On blogging

Here is the muse of the current blog, my glamorous friend Sophie Sarin, in two incarnations (more anon). For over a year now she's kept us posted on the setting-up, vicissitudes and triumphs of her new hotel in Djenne, Mali, famous for its mud mosque (and now for her hotel, which vies with it for architectural distinction - perhaps I exaggerate a little).

Of course it's all a lot more 'other' and startling than a plain old chronicle of London musical life. But I enjoyed it so much I was inspired to do the same. Another friend thinks blogging is a hideous self-indulgence, a wamble without editorial interference and a bore (even when I directed her to Sophie's site - www.djennedjenno.blogspot.com - she was unimpressed). But I like it.

The photos? One is of our Sophe pumping the water away from Hotel Djenne Djenno when it came under threat in the recent floods. The other - and this justifies her presence in a musical context - sees her standing beside a bust of Gustavus III of Sweden at a recent Swedish bash in London (she has been here on a hard-working visit painting a floorcloth for Apsley House). Gustavus III, the tenor hero of Verdi's Un ballo in maschera, was of course shot by baritone Anckarstroem, who turns out to be Sophie's mother's lover's great-great-(great?)-grandfather. Alles klar?