Artie & Vincent

Like millions of people we're woken up most mornings by the dulcet tones of a radio alarm, not too loud you understand, not so quiet as to be ignored. It blips into action this time of year at 6am then for a period of time just after that we find ourselves in that very pleasant semi conscious state listening to whatever the beeb is broadcasting our way. We mostly have on radio two these days, which may be a bit of a giveaway as to which demographic the pair of us has slipped into. We experimented with 6 music for a while but didn't find it quite what we were after for our wake up tunes, but its pretty good later in the day. Once downstairs it has to be radio four for news, weather, 'thought for the day' etc., anyhow I digress.

This morning we were woken by a fabulous swing tune by Artie Shaw titled 'Frenesi', which was a most pleasant start to today. Now hearing this I was reminded of something I read that Artie Shaw was quoted to have said about Vincent Van Gogh and is so simple in it's language but so profoundly true of all great artists, be they painters, writers, musicians etc. that I thought I'd share it here.



'What was Van Gogh about? God knows, we could talk about that forever. One thing we do know is that he was not trying to please somebody else. He was trying to do what he had to do.' ~ Artie Shaw