Friday, June 16, 2017

RIP Lionel Bart


OK, I know that Lionel Bart died in 1999. It's just I've be recently reminded of his own erratic genius as a result of seeing one of my grandsons star in a school production of Oliver. Considering that Bart couldn't read music his work in putting together Oliver and coming up with all those truly killer songs is amazing. These joyful, moving and seemingly unburstable melodies are as strong and timeless as it gets. Of course after watching the energetic school production and being drenched in those tunes once again, I was whistling and humming them like it was 1965 and back on the Light Programme. The power of memory and the prompting of music as a reminder of things past is scary. Maybe when I'm old, confused and decrepit it'll be Oliver that's on the padlocked headphones rather than Pink Floyd, Nico or Del Amitri.

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