Making Music

Cheeky chappie we met on a walk through Coton.

For the non-Brits, that's coat-on not cotton. We delight in village names pronounced anything other than the way you spell them.

Whilst between steam festivals and lake swimming, I had a go at restringing Merrick's 12-string. It's been up in the attic for a while, so I ordered the strings online and had a go. First time I've ever restrung a guitar. I don't play them because I find it uncomfortable pressing down on the wires - prefer pianos, but it was really interesting to figure it out and it plays really nicely now.

Earned me a gin and tonic.

Next on the list was tuning Merrick's piano, which belonged to his grandfather. That turned out to be a bit of a riddle.

 

Turns out, Thomas Dawkins & Co. didn't actually make pianos. More likely, they imported them and put their name on as a reseller.

That makes this one extremely difficult to date as we have a serial number but no make, so you can't look it up in the records. Think somewhere between 1890-1920, probably 1900-1910 according to a forum I enlisted for advice. Dragged it into tune though, and had a lot of fun playing it.

That earned me a pint and (sorry piggy) a packet of pork scratchings up the pub.

Old Speckled Hen

Went for a walk around Naseby - well, to the pub - with my friend Jim, which took us past this ancient well.

Asking around about the folklore of it. Took a drive home past Rupert's Lookout and Fairfax's Lookout. The Battle of Naseby was a decisive defeat of the Royalist forces during the English Civil War in 1645. It's just the next village up from ours.

Rupert's View - Royalist Forces

Fairfax's View - Parliamentarians/Roundheads