Accomplished nonchalance

THIRTY seconds of jazz percussionist James Maddren (ThA, GrW 98-05):



Want more? Try five minutes with the George Hogg Quartet, of which James is 25%:

"You need to draw people in"

TODAY'S Daily Mail invites Bruce Grindlay (Director of Music 01-09) to respond to the Bishop of Croydon's strictures on Christmas carols.

Getting things done

MATTHEW KIMBERLEY (PeB, MaA 91-98) spells it out.

51 more people have been added to the links page during November.

Unpalatable blessings

IN this week's Church Times, the Rev David Bryant (MdA 46-54) thinks over his days at CH.

Best possible Tace

A MASSAGE therapist for horses, dogs and humans, Tace Allen (BaA 89-96) has worked on tour with the cast and crew of Channel 4's Scrapheap Challenge, Incubus, Blazin' Squad, Will Young and Bryan May of Queen - not forgetting the Tweenies Live and Noddy Tours. Currently she's Team GB's sports massage therapist for the IFCS World Dog Agility Championships. Her website is here.

Curiosity, compassion, kindness

PUBLISHER turned literary agent William Miller (LaB 44-53), once jailed for revealing official secrets, has died at 75. Here's his Guardian obituary, plus a tribute by Naim Attallah. (UPDATE: an important correction.)

Journey through a life

BBC Online warmly commends the new book of photos by Chris Steele-Perkins (MdB 56-65). (Among others praising it are Michael Palin, Damon Albarn, Lee Hall, etc.)

Individuality and bravura

NINE remarkable paintings of historic buildings by Nick Plumley (Horsham Staff 67-87, Archivist/Curator until 01).

Bovver boy

A BLOOD-spattered tribute to Bovver, the character played by Leo Gregory (MdA 90-95) in the 2005 movie Green Street (3½ minutes):

Needs must

AT a dinner in New York last month, reported here, the Headmaster announced that

up to 92 new full fee students would be carefully phased in over the next five years in order to help fill the present gap between income and expenditure. He explained that the new full fee students would be admitted at ages 11 and 13 and in the Deputy Grecian year and would be spread evenly among the sixteen Avenue houses and two Grecians' houses. He added that the program was easily reversible once the current cash flow shortage was resolved.

The discussion begins…

Takes all sorts

WHY play your cello in caves, on mountains and on top of cathedrals? Three years ago "extreme cellist" Jeremy Dawson (LaB, LaA 87-94) spoke frankly about his compulsion.

A mentor remembered

THE distinguished mathematician Sir Christopher Zeeman (MdB 34-43) had this to say in The Guardian last week about the late Shaun Wylie, big gun at Bletchley Park and later at GCHQ:

I first went to the lectures on topology by Shaun Wylie to find out what the word meant, and was captured by his enthusiasm. Eventually he supervised my PhD thesis on the subject.

My father had died shortly after I was born, and I had always missed not having one, but Shaun filled that role. He taught me not only about mathematics but also about people, and becoming a serious academic. He was one of the finest people I have ever met.

It must be true, it's in the Mail on Sunday

NOT only has CH shut down due to swine flu, but Big School seems to be attacking Dining Hall…

Repeated today

…if you're quick, that is: Holly Walsh (LHB 92-99) was on The News Quiz on Radio 4 yesterday, and the repeat's coming up at 12.30pm. (Failing that, there's always BBC iPlayer.)

Home turf

BOSTON MANOR is the third album from jazzman Jonny Boston (LaA 82-89).

Known Unto God

AS a wreath is laid once more on the Tomb of the Unknown Warrior - with, for the first time, none of his fellow Great War combatants to witness it - let's remember our own small piece of the story: it was Lt-Col Henry Williams (CH c. 1905-14) who arranged for the exhumation of four unidentified soldiers from the areas of the Somme, Aisne, Arras and Ypres, one of whom was chosen to lie in the Abbey tomb.

Exuberant character

PIONEERING surgeon Simon Cox (LaA 49-59) earns a glowing obituary (be sure to read the comments too).

The inventor's life

…as depicted in the opening 7½ minutes of The Dam Busters (1954), with Michael Redgrave as Barnes Wallis (Wd VII, PeA 1900-04, Treasurer 57-70):

Luminous craft

THERE are beauties to be found on the website of stained glass artist Karim Yasamee (MdB 69-76).

What does Europe look like?

IF anyone knows, Michael Wintle (MdA 62-70) does.

Three generations

AN Old Blue herself, mother of two more (one of them famous) and grandmother of two more: Molly Snow (Florence Maria Eccles, 5's 22-28) has passed away at the age of 98, as Kerren Simmonds (2's 57-66) reports.

Condolences to her family, and to all who miss her.

Intervention-free, pain-free

"I'M a doctor so I knew what there was to be frightened of" - Clare Thormod (4's 75-82) talks about the birth of her son James in 1995 on this page about the Gentle Birth Method.

Soundscape

SHE didn't write this poem and she's not the person reading it, but everything else we hear in this 5½-minute recording is the work of Fari Bradley (BaB 85-92):

O'er hill and down dale

FRANKMUSIK, the pop star who undoubtedly is an Old Blue (Vincent Turner, MaA & GrE 97-04) embarked on his winter tour of the UK yesterday.

A salutary twist to the jobs market

SINCE taking voluntary redundancy from his management consultant job last December, Tim Mukasa (MdA 91-98) has created Freelance Students, "the easiest and most effective way for businesses and private individuals…to connect with talented, enthusiastic and ambitious students for one-off jobs, short-term projects and internships." Recent graduates are welcome too. Front page of the site is a collaborative blog with careers advice and more besides, and now there are forums as well. KillerStartups.com gives it all a positive review.

Our prophet

HUGH SACKER (ColA 35-43), also known as The Prophet Obol, describes his blog as "the last chance saloon of the human species." Composed between June 2005 and October 2006, it culminates with this earnest appeal to the world.

Onward and upward

CONGRATS to Sebastian Scotney (ColB 66-73) whose 9½-month-old LondonJazz has just been hailed by LastMinute.com as one of the capital's Top 10 Blogs.

Welcome

A WARM welcome to everyone arriving here via the link in the latest edition of the CHOBA email newsletter. Hope you find something to interest you.

If you know of any websites, web pages or online videos that would fill some of the gaps in this blog's coverage of Old Blues and other members of the worldwide CH family (I'm well aware of the male-female imbalance and the recent scarcity of items about younger OBs), please let me know.

Not ours?

MANY CH pupils, we're told, believe chart-topper and Brit Award winner Taio Cruz is an Old Blue. But is he?

It's true his name appears on Wikipedia's list of Old Blues, but his own Wikipedia entry says nothing about the school.

Several young Old Blues who would have been contemporary with him at CH have said they don't remember him, and the administrator of the CH Association (now renamed CHOBA) can find no trace of him in the records under either of his supposed "real names", Tayo Oluwaseyi Cruz da Silva and Adetayo Ayowale Cruz Onile-Ere.

Moreover he has this to say about his schooldays "in rural Sussex":

"At that age I didn't even have any concept of colour… It's only now that I look back and think 'Oh, I was pretty much the only black kid in the whole school'".

Doesn't sound much like CH to me.

If anyone reading this is aware of hard evidence that Taio Cruz is indeed an Old Blue, please share it. If not, perhaps it's time we laid this appealing myth to rest.