that the theme to Panorama sounds more-or-less the same played forwards or backwards.

Rearranging a Nokia ringtone for French Horn.

Making us wonder how ITN's Non Stop could ever function as a serious news theme. (But it was, for decades!)

Helping to play Saint-Saens' The Swan on cowbells.

And making NBC's Nightly News theme The Mission out as something of a modern day classic.

But without any doubt, the piece de resistance was turning to theme to Doctor Who into a Belgian-style jazz piece. The sooner that's released commercially the better.

I see that Amazon have the DVD. Go and buy it at once!

3 MBS

I have lots of “bitty” stuff to do this morning and feel in the need for some relaxing music. Normally, this involves pressing the BBC Radio 3 button but from time to time (including this morning) I listen to a Melbourne classical music station called 3MBS.

From what I can gather, it’s actually an amateur station (by which I mean it’s run by volunteers for the love of it, not that it’s in any way sub-standard, which it certainly isn’t). Australians use the term "community station" for this, an idea mooted many time in the UK but which has never really happened. Certainly not like this, anyway!

The musical choice (and the commentaries that go with it) of 3MBS are done with a great deal of intelligence and it’s a bit of a text book case in Good Radio. If you can listen to radio on line it’s well worth doing so. (In the unlikely event that you’re in Melbourne you can even hear it on FM!)

Musical Brum

We've been to see the CBSO doing Holst's The Planets tonight at Symphony Hall.

The CBSO are always fabulous but tonight's performance was especially enjoyable. I do like The Planets and the CBSO are one of the biggest of Birmingham's plus points.

A few observations:

The ICC is a very dull building on the outside but from an architectural point of view it really does work! Symphony Hall is as brilliant today as it was when it opened.

We were almost caught in traffic heading to the NIA to see Muse. Never heard of them but I suppose that comes from inhabiting Jelfworld!

And finally, the first part of the evening saw the orchestra doing Grieg's Piano Concerto. I defy anyone to listen to that without thinking about Morecambe & Wise and Andre Preview!