After a break since earlier this year, I got out walking again with Anne – we did a little walk up Castlelaw Hill to check out her knees! All seems well, thankfully. It was an extremely windy day, but our walk slotted in nicely between showers so we didn’t get wet.

Anne on the summit. The Army’s flag has been unfurled by the wind.

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I enjoyed playing with the Greenbank Buskers again for the annual youth ceilidh. The fiddle needs its exercise! Here’s the best photo of the band (until the Facebook link breaks).

Posted by Greenbank Parish Church, Edinburgh on Saturday, 29 September 2018

The band personnel always depends on who’s available, but it’s always good fun to play with these great people.

Apart from Steff’s sparkly Christmas tree plant, we haven’t had any plant life in the house for ages. I decided that I would like – at the very least – to start growing spider plants again. I used to have a lot of them, because I found them fairly unkillable and they propagate by producing babies very easily. A few days ago I ordered one from Waitrose (I couldn’t find them in local shops) and it’s arrived. A magnificent specimen with lots of babies already, so we’ll soon have a few more.

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Early September means the annual Halsway nyckelharpa meeting. This year Marwyn attended as a non-participant (i.e. groupie!) and enjoyed the concert and sessions (and catching up with her Swedish). I enjoyed the workshops and wished I could have been at all of them – the guest musicians were Josefina Paulson and Torbjörn Näsbom, with Vicki Swan also teaching some fascinating stuff (as well as organising the whole thing).

Moraharpa – top view

One feature was the increased number of gammelharpor (old style instruments) and their relations – not from the original period, but built recently (including my kontrabasharpa). The photo of Vicki’s Moraharpa (I thought it was Scott’s – they come from the same maker!) is one of several (along with measurements) I took – now I wonder what a future project could possibly be?

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I enjoyed a great session in the Boda Bar this evening hosted by Alice Thorsell. Lots of great tunes (pretty international, though lots of Swedish and Scottish) and good to see other session friends there. I will be back! For a change, I took the fiddle – nice to give it some exercise, and I played a few Swedish tunes on it that previously I have only played on the nyckelharpa. G minor is very good for my fingering 🙂  No photos, sorry.