Vegetable garden – Badgers and CD's

keane — Sat, 06 Jun 2009 15:05:01 +0000

We are now well into June so maybe we should give a brief account of what has happened so far in the barganews vegetable garden. I am standing in the garden now* and I can see in front of me 120 plants growing quite happily beneath a bamboo framework that has been erected above them to support their “hopefully” tomato laden future. Further down the row, there is a line of basil growing – for the Pesto, the classic dish from Genoa. Further over into the field there are four lines of maize – an antique variety of corn called Otto File. The name means “8 Row” and is likely a very close descendant of the old—also 8-rowed—corns that would have come over to Europe with Columbus and crew. These small plants are now at risk from the birds who pull up the young plants to get at the seed beneath.

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On the far side of the field are lines of beans of various types - runner and borlotti. Further over are the carrots, finocchi, a couple of types of lettuce, zucchini and cabbages…. and then we come to the disaster area … a strip of black plastic sheeting with holes in at regular intervals out of which should be showing 30 strawberry plants and which at the moment I can see only one visible healthy looking plant. The rest have been frizzled and burnt by the sun.

We put them in at the wrong time and moved them at the wrong time and we’re paying for it now. Most are dead by the looks of things and anyway we put them in precisely the wrong place in the field as at the end of this season when the tractor comes in to turn over the land once again you don’t want those strawberry plants sitting in the middle, they should have been planted somewhere on the side where the tractor can easily move around them. Oh well, it’s a learning process with a steep learning curve.

The electric fence has been working quite happily, only allowing in the porcupines once this week and there is an interesting thing. We keep saying porcupines but so far I have not found one single quill. Generally when they move around, especially if they got shocked and they did get zapped at the start of this month by the electric fence, they would have left one or two porcupine quills on the grass or on the ground. I have not found one. This is making me believe that maybe we are not dealing with porcupines are all but maybe with that other large forager that comes out at dusk – the badger.

The major problem with plants being eaten now seems to come from the air with birds looking to get a free feed.

Its time to think about some scarecrows.

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Carrying on with the idea of reusing old objects. A large collection of CD’s by The Barga Band “The Songs” has been sitting in my studio for a number of years. I have used one or two of them in a large head sculpture for Halloween which succeeded in scaring a few children so how about using the CD’s as a means of scaring off the birds?

The light bouncing off them as they moving in the wind should be enough to keep the little devils at bay for at least a couple of weeks until the plants are large enough to no longer be in danger.

Back in the archives of barganews from 1993 we find an article about “The Songs” … click on the link above if you want to know what they sounded like.

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On to the next problem to be solved; water … hmm, now this is going to be a hard one.

* I am standing in the garden now ? … what writing this article ? .. well actually, yes.

This has been dictated onto a hand held sound recorder and then transcribed by voice recognition software. No typing at all.

CD launch from Nino Pellegrini

keane — Sun, 19 Apr 2009 21:57:53 +0000

An old friend of barganews readers, Nino Pellegrini was in Barga this afternoon to launch a new CD of his music “Emma e Il Martedì”. The title of the CD gives some idea as to just how personal this latest musical offering from Nino has been – Emma is the name of his daughter and Martedi – Tuesday, the day of the week when he gets to spend some quality time alone with his daughter . The official launch of the CD was held in The Barga Jazz Club – more or less home territory for Nino who has played here many times over the past few years. On stage with him were; Piero Borrion on drums and Andrea Pellegrini on keyboards. Nino’s myspace site can be seen here

Nino Pellegrini, “Emma e Il Martedì”, duo con Andrea Pellegrini, musiche di Nino Pellegrini, Andrea Pellegrini, Luca Flores e altri, Studio Vinile, Livorno 2009

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E’ uscito il nuovo cd di Nino Pellegrini, “Emma e il Martedì”, in duo con Andrea Pellegrini.
Dopo molti anni di collaborazioni che l’hanno visto al fianco di decine di musicisti jazz in una ventina di dischi, Nino Pellegrini pubblica il suo primo cd con proprie composizioni in duo con il fratello e compagno di lavoro da molti anni, Andrea Pellegrini.
Oltre alle musiche di Nino Pellegrini, anche brani di Luca Flores e Andrea Pellegrini.
Commenti di Michela Lombardi, Tino Tracanna e altri. Note di copertina di Nino e Andrea Pellegrini.

Il cd è reperibile a ogni concerto di Nino Pellegrini (tel. 380 77 77 744).

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Ha studiato contrabbasso classico con Paolo Tommasi e Jazz con Paolino Dalla Porta, Furio Di Castri, Bruno Tommaso.
Nel 1994 e ’95 ha vinto due Borse di Studio presso la Scuola “Siena Jazz”, all’interno della quale ha fatto parte del Gruppo di Musica di Insieme di Enrico Rava e della Big Band di Giancarlo Gazzani. Ha partecipato a Seminari Internazionali organizzato dall’Associazione Siena Jazz con Marc Johnson, con Borsa di Studio, ed ai Seminari Internazionali della IASJ (International Association Schools of Jazz) del 1997. Nel ’94 e ’95 ha vinto due Borse di Studio per il Corso triennale di Alta Qualificazione Professionale per Musicisti di Jazz e Derivazioni Contemporanee conseguendo il relativo titolo Cee – Post Diploma di “Esecutore di Musica Jazz e Derivazioni Contemporanee”. Ha suonato con l’Orchestra Nazionale Giovanile di Jazz diretta da Bruno Tommaso e Giancarlo Gazzani con la quale ha svolto tra l’altro un Tour con James Newton, Palle Daniellson, Peter Erskine, John Taylor.

Ha suonato in numerosi festival e sale da concerto come:
Clusone Jazz Festival, Festival Jazz di Palermo, Festival Jazz di Waren (Germania), Festival Jazz di Pavia, Grey Cat Festival di Grosseto, Fiera Della Musica di Ferrara, Siena Jazz Festival, Firenze – Toscana Music Pool, Roccella Jonica, Anfiteatro Jazz di Lucca, Barga Jazz, Jazz In Forte (Forte Dei Marmi), Parma Jazz Frontiere, Parigi Duc de Lombards, Terni in Jazz, Bologna, Festival Jazz Cosenza, Montescudaio Jazz, Tokyo e Niigata (Giappone) per istituto italiano di cultura in Giappone, Locarno jazz festival del Cinema, Francoforte e Monaco di Baviera (Germania) ecc.

Attualmente insegna contrabbasso jazz presso la Scuola di Musica Bonamici di Pisa dal ’96, dal ’98 Teoria musicale, Armonia, storia del jazz e Basso e Contrabbasso Jazz e Musica di Insieme presso il Laboratorio Musicale di Rosignano e dal 2007 alla scuola comunale di musica di Donoratico (LI).

E’ leader del progetto “12 Contrabbassi + 1″, ensemble di 13 contrabbassi con cui esegue repertorio di standards e altri brani intorno agli stili del jazz. Suona tra gli altri con il Quinitetto di Livorno con Tino Tracanna e Andrea Pellegrini, con l’Ensemble Ainulindale con Paul MCCandless e molti altri gruppi.

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Vegetable garden – Badgers and CD's

CD launch from Nino Pellegrini