jonnybaker

who do you think you are?

it was so wonderful last week to get to spend a few days in scotland with pioneer practice tour packing in 5 gigs in 4 days along with gav mart. we were hosted by steve aisthorpe who had helped pull together the itinerary. he even had a van so it was like a proper tour bus :)

each location was different but my biggest takeaway really was that in each location the start point seemed to be us being told that there's not really a lot of pioneer practice going on, but by the end of the session when we had invited stories to be shared it was clear that all sorts of things are happening and bubbling up around the edges. it feels a good time (at least from the outside) in that networks are forming, there is a pioneer scotland facebook group, and so many good people involved across the board in encouraging, networking, training across denominations and streams. and crucially imaginative practice. scotland you have enough in your hand.

we bumped in to various scottish phrases along the way - it reminded me of kate fox's watching the english book where she explores phrases to get at englishness. i wish i'd written them all down. but one that stayed with me was 'who do you think you are?' - which was some peoples way of saying it is a hard culture to stick your head above the parapet. and yet when we did a poll on pioneer practice the top answer in every location was it's about seeing and imagining. so those gathered really seemed to embody something different, or at least their answer to that question was 'a possibility people' (for those old enough to remember that is a nod to a late late service rant which of course was a scottish liturgy).

thank you for having us! this is a rare moment when we had a minute to catch our breath on montrose beach - thanks to gav for the pic

no gigs this week, but back into the fray the week after with newcastle and bristol - yes i know not exactly good planning on my part! 

a festival brimming over with life

jenny and i visited edinburgh festival for four days last weekend. it's such an incredible festival with so much going on. i genuinely don't know how they pack all the events into the city let alone where all the people find places to stay. it brims over with life, joy, poignancy, artfulness celebrating life.

we first visited i think in 2009 when harry took part in an open mic at a free fringe event. he was subsequently invited to a poetry event in london and that was the beginning of an adventure which included exploring poetry for a gap year and went ever upwards from there. so it was incredible to be back at the festival again and see harry with a solo show in underbelly and a harry and chris show in underbelly both selling out when we attended. it's harry's seventh festival i think with three solo shows and three harry and chris before now. i of course have a totally unbiased view but they were fantastic. it's not just me as you'll see from these 5 star reviews. i have added some photos to an album here.

we packed in about four shows a day of comedy, circus, theatre and also visited some of the art festival. it's hard to pick highlights but we loved in no particular order occam's razor, john robbins, jessica fostekew, matt winning, milton jones, bryony kimmings, tom crosby, lazerkiwis, nathan coley, alfredo jaar. it's surprising how much you can pack in to a few days (and how much you can spend!).

scotland

i have added photos from our trip to the west of scotland (and edinburgh at the end) to a slideset on flickr here. i am sure i'll add a few individual photos here to keep reminding myself how magical it is.

skye road

loved two weeks in the west of scotland for a break - every corner you go round seems to be an amazing scene of mountains, big sky, lochs, waterfalls, clouds and sun breaking through. i'll add some photos here over the next couple of weeks no doubt. this is on the island of skye - just had to stop the car and take a photo as this road was so brilliant!

headspace

just back from a week on the isle of mull. it's now a habit of mine to take a retreat of some sort each year which is one of the best decisions i made a few years back. i always switch off from phone, internet, and any media and take some time to think, walk, be, pray, read, write, and take photos. the last few years i have been to a community wise in the ways of the soul to join in their life of silence and prayer. this year i decided to just head to scotland, risk the weather and camp. unsurprisingly it was cold - i had about 6 layers on most evenings. but it was glorious to be away and in the beauty of the scottish landscape and islands. i actually took my first retreat in this sequence on a scottish island so it was good to be back. i picked up a traveller who wanted to hitch a lift so i wasn't totally solo but headed off alone most days and then had company for evenings and meals round the fire. 

i have added some photos here.

harry is having a pretty good first month making a life as a poet!

harry graduated in july. so technically august is his first month making a life as a poet and it's all going rather well! admittedly he has been performing all over the place for the last few years while studying but you get the drift. he is up at edinburgh festival with his show the sunshine kid in the free fringe. this has been full very day so far and received some good reviews - see tvbomb and broadway baby for example. i loved this quote from the tv bomb review:

Underneath the veneer there is a melancholic yearning that often seeps through, a deep awareness of the intrinsic ache of the human condition. With this in mind, the poems develop into an argument for a positive outlook, for self-belief and for finding meaning somewhere within ourselves. This is a performance that will make you laugh and make you think; art at its transformative best.

as well as doing that he seems to have got himself invited into other events/shows to perform every day which is fun and how you get the word out about your show. this included an invite to perform on simon mayo's radio 2 show - a one minute poem reflecting the contents of the show. this went so well that he was invited back for the week. those shows are up on inlayer for mon, tues, weds, thurs of this week and no doubt the bbc web site as well (it's the first time i've listened to radio 2 for a while being more of a 6 music fan myself…).

i'm heading up to edinburgh on saturday to see the show and hang out and cheer him on which i'm looking forward to. the month will end up with him performing at greenbelt festival. today there is a big feature on him in the church times which is a rather lovely piece. 

also this month (probably week) his TED talk will hit one million views by the looks of it - which is pretty amazing.

i can't imagine every month going quite so swimmingly but not a bad start!!! i'm thinking i probably should get a t-shirt saying 'harry baker's dad'. if you are in edinburgh saturday come to harry's show - see you there - though get there early by all accounts.

the pioneer gift - doug gay remixes the church one more time

some time in the next few weeks the pioneer gift will hit the shelves which i am excited about. the book is a series of reflections on the pioneer gift. i wrote the first chapter reflecting on what pioneering is and what the nature of that gift might be. the book arose from a day we hosted at cms last autumn and the things presented were so good that we thought we should pursue publishing them. i'm happy to say that canterbury press also tought it was a good idea. on the day i video interviewed 5 of the people presenting and to celebrate the launch of the book we will be adding one a week to the cms pioneer blog and they'll be located on vimeo. first up is doug gay who has started a new remix of the church in glasgow. wisdom as ever from doug...

on pilgrimage 3: rumours of deeper things

a few years ago i went on retreat with chris goan and aoradh community to an uninhabited scottish island. it was a fabulous trip and they are off again this weekend to a western isle. i must go back!

chris has posted a series of 12 dispatches/short poems that he wrote and has posted on cliff tops at the start of such retreats. they are totally wonderful both for retreat and/or pilgrimage. the reason i have added them on pilgrimage is that i happen to have a series on the go for that and they seem to connect with the wild places and wild spirituality akin to the irish pilgrimage.

here's the first and go here to find all twelve...

There are rumours-

Like smoke signals blurred in desert wind
They say

He is here

Not in metaphor
Not whipped up in the collective madness of charismata
Not just politely suggested by the high drama of religious ritual-

Here

Sweating
Breathing
With mud on his shoes...

[worship trick 52, series 4]

and you may say to yourself...

i have added a few colour photos from scotland to go with the black and white set. i love this one of jen at st monans smokehouse (if you ever go get some of their smoked paprika - just amazing!)

two gulls

this is possibly the favourite photo i have taken for a while (things have been quiet on the photography front of late). it looks good on black actually. it's part of a set of black and white photos i took in fife a few weeks back...

the world looks incredible even in black and white!

over the next couple of weeks i'll add some photos from our holiday in st monans, fife.

speed of light

we took part in speed of light at edinburgh festival. it was a night walk of 3 hours up to arthur's seat in holyrood park overlooking edinburgh with walking sticks that had a a light at the bottom end to help you walk and a gizmo that emitted ambient sounds at particular altitudes. groups of runners in suits with lights on them ran across the adjacent hill to the walkers, creating a mesmerising effect. whilst it was called speed of light it was actually a slow meditative experience raher than a fast one. it was designed and put together by NVA. if you are in edinburgh book yourself in. clearly a challenge to photograph so i took up a tripod and grabbed a few 10 second or so exposures which look rather beautiful in their own way. this is the base of walkers light sticks (sabres?!) as they walk past. this is a moment at the top to pause and look over edinburgh and this gives a sense of the light sticks. 

if you want to see a much more amazing set of images than mine (!) this slideshow at the guardian is brilliant...

"one of the greatest things i've ever seen!" radio one's verdict on harry's edinburgh show

"one of the greatest things i've ever seen" - that's how harry's show proper pop-up purple paper people was described on radio one ths afternoon and given a 5 star rating! who knows how but chris who picks out a show to review each day for scott mills landed at harry's venue and loved it (if you want to listen on iplayer it's about 1:23 in to the show). joel rang me as he was in the car and had radio one on at the time and was somewhat surprised to find harry being reviewed... the show is in a small basement at the royal oak so expect tomorrow to be packed!!!

harry baker back at edinburgh fringe

following last year's debut fringe show, harry is back for three weeks with a new show - 'proper pop-up purple paper people' with a bundle of new material. we're on holiday in scotland next week so will be going along and looking forward to it. this runs for three weeks before he takes it to greenbelt festival for a solo show. he is also repeating last year's amazing adventures - birth of a champion show for 10 days from 13 august so you can catch him twice!

solas festival 2012

i'm heading up to scotland again at the end of june for solas festival which you may remember me blogging and enthusing about last year. the line up is growing. rory butler and adam stearns who i picked out last year as highlights are both back. harry baker (!) is performing, along with the likes of ricky ross. this year i am giving a couple of talks. maybe see you there?

scottish wilderness retreats

last year i went on a retreat to the mccormaig islands off the west coast of scotland with some pioneers from cms course hosted by chris goan and the aoradh community in dunoon. it was a wonderful experience - amazing location, retreat with silence and space for reflection, and as a bonus i missed the royal wedding!

chris and others are now running two trips in 2012 that you could go on - in june and august. contact them direct if you are interested. lots of photos and details are here

mirazozo

mirazozo is a colourscape construction lit solely by daylight and designed by architects and kept up by being filled with air pumped in and through it. chilled sound plays inside and it's delightful. these photos are all taken on my phone which couldn't seemingly handle the colour saturation but i rather like it because of that... i encountered it at edinburgh festival.

by the light of the moon

this is no ordinary light bulb, but one designed by katie paterson to emanate the light of the moon as part of the mystics or rationalists exhibition at the edinburgh art festival 2011

i took a photo of another lightbulb that was in the corridor of one of the buildings i visited for another exhibtion in edinburgh

soft inside

urban fox