My seventieth year begins…

It’s not my seventieth as a performer although I think in my very early years I discovered the calling.  My debut leading role in the Sunday School drama ‘Little Tuck’s Dream’ (I was little Tuck and five years old) propelled me into a life of loving the ring of laughter and applause. So I guess I can claim this is my sixty-fifth season in my seventieth year.

But that’s enough of that.  The season has started and I am writing this in the lorry at the Hereford Steampunk Festival in the intriguing and historic Hereford Waterworks Museum.  And a cold, blustery and wet start it was with a thus-far unnamed Storm disrupting set up day and a very difficult access problem, eventually solved by a friendly woman with a tow bar who was able to hook up the trailer and we manhandled it into the right space so the real business could start.

The Hereford Steampunk Festival is a noble affair supported by the great and good of the Steampunk world.  I love all things Steampunk.  The people are warm-hearted, eccentric, imaginative folk who have found a niche in this meeting of all things quirky Victorian with Jules Verne science fiction, and a touch of Philip Pullman for good measure.  I hope I don’t sound patronising. I don’t mean to be. A fabulous melange and some superb costumes, concepts and contraptions.  Last night I co-hosted an evening of such performance with my good friend and steampunk entertainer Greg Chapman and a superb, if sadly under-supported event it was.  The forty or so steampunk souls were rather swallowed in the cavernous and impressive Hereford Shire Hall, but it made no difference to the power, creative energy and genius of those performing on the programme.  The soiree was a rip-roaring success, topped by a solo performer whose extraordinary talent, musical virtuosity, raw energy and profound observation of humankind took us away from our daily struggles and strife.  Captain of the Lost Waves.  Google him, Youtube him but best of all go to a live event where he performs.  When I first saw him, whatever I was expecting from this diminutive, top-hatted soloist rapidly vaporised as his energy, musicality and genius emerged.  He worked the tiny crowd and by the end we all danced with him, accompanied him to this other world seduced by wry perception, superb tunes and rhythms and sheer exuberance for life.

It is by witnessing such talent that makes me understand, yet again, why I am in this business.  And although the aging coil aches in places where it used to play, I find I can still amuse with all the strange antics in my repertoire so I shall carry on.  I have told friends and family, and I tell you all here, that I shall give it all another five years before taking some time to contemplate the following five.  At this time of life, contemplating eras in bunches of five years seems sensible and profoundly pragmatic.  Not that I’m known for my sensible nature.  Although I said I wouldn’t, I have resurrected the three chair balance and it is there, beckoning with a strange somewhat macabre look on its face…

I also have a new dance.  Inspired by the fabulous and nostalgic film Stan and Ollie, I have found a choreographer prepared to stifle her sniggers and teach me a few moves.  Set to Maff Potts’ short, sweet celebration of his son Herbie’s birth, it finishes off the third show of the day.  I would welcome your critique of it.  Anyway I love dancing it so I hope that comes over even if I will not be winning Strictly with it.

And some new close up magic and last, but by no means least, the addition of Martin Orbidans and live music to accompany the show.  Persuaded back from early retirement in faraway exotic Eastern lands, Martin brings his amazing musical virtuosity to the show this summer.  I look forward to my seventieth year and sixty-fifth season with enormous pleasure and anticipation and look forward to seeing you somewhere during it.

All the best from a road near you,

Mr Alexander

Santa’s Magical Farm

There are times when I wonder what I am doing in this business.  Perhaps it happens to everyone.  A seminal moment - you look around, shake your head and say, 'What on earth am I doing here?’

I am in a small petting zoo just outside Hawarden in Flintshire.  It is deep and dark December and bitterly cold. I have just set up the show in a corner of a marquee which I am sharing with a vintage fire engine.  It is slightly surreal.  There is no-one here except a very occasional toddler in a push chair on their way to Santa’s grotto.  I have a friend who is down to do a circus workshop in the marquee next door.  We take it in turns to return to the caravan to warm up. But at least we do have a place to warm up.  There are a number of stallholders who are behind trestle table in other marquees with no heating and no-one to sell to.  They have probably paid to be here on the promise of the footfall of thousands.  So really there’s nothing to complain about.  The time will pass.  I will be paid.  We have a caravan to warm up in and a kettle for tea.

Well the above is now firmly in the pre-Christmas past and a dull memory to be filed in the folder 'Gigs I’d rather not remember’.  And that folder is thankfully not very full.  Most of my gigs are wonderful, and some are spectacular.  There’s a welsh word which means more than glorious – ‘bendigedig’ - just saying it makes you feel good, especially if you smile at the same time. So I always have a few bendigedig gigs, though as adjectives follow nouns in welsh it ought to be gigs bendigedig.  Anyway enough of that.

I drove down to Burgundy for Christmas via the Eurotunnel to spend a week with my sister who now lives in isolated splendour in Southeastern France. I ate and drank far more than anyone should and whiled away the hours with twelve others, including four children, the sons and daughters of my sister’s children.  I think that makes me a great uncle, though I can’t be sure.  It was a good opportunity to practise some closeup magic. It was fun.  The drive was epic and I scared the bejesus out of one french driver as, after six and a half hours driving I felt good as I was nearly there and came out of a little village onto the left hand side of the road and cursed the driver coming towards me on the wrong side of the road.  I did realise just in time and swerved back to the right, but not before he made a very Burgundian gesture at me.  Poor man.

And the new website is about to be launched.  I did it myself on Squarespace and quite enjoyed the process.  The front page photo was taken at Widnes in October and makes the set and the lorry look splendid in the late September sunshine.

And we are now in the down time.  For me this year and almost ever for the first time I’m not feeling too down.  Partly because I’ve cleared up a few debts this year and therefore have fewer financial worries.  Partly as summer 2019 is already looking very full and with some new shows, including a long boat trip down to the sunny Guernsey in August for their West Show.  A slow boat but I love boat trips and an overnight cabin on the way back.  I’m really looking forward to that.

And Martin Orbidans is making a very welcome return this summer.  He will be with me from June to August and will be accompanying all the shows.  He has made a compete recovery from everything he was suffering from and we are planning some new routines integrating him even more fully into the shows.

All in all, it is looking good. So after the pre-Christmas tale above of ‘What am I doing here?’ it is now clear.  In my seventieth year I shall continue to present shows at all my favourite events and any new ones who would care to book me.  And continue to develop new ideas and routines for them.  And I look forward very much to seeing you all again later in the year.

All the best from a road near you,

Mr Alexander

D Day again

Another visit to Southsea in November and one of my favourite visiting spaces, the D Day Museum car park on Clarence Esplanade, with the wind and rain lashing the lorry.  Just a literal stone’s throw from the Solent but feeling like a boat rocking on it.  The occasional roar of the Isle of Wight hovercraft passing in the long dark. I find it comforting though I guess many might not like the physical fragility of this travelling life.  I love it.  It reminds me of the impermanence of everything.  I like keeping the rain out as it tries insistently to dribble in to the living space. And stuffing socks into gaps where the wind whistles through.  And my life-saving, god-sent woodburner churning out the dry warmth and cracking and tinging as it does the magic, dries the towels and cheers the soul.

Other magic too.  I don’t even need to leave the cocooned warmth of my life pod to trudge across the weather-whipped carpark to shove pound coins in to the machine.  One click on the app, three numbers of the CVC and it’s found me, charged my card and saved the receipt for tax reckoning day.  And all for only an extra 20p a shot.

Talking of tax reckoning day, I’ve just spent the most tedious days of my year doing mine for 2017/18.  The only joy involved is the memory of the events passed, the props purchased or the teeth fixed. (I am in that wonderful profession where I can set dentistry and haircuts as a legitimate expense – you wouldn’t like a toothless hairy Mr A, now would you?) I don’t think I’ve ever had the accounts away from my desk in November before.  It’s so often been a mad dash to the post on Christmas Eve.  Pity the poor accountant coming in after the break to that mail bag.  But then, they did decide to become accountants…

And tomorrow a radio interview.  Not just ANY radio, but the BBC World Service, the programme Outlook and the broadcast day, Christmas Day.  Another step in my plan for international fame, and all arising from Rhys Edwards’ fabulous film on National Geographic. If you’ve not seen it check it out here –

https://www.nationalgeographic.com/video/shorts/a-look-at-the-whimsical-life-of-a-traveling-showman/

The World Service reporter AND a photographer (it comes to fame when you have a photographer too) are coming down to Portsmouth tomorrow for the recording in my lorry alongside Nelson’s Victory at the Historic Dockyard.  All my Great British goosebumps will be jostling…

Arriving at the Historic Dockyard but, this year, no worming my way through to the pleasant but hidden Second Sea Lord’s residence where previously I have been sited. No, this year, THE gate is opened and here I am nudged up alongside the majestic Victory with all its history, the awe and wonder of that classic bark. 

It must rank among the best locations.  No, it really is THE best.

And a good interview.  Listen on Christmas Day.  Just before AND just after The Queen.  Hey twice in one day, or so the lovely Mariana, producer of the World Service told me.  A young lady of considerable talent for her meagre years.  Expert at handling the recorder and at encouraging me to talk.  I can’t wait to hear the result. Another chapter in the white book.

All the best from a historic battleship near you,

Mr Alexander