Hair

Ever since I can remember, I have been concerned about my hair. Even in early childhood I battled to tame my mane of dark, thick, wavy, curly hair that was so unlike the straight, fair hair I so admired on the heads of my friends at school and in the London neighbourhood where I grew up. My mother claimed that she used to find clumps of hair that I had cut off and stuffed behind the mirror in the bedroom I shared with my sisters, but I have no recollection of abusing my hair in this way as a child.

As time went by and I grew up and, with the help of various hairdressers, became more able to manage and accept my hair it ceased to be the bane of my life and was even considered attractive.

But now that I am in the sere and yellow leaf of my life (to crib from Macbeth) my hair has assumed a less prominent role in my daily existence, though I generally do my best to keep it clean and tidy.

Easier said than done. When I’m at home I have my hairdressing routine with the tried and trusted hairdresser who has attended to my recalcitrant curls for many years now. But spending two months away from home creates problems in the hairdressing department.

When we first spent time in rural France I went to the hairdresser in the nearby small town (or large village), where an energetic lady of middle age supervised two beautiful young ladies who washed customers’ hair while she attended to the more complex tasks of the hairdressing profession. There I sat alongside the wives of the local farmers and tradesmen while the owner conducted lively conversations with everyone around her. Whenever a customer paid at the desk it was customary for her to drop a few coins into a glass jar placed adjacent to the till. At the sound of the tinkling coins the two young ladies would chorus ‘Merci Madame,’ to everyone’s gratification. Unfortunately, the efforts of the hairdresser to produce a satisfactory result on my head by means of what she called ‘un petit brushing,’ left me almost in tears, and after I’d had to wait for an hour to be attended to even though I had made an appointment I decided that this establishment would no longer enjoy my custom.

But getting to a hairdresser in rural France in the middle of summer is no light matter. Another local establishment told me they were booked up until mid-September, by which time we would no longer be in the area. The mobile English hairdresser who travels around to attend to ladies’ hair in their homes informed me he works on the basis of a wait time of between four and five weeks. So no go there either. This is the time of the year when almost all French people, including hairdressers, go on vacation.

The last resort was the rather formidable establishment in the nearby town which is considered the regional metropolis, with several large supermarkets, shops of various kinds, a garden centre, and a number of restaurants, cafes and bars. I managed to make an appointment over the phone and duly turned up as arranged.

I was treated in an efficient and professional way. I did not have to wait. The establishment was spacious, clean and aesthetic, and my hair was cur in a way that seemed to me to be satisfactory. I may have had to pay more than I bargained for as I was treated to a very pleasant) head massage, probably because I hadn’t quite understood the relevant question. But at least I managed to refuse ‘un petit brushing’ and emerged with my head feeling lighter and my appearance less akin to that of the Wild Woman of Borneo than before. I won’t call it Parisian chic, but at least I feel normal again at last.

Music For All

About ten years ago, when we first started spending part of the summer in rural France, we attended a series of concerts of varying standards and types (mainly classical music) given by visiting musicians in the ancient churches of the region. Some of these were outstanding, and I remember with particular fondness a performance of Allegri’s Miserere given by a choir from an English university. The acoustics of the church enhanced the power and beauty of the voices, and it was a truly inspiring performance. Another concert was given by a group of male singers from Sardinia, whose unique music and style of singing was an interesting but not entirely enjoyable experience.

But suddenly all that came to an end, and was replaced by a series of concerts entitled ‘The Noise of Music’ (Le Bruit de la Musique), and noise it certainly was. I attended one of the concerts, which was given in our local church. The place was filled to the rafters with an audience of people eager to hear this kind of experimental music. To my ears it was a mixture between a cacophony and some form of Chinese torture, but it was enthusiastically received by the audience.

All concerts stopped for a year or two during the epidemic, but now the experimental music performances have resumed with a vengeance. A few days ago the church near our house turned out to be too small to accommodate all those who wanted to attend the concert, so the doors were left open and the ‘overflow audience’ stood outside to listen. We could hear all manner of thumps, bumps and bangs emanating from there, but at least we could close our doors and windows and so avoid hearing more.

The following concert was moved to the larger venue of the open field next to the Mairie in the centre of the village. Tents were erected, food and drink was served, and before we knew what had happened our sleepy, remote, semi-deserted little village had become the focus of a major happening, attracting devotees from all over France (and even beyond it possibly).

Some consolation for those of us who are lovers of classical music (‘melomanes’ in French) is provided by the annual visit of a group of musicians from the Paris Symphony Orchestra who come to this part of France, where they have family connections. Each year these first-rate musicians prepare several programmes which include, inter alia, adaptations and arrangements of orchestral pieces introduced in a relaxed and conversational way by their leader, who is a cellist.

This year, for example, they gave some ten concerts in different venues in the region. We attended three of them, and were treated to Vivaldi’s Four Seasons and Mozart’s clarinet concerto at two of them. The third concert was devoted to music from films, but this consisted primarily of music by Mozart, Beethoven and Brahms, concluding with a moving rendition of the theme from Schindler’s List.

So our time in France continues to pass pleasantly and in an interesting fashion.

Mary Churchill’s War

Mary Churchill, youngest daughter of Winston, was just sixteen years old in 1939 when she started writing her diary. She starts her entries with rather typical and trite comments about being sixteen, and her concerns are those of a person of tender years. But Mary was no ordinary teenager (a term that was not in general usage at the time), and as her father was involved in politics, she followed his lead and interested herself in the events of the day.

For Mary, Winston was not a distant figure but a very beloved and admired father, who also showed affection towards her. Her mother, the beautiful and intelligent Clementine, was the dominant figure in the home, together with her mother’s cousin, known as Nana, who served as Mary’s nanny. It is tempting to try to regard Mary as just another teenager growing up in an ordinary family, but how can anyone be considered ordinary if their home is the stately home of Chartwell and her parents’ friends and acquaintances are leading politicians from both Englnd and abroad?

Still, like many girls of her age and social class, Mary loved riding her horse and was preoccupied by her religious beliefs, her schoolwork and her friends. But as the situation in Europe grew grimmer and the threat of war began to hover over England Mary begins to consider her future. She rejects the idea of going to university as she wants to remain close to her parents, writing: ‘I am enthralled by the magnitude of Papa’s brain and personality. I fear I have not appreciated him sufficiently or loved him till just lately – but now my heart has been awakened and thrilled and I am torn between pride and a deepening and ever increasing love for him,’ showing considerable maturity and insight for a girl of her age. However, only a few weeks earlier she writes: ‘I have come to the frightful conclusion that (a) I am insincere (b) a coquette (c) I bite my nails (d) I think too much about myself. Reform is needed and I am determined to be more natural and nice.’

One cannot help but admire the girl’s sincerity and honesty. Growing up in a household where politics was the driving force it is hardly surprising that Mary was concerned about reports in the newspapers criticizing her father, and very much took to heart the various political skirmishes and infighting that characterized politics then and now. A slew of newspapers were doubtless delivered to the house every day (unlike the single newspaper in the average home of the time), and Mary’s life was obviously far from average. She lunches in London with her mother and various relatives, meeting Dr. and Mrs. Julian Huxley, for example, then goes to the zoo for a ‘private audience’ with the baby giant panda, concluding with a visit to the House of Commons where, from the Speakers Gallery, together with her mother, she watches and hears part of the debate about conscription. Only a few months later war is declared and, after a brief interlude, her father becomes Prime Minister. For Mary this means moving to 10 Downing Street and also spending weekends at Chequers while her beloved Chartwell has to be closed up and abandoned.

As the war proceeded Mary, together with her close friend Judy Montagu, joined the ATS and was posted to anti-aircraft battery duty. Army life was not easy for the cossetted child of English aristocrats, but she was determined to do what had to be done and in fact excelled in fulfilling her duty. As the war continued Mary still managed to enjoy life, whether on leave or at weekends, when she was often wined and dined by eligible young men, went to parties and night clubs, quaffed champagne and ate caviar and other delicacies. How she managed to do this during wartime, when food was rationed and blackouts prevailed, is beyond me, but the diary entries record all this as happening, together with shopping expeditions to Harrods and tea at Fortnum and Masons.

Affairs of the heart also concern Mary greatly during the war years, and she enjoys the company of English as well as American servicemen, spends time in France and Canada as aide-de-camp to her father, meets President Roosevelt and many other prominent personalities, and is an eye-witness to events that changed the course of world history.

The book of Mary Churchill’s diary ends as the war comes to an end, and jubilant crowds, including Mary, celebrate outside Buckingham Palace. In a note at the end, Mary’s daughter, Emma Soames, writes that just two days after ending her romance with one suitor Mary gets on the train taking her from Paris to Rome, having briefly met Christopher Soames, the junior Military Attaché at the British Embassy in Paris. On an impulse, young Soames jumped onto the train taking Mary to Rome to visit her sister, and by the time they arrived in Rome Christopher had proposed and been turned down. He proposed again, on the steps of St. Peter’s Basilica, and was accepted.

And so, as we now know, the young girl who embarked on writing a diary at the age of sixteen, continued to have a happy and fulfilled life. Together with Christopher Soames, she had five children, wrote books, was involved in public life, and died at the age of ninety-one. The account of her life as the daughter of a distinguished man is fascinating and surprisingly well written.

An Unbeatable Experience

My family’s association with soprano Ilona Domnitch goes back many years, to the 1980s, when my parents moved to Israel and were active in the activities of Bnai Brith there. One of the projects which that organisation undertook at the time was to help new immigrants from Russia integrate into Israel. One of those recipients of aid was a teenager called Ilona who, as a new immigrant, was unable to pay for the books and equipment required by the music academy high school she attended.

To cut a long story short, when the aid from Bnai Brith came to an end my father, whose sole income was his pension from England, found ways of helping the young woman to further her career. Today, Ilona is an established singer, based in London and performing all over the world.

When we were in London a few weeks ago, at the height of the horrendous heatwave there, Ilona came to our hotel to see us and said that she would be singing the very demanding title role in Puccini’s opera Tosca. It transpired that one of the performances would be at a music festival in the Correze region of France, not far from where we would be spending part of the summer. France is a very large country so ‘not far’ involves driving more than two hours in either direction. But we decided to make the effort and undertake the journey in order to attend the performance, which was to take place in the grounds of the Chateau de Saillant.

On the appointed day we packed a picnic and set off in good time to get to the place, enjoy our food and attend the performance, having been forewarned by Ilona. To our surprise, we found that we were the only people who had brought their own picnic along, everyone else queued up at the very elegant stall providing drinks and finger food. The queue for service was very long, making us feel smug at having brought our own provisions.

The performance took place in a converted barn in the grounds of the Saillant chateau, with a central stage and seating on three sides of it. The production took the limitations of space into account, and the orchestral part was played by the very capable pianist Bryan Evans on a Steinway grand. Each and every one of the singers was outstanding, with powerful voices and a wealth of expression that would do justice to any major operatic performance.

And of course, Ilona was outstanding as Tosca, a real diva, using her silvery voice to maximum effect and displaying impressive acting ability into the bargain. When she sang her principal aria, seeking mercy from the Lord and invoking her piety and her devotion to art, she managed to display such conviction that it brought tears to many eyes in the audience (including mine).

The reaction of the audience, which included local resident and former President of France, Francois Hollande, at the conclusion of the evening was rapturous. The cast was called back to take a bow at least ten times, the audience stood and clapped, shouting‘ vo!’ for many minutes.

When we left the auditorium and started to leave the grounds, there was Ilona (still wearing her Tosca costume) coming towards us, eager to kiss and hug us as we congratulated her and shared our delight at having been able to hear and see her sing so well. And to crown it all, she made a point of saying that having us there in the audience that night was almost like having Manfred (my late father), to whom she owed so much, there.

What more could anyone ask? It was an unbeatable experience, and the memory of it will continue to delight us for a long time.