Category USA
It’s Up To You, New York – Day Three
After breakfast at 8, I set off for Central Park. I had a loose plan to visit Bloomingdales department store along the way for a present for Mrs Wilbur and to take a look at the Roosevelt Island Tramway. After being delayed by watching the antics of some entertainingly zealous NYPD traffic cops, my first […]
It’s Up To You, New York – Day Two
Day Two – Monday I awoke on Martin Luther King day early once more, still not fully acclimatised to the 5-hour time difference. Today was a special day as not only was it a public holiday in honour of MLK on his birthdate, but it was also to be my first visit to the Statue […]
It’s up to YOU! New York – Day One
I have just returned from a three day trip to the city that never sleeps and managed to pack a lot in. My feeling of elation at being in the Big Apple is best described by saying that I felt like a kid in a sweet shop who was able to choose any goodie they […]
English Icons
In the space of five days I have visited memorials to perhaps two of the finest contemporary musical artists England has ever produced. John Lennon Memorial, Strawberry Fields, Central Park, New York taken 15th January 2018, Martin Luther King Day in the US. David Bowie Memorial, 155 Hauptstraße, Berlin (Bowie’s former residence) taken 10th January […]
Pooh York
On my flight over to New York I watched the wonderful film ‘Goodbye Christopher Robin’. It tells the story of how A.A. Milne, inspired by his son playing with his soft toys in Ashdown Forest in Sussex, wrote the classic Winnie the Pooh books. A footnote at the end of the film’s credits stated that […]
New Orleans & All That Jazz
One hundred years ago today the ‘First Lady of Song’ Ella Fitzgerald was born in Virginia USA. The iconic singer was first known as the finest female proponent of scat singing. Wikipedia describe scat singing as ‘vocal improvisation with wordless vocals, nonsense syllables or without words at all. Scat singing is a difficult technique that […]
Independence Day
Happy 4th July to everybody in the USA. I haven’t spent nearly enough time in the States but my favourite city visited thus far was New Orleans, which I was lucky enough to go to in 2001. The music scene was second to none and the Mardi Gras and Jazz museums still count as two […]
