The Economist and the Maharani

Have just read the most extraordinary obituary in The Economist about the Maharani of Jaipur. Reads as though it was written in the 30s! Would love to know who The Economist commissioned to write it - apparently, when she was sent to prison by Indira Ghandi, she poured French perfume into the sewer in her cell; 'As it ran through the building, Asia's largest prison and one of its worst, other prisoners gathered to inhale the wafting vapours, the true scent of royalty.'
Makes me see The Economist in a whole new light!

It's a funny thing, this blogging business. I suppose it's true that one blogs to be read but not knowing whether anyone does read your stuff, and then, even more so, not knowing WHO is reading it can be both daunting and discouraging. Which is why I stopped for a while. But in the last couple of weeks I've been amazed to meet people in very different places, both geographically and in my life, who have seen it and read it so here I am again! I've been tweeting too, mostly inspired by Stephen Fry's tweets - following him to Bayreuth and sharing his joy at the performances there has been a delight - of course when he talks about cricket, I'm lost! But I was reminded of when I was at the NT and Peter Hall was doing the Ring at Bayreuth - the stories were legion but, given the recent legal ruling, probably better not told here! Peter was an amazing man to work for - physically very imposing, he almost always spoke gently and calmly, playing against the sheer charisma that you felt the minute he walked into a room - most of the HoDs had stories of going to see him while you were steaming about something and coming away 20mins later feeling on top of the world,the crisis quite forgotten! Looking back now, it was an extraordinary time in my life! But then, so is now - Jorge from Sao Paulo emails to ask if I'm going to the World Arts Summit in Jo'burg next month and could we meet up; Craig, currently writing the score for a Mark Ravenhill play at his request, rings to see if I can go to Nashville to see his new work there; Elena from Toronto writes to make contact because she's been reading about CIDA - Lee and I have spent last couple of weeks working up CIDA's aims for the next five years - and I find that the DCMS cabinet (no ampersand on phone) is following my tweets - such fun!

Excellent meeting with Keith Arrowsmith, our Company Secretary - he's moved to London (www.sghlaw.com) so we met at the Champagne Bar in St Pancras and had delightful pot of tea! Had lovely long and wide-ranging chat: about using blogs - he apparently gets phoned by journalists about various media stories because his blog makes him visible, as it were - fascinating stuff! The Diageo and Sainsbury story, Alton Towers and Speedos.....very funny and lightens up a more serious week! Also exchanged notes on theatre - he loved Streetcar and I loved The Mountaintop - we were both seeing Arcadia next - he told me of audience research pointing out that majority of concertgoers play instruments themselves so musicians should be less supercilious about amateurs! He tells me that the CEO of a company he's a Director of actually emails Board members every Friday...! Altogether a revitalising and happy chat at end of a not so good day!!

Can anyone Recommend Collaborative Document Working Software?

Can anyone help to point us in the direction of an effective and user friendly site for working simultaneously with colleagues on collaborative documents? Any ideas welcome!

CIDA International

In a flat panic to clear the decks before going on leave for a couple of days - Literally, in the last hour, I have signed an agreement with Young Entrepreneurs in Oporto Portugal to collaborate on a project for young people; sent a formal invitation to the wonderful Decio in Brazil for him to come over and shadow us at work for a month and then for one of my CIDA mentors to go there for a month and do the same with him in SEBRAE, Brazil's nearest equivalent to CIDA; brokered a meeting for Albert Nyathi from Zimbabwe with a fab UK promoter of world music; and introduced Screen Yorkshire to an amazing partnership opportunity with a company who is the main funder of a major Beijing film festival and who are now looking for international partners to set up an exchange training programme -

Well the above paragraph may not be pithy, but my God the work is exciting! -

And now off to rainsodden Devon..................but at least the company will be great!

Help please!

Working on several bids at the moment - great way to spend the summer! (yes yes - what summer?!) anyway, need some help - we all get so confused with the 'versioning' of documents that I am desperate to find some on line system of collaborating that really works and really takes the pain out of all this - thought I'd found the answer with Scribd but then discovered you can't edit on line - so it's not really collaborative at all - are there any other good and user friendly sites - does anyone know? is there anyone out there?

Just another lazy Sunday (19 July 2009)

Albert Nyathi is here - he is a highly acclaimed performance poet and musician from Harare - we worked with him when we were there recently and he has now come to the UK to perform. He is former Director of the Zimbabwe Arts Council and one of Culture Fund's group of artist assessors for their funding programme for new creative businesses. He is a huge personality whose creativity, seriousness of purpose and great sense of fun all burst through simultaneously - a natural leader and hugely popular in Zimbabwe - when we went out with him one evening, we kept being stopped by people coming up to him in real delight at the chance of meeting him. He's coming up to CIDA on Friday as he is keen to discuss the potential for setting up a version of CIDA in Harare - (be still, my beating heart!) - watch this space! And spent yesterday working with Adalet Garmiany, an Iraqi artist introduced to me by Lee C - he's actually from Kurdistan, his father was one of the leaders there, and he is trying to set up an amazing art event in Iraq in November called Post War Art and Cultural Festival - (could perhaps do with re-titling!) - potentially taking the artist Richard Wilson out to do an extraordinary installation (involving the use of oil, real oil!), as well as four other UK artists to work with 10 Iraqi artists, and involving local children, schools etc. Adalet is passionate, intense, utterly committed, well connected and very bright - he's secured a lot of support but needs more money - £150,000 would do the trick if anyone knows anyone! - we spent the day doing budgets - (I get all the good gigs!) - starting at 1030 but we'd (I'd!) had enough by 5pm and so we called it a day but we need to do another day still to get the company finance sorted - The passion and commitment that are characteristic of both Adalet and Albert just bring home to me a couple of thoughts - firstly, confirmation of my experience that artists all over the world are united by a common set of values stronger than anything that you normally see within individual nations; and secondly, how important the arts are in sustaining hope, inspiring the imagination and sustaining the 'spiritual' life of people even in the most appalling of life's circumstances - it's genuinely humbling to work with people like this -