The @urbandictionary says "Lilac sky" = "A moment of pure completion. A moment of complete satisfaction... when you feel as though the world is at rest." May your Christmas be a "lilac sky" day, despite the worries + fears of today's world. May the Christ child bring you peace.

A couple of years ago I was watching a few episodes of Great Canal Journeys with Tim and Pru at their home in Wandsworth when all of a sudden Tim nudged me and said, "Watch this, Pru's amazing". Nail on the head! God bless Pru xx

In the #GospelOfToday (Lk 18:9-14), Jesus gives us a powerful message: it is not by flaunting our merits that we are saved, nor by hiding our mistakes, but by presenting ourselves honestly, just as we are, before God, ourselves and others, asking for forgiveness and entrusting

Forgot to mention in my long thread about Yann Goasdoue + Chorale Mouez Patroed Breizh that I organised a concert for us to perform in my congregation’s Mother House chapel in Ploërmel last July. Pic 1) I'm accompanying 1 of our pieces on guitar 2) Yann is seated infront.

SO glad to have been invited to join this choir. Yann is just one of the many wonderful characters who have become good friends. I’ll later talk about the Irish pub music “sessions” here + my new vocal duo with a retired Dubliner living nearby (with me on guitar+banjo). 🇮🇪☘️🎸

And finally, here’s Mouezh Paotred Breizh a few yrs. before I joined them singing the Breton National Hymn (same tune as the Welsh one!!) with Yann coming in towards the end.

And here’s Yann coming out of retirement for French National Music Day 10 yrs. ago.

Here’s the group in 2002 after Yann had left, 2 younger “sonneurs” playing the bombarde. https://t.co/4oPVKSm6mY.

I ordered copies of the vinyl LPs of his own group, Diaouled ar Menez. The instrument he played in the group (and still plays with our choir), the bombarde, is the ancestor of the oboe + is one of the main components of Breton marching bands with the cornemuse (Breton bagpipe).

This 1970 concert included a performance of Mná Na hÉireann (Women of Ireland) by Pheadar Ó Doirnín in an arr. by O’Riada which would be made famous by The Chieftans through its use in Kubrick’s masterpiece, Barry Lyndon. https://t.co/kgEztKONrK. After the day at Yann’s house

I ended up coming home with the below collection, including a wonderful concert album recorded in Dublin’s famous Gaiety Theatre @stephenkeeler of music by Seán O’Riada, a legend in Irish music who set The Chieftans on their way to a glorious career, amongst others…

he invited me for a meal in his converted farmhouse, prepared by one of his sons. In what was a grange he keeps all his instruments, books, vinyl LPs, cds, etc… It doubles as his rehearsal room. What a treasure trove!! He asked me to take my pick of his vinyls of Irish music…

From Pope Leo’s homily today.

+ his day job being the director of a publishing+distribution company for Breton language books and Celtic music cds. In their heyday, his band toured with The Wolfe Tones + a couple of members of The Bothy Band, both highly successful Irish groups. When we got back from the tour

… We got on like a house on fire, sharing our mutual passions for all things Celtic in discussions + music listening late on into the night. He’d been a founding member of a leading light in the Breton trad music + “fest noz” revival of the ‘70s-‘80s, the band Diaouled ar Menez

… His wife had passed away 2 weeks before we left with the Chorale Mouezh Paotred Breizh on a recent concert tour of Haute-Savoie. I was asked by the choir committee if I would share a room with him for the tour. He’s partially sighted, hard of hearing + obviously still grieving

I feel privileged to have got to know some amazing Breton musicians here through being invited to join 2 Breton language choirs + the various other musical encounters I’ve made these past 4 yrs. One such person is 85 yr. old Yann Goasdoue, singer/bombarde player extraordinaire...

The poet Sylvia Plath was born #OTD 27 October 1932. Here she is with her bike on the wall of the Shoulder of Mutton, Hebden Bridge, West Yorkshire. She's buried in the extension churchyard at Heptonstall on the hill above.

"No two trees - no two leaves - are ever exactly alike. No plant - no flower - ever perfectly symmetrical. Repetition, yet with a slight difference. Variety, yet with conformity. This is how we expect it. This is how we love it. This is beauty." ~ C.R.Milne #nature #autumn #trees

Christ be with me, Christ before me Christ behind me, Christ in me, Christ beneath me, Christ above me, Christ on my right, Christ on my left, Christ where I lie, Christ where I sit, Christ where I arise, Christ in the heart, Of everyone who thinks of me. St Patrick

Dear Lord, thank you for the gift of a new day. May all that I do today be done with love and for your glory. #MorningPrayer