She smiles and the world is a brighter place
Her eyes sparkle like ebony lakes reflecting the moonlight
Few who feel the ripples of warmth emanating from her heart are left unaffected
I can only play my guitar

© Irene Lundgaard

One of the first things I did when I moved here was to plant some trees, somewhere between one hundred and one hundred and fifty trees in fact, the rabbits destroyed some while they were still saplings but the majority survived. They were mostly native trees, oak, ash, birch and beech etc but there were a few exotic ones as well, a ginko, judas and tulip tree and so on. As the years have rolled by many of the trees have reached at least ten metres in height and some like the spruce trees have begun to block the light and smother some of the surrounding trees, so much so that this autumn I will have to select some for felling along with some of the alder trees which have been the most spectacular as far as growth has been concerned.

Still with rising oil and energy prices maybe this is not such a bad thing when one has a wood burning stove that except for maintenance never goes out from the time it is lit in the autumn until spring arrives again.

© Irene Lundgaard

Many hours spent in the studio working on new music, outside the sun has been shining and life goes on as normal. Inside the studio there is no natural light, the outside world is shut out and time stands still, or at least it does for the duration of the recording as one attempts to capture a moment in time, that can withstand the test of time. When all is finished and it’s time to take the music out into the world, where all the hard work, time and effort can be dismissed in an instant, it’s important to remember that in regard to any anticipation one might feel about possible reactions or response, one must not hold one’s breath.

Music can help to sell things and to many this is it’s greatest value, a commodity that can be used to promote other products. But music is much more than that and deserves to be listened to for what it is, although using music in commercials and as background music to reality TV shows is not only financially attractive to bands and musicians, but in many cases necessary for survival in today’s world. There is probably more money to be made selling merchandise such as band tee-shirts, posters, coffee mugs and anything else that you can put a band logo on than there is trying to sell music CDs or downloads. Music now is very often no more than an afterthought to the packaging and glitter that surrounds it or to the product that it promotes.

There is nothing wrong with the partnership of music and business, in fact it is necessary in order to promote and distribute it in any meaningful way and it has always been so. But when commercial and business interests not only dominate but often dictate the music we hear, the question has to be asked, what will happen to the quality of the music?

© Irene Lundgaard

About two years ago I was sitting reading one summers day with all the windows open when suddenly a swallow flew in one window and started flying around the room unable to find it’s way out again. After circling the room two or three times it collided with the wall and fell to the floor where it remained motionless. I carefully picked it up to bring it outside and as I did so my fingers gently stroked it’s plumage which felt like silk to touch, occasionally the odd bird has fallen down the chimney and needed rescuing in a similar fashion, but none had feathers that were so smooth to the touch. In a strange kind of way just as the swallows are arriving from Africa to spend the summer so it is that the wild geese are gathering to migrate to eastern Greenland and Iceland until the winter, flying in their distinctive V-shaped formations and honking all the while.

For three days in a row last week the sun shone, the temperatures rose to between 15 and 18 degrees centigrade and the living room window had been left open all day and long into the evening. It really felt as though spring had come, the alder, birch and rowan trees had all started to bud and the laurels had already flowered. Then just as the prospect of the new season seemed to dangle before us bringing with it long, warm and sunny days, it all changed. The winds turned northerly bringing the cold weather down from the Arctic and covering the hills in a blanket of snow, winter was giving us one last flash of it’s teeth, but it was beautiful.

It’s Sunday afternoon, the sky is overcast and there has already been a shower of rain so notions of pruning the apple trees or going for a walk in the woods have been cancelled. As a matter of fact everything else that involves anything other than chilling out has also been cancelled for the day too, because it’s coffee time. There is nothing like the aroma of freshly ground coffee beans hitting the nostrils in advance of the taste which almost always seems to give the perfect lift at this time of day. Around here coffee time usually happens sometime between 4pm and 6pm, although this can change when out travelling or during extended periods away from home. There are probably some places where there is no such thing as coffee time, but I try to avoid such places and don’t think that I could live anywhere like that, at least not by choice. Could you?