A month of nights

 In a strange way, the mourning over the Queen has supplied a welcome distraction from other "stuff" happening in the world.  You can supply your own list, but I realized, with a sickening lurch, that the new head of the Conservative Party in Canada is a populist, who supported the truckers' convoy that occupied Hades for nearly a month last winter.

I felt the same way when Trump won the Republican Party nomination in 2016.  This could get messy.

Rather than distracting myself with footage of the royal hearse passing the villages on the Carse of Gowrie, where my Scottish ancestors lived for centuries, I am mindfully turning to music.

Long before he became the musical genius behind the Peanuts cartoon specials, Vince Guaraldi came up with a gorgeous instrumental, which eventually was given the title "Cast Your Fate to the Wind" .  

Some time later, Carel Werber wrote lyrics for it, and some vocal groups recorded it, including We Five (who had a hit with "You Were on My Mind" on the same album). 

(The drummer in this recording, incidentally was Jerry Granelli, who died in Halifax, Nova Scotia last year, and for some time, was Vince Guaraldi's drummer.)

But last week, Spotify sent me this relatively recent interpretation by jazz/folk instrumentalist George Winston.

Listen, is it sacreligious to admit that I think I prefer this to the other recordings (which I love, I hastily add)?

I loved the original for its humming continuo bass line, achieved by the bassist bowing his instrument.  Winston achieves by -- how -- the pedal?  He also illustrates that the piano is indeed a percussive instrument; I keep thinking I hear a drum set joining in, only to realise that this is all in how he strikes the keys. 

Goodness knows, I'm no sailor, but I'll gladly float away from the craziness on this boat.