Eye - 28 March 2014
From music to 'appyness
Making music
Bernard Thomas, of Heswall Meeting, has embarked on a musical mission:
‘Several years ago our local radio station, BBC Radio Merseyside, approached my Local Meeting to do a half hour broadcast about Quakers. This we did, but one of the things they asked for… was some Quaker-related music.’
After looking around, Bernard was disappointed by the lack of music ‘that was both current and professionally recorded, which is what the BBC required’.
‘Since I am into music and do, on occasion, write the odd song, some Quaker-based – and also have some good friends who can perform and record to a professional standard – I thought we should give it a go and produce some ourselves. We did and they were broadcast with the programme.
‘Since they seemed to go down OK, I thought that, now I am recently retired, this might become a bit of a project.’
Bernard’s sights are set on producing at least ten new Quaker songs, ‘possibly for a CD which might also be sold to raise money for Quaker charities’.
Work is underway but Friends don’t have to wait if they would like to hear the songs as the project develops: ‘Rather than keep these songs all hidden away until we have our ten, my next thought was to make them available as the project proceeds. So far five are completed, with another two in the production process.
‘One that is available is BBC Radio 2’s best original folk song of the year 2012, not written by me of course but by the brilliant Steve Tilston, who kindly gave us permission to record it. It is called “The Reckoning” and says all you need to know about looking after our planet.
‘Other songs from me so far available cover Margaret Fell’s letters, William Penn’s adventures, zero growth, God being in everyone and everywhere and peace. The latest in the works are about Victorian Quakers and quietness.
‘Songs so far completed can be found, to stream or download, at http://edenthomas.bandcamp.com/album/quaker-songs. If you want to download, each song is £1 (to go to Quaker charities), but they are free to stream as many times as you want.’ Bernard is keen to hear from any readers with an idea for a song, after all ‘we do not have to stop at ten!’
Spied in the countryside
Connie Hazell, of Bournemouth Meeting, found herself Quaker spotting in a recent edition of The Countryman magazine.
In an article describing the making of a garden from scratch, the writer reflected: ‘In all these things one felt that the planning of the garden had been shared by an unseen presence, the Garden-God. But intervention, divine or otherwise, became most marked when I started laying my own crazy pavements.
‘I had then a very dear old Quaker friend, who believed very firmly in divine intervention, which I have suggested… After a week of work I said to her “either there is no such thing as divine intervention, or divine intervention enters into everything”.
‘The reason for my saying this was that the pieces which came to hand and which fitted far exceeded the law of average… I own that my crazy pavements became better and better as I worked on them and gained experience, but from the very beginning there was something working in me which was not me.’
Connie found another article in the magazine also resonated with her: ‘the writer, bemoaning the erosion of the countryside and the noise and pollution which goes with it, says “Those who still have silence have a wonderful and diminishing commodity”.’
‘Appy advices
Friends with a hankering for Quakerly apps for their mobile phones may be intrigued to hear that the ‘Quaker App’ by Chip Thomas (Eye, 7 February) has company – in the form of simon gray’s ‘Quaker Advices and Queries’ app, currently available for Android phones (http://bit.ly/AdvicesAPP).
This app brings together advices and queries from more than a dozen Yearly Meetings around the world, categorised by themes such as ‘children and family’, ‘diversity’, ‘integrity’, ‘Quaker business’ and ‘worship’.
One reviewer says it is ‘a fun way to read advice from many different Quaker traditions, encouraging us to look beyond the familiar phrases from our own areas.’
