Friday 6th November

It can send you to sleep, slowly, gently and with the glass leaning over ever so slightly you may find yourself slipping into slumber as the notes drift on and through your sleeping brain. It can revive you, lift you if you are feeling low; when that reassuring glow hits your mouth and you find yourself mouthing the words along to the music.  It can be like an old friend, coming home and out of the cold.  It can also be something new, a different tinkling melody that delights and amuses.

I went to a wine-tasting here in Eymet, run by the owner of the Cave; she was trying to interest us and most importantly educate us into trying and maybe appreciating something a bit more sophisticated, more high-brow and undoubtedly more expensive.  But we are a rough old lot, who (in the words of a Genesis song) know what we like and we like what we know.  Strangely she started by telling us that we might find these wines harsh, sharp and discordant after the softer, gentler more rounded wines of Eymet.  Too right – they were bloody awful mostly, very dry and hard to just gulp down.  Like a lot of music that is supposed to be good for you, one struggles to discern a melody.  And yes, if one immersed oneself in enough of the stuff you might get to like it eventually.  But why bother when we are surrounded by the cheap and comforting wine and song that we know and love.  So what, if the experts value their expensive vintages so highly; we know what we like and we like to sing along to it on a Friday night too.  Elvis again tonight, and I am afraid an awful lot of cheap wine will be drunk as we sing “Well – since my baby left me” and other familiar odes.

I have always said that all music is good, there may just be some I am less familiar with; same with wine, though I have much less desire to explore the more esoteric forms.  The only real difference may be that whereas one can never have too much music….oh, yes same again please.