I thought It would be fun to run through a few nice constructions in English. We might hear these all the time in films and TV series and understand them perfectly, but not have internalised them to the...

A glance at which radio programmes people like to listen to and what music they stream only confirms what we all suspect – that classical music is really at the margins these days. But there is still,...

Art Tatum (1909-1956) sounds like he’s constantly out to impress and take the listener’s breath away – not perhaps the best goal of an artist. But his superhuman technical prowess aside, his pure musicality...

The early silent films were accompanied by a cinema pianist improvising before the screen, playing a mix of popular and classical music. With the coming of sound, professional film composers wrote music...

Let me share with you an overview of the music of the great Maurice Ravel (1875-1937). I’ve highlighted my favourite works.   Piano music   Much of Ravel’s music was conceived on the piano, and then orchestrated...

Sam Harris’ hero   In the fascinating exchange between Sam Harris and Jordan Peterson that many of you will have come across on YouTube, Harris mentions Marcus Aurelius as one of his philosophical heroes:   “I...

I’ve now written 8 short posts on my exploratory trip to Hong Kong.  I won’t rehash what I’ve covered before, but just to wrap things up I wanted to close with some final comments. I watched YouTube videos...

In this series I’ve been recounting something of my travels and observations when I visited Hong Kong back at the end of October. This post is a bit different. Just for completeness I set out here a quick...

I have always been a Burgess fan. Novelist, composer, linguist, talk show guest, interviewee and general polymath, Burgess’s greatest legacy for me was his essay writing. Happily, many of his best pieces...

In the second half of my week in Hong Kong I visited the northern towns of the territory. I transferred to a hotel in Tsuen Wan, and then from there I visited Yuen Long and Tai Po (there’s a map of these...

For many, the modern Island of Hong Kong is synonymous with Hong Kong itself. During my week travelling, I only spent a few hours on the Island so I’m no authority – but here’s a sketch of what I...

Following on from my previous post, here are some further observations when out and about in Kowloon. Convenience stores are everywhere – Circle K, 7-11 and Wellcome are the main ones....

Kowloon is the southern peninsula of the mainland, looking South onto Hong Kong Island.   Kowloon has been described as “downtown Hong Kong”. But “downtown” denotes the busiest part of a city where the...

This article is a summary of my findings from wandering around Hong Kong for a week.   The cuisines on offer   There is a wide variety of Asian cuisines on offer – Thai, Filipino, Vietnam, Sichuan, Tibetan...

Ugliness The first point we can make, without fear of contradiction, is that most of the cramped accomodation in Hong Kong is irredeemably ugly.  With...

I spent a week exploring Hong Kong at the end of October. I hadn’t put in much preparation for my trip. I had got hold of a guidebook to read up the basic stuff about currency, tipping etc and to fix...

Provins is a medieval town designated as a UNESCO World Heritage Site. It lies about 90km to the southeast of Paris in the Champagne region. One can get there from Paris either by car or by train from...

A few miles northwest of Paris lies the charming town of Auvers sur Oise. The Oise is a river which starts its life in Belgium, crosses northern France before flowing into the Seine. The impressionists...