Simon’s Diary

Jun 02 '08
New York City

Hi Everyone! We're all gearing up for Jasper's First Birthday this Saturday, June 7th. And, yep - the time really does whizz by when a small child begins to run your life. He's doing great, currently snoring away during his mid-morning nap, after I oh-so-intentionally got him up at 5.30am. His knowledge of the English language is vast and varied now:
"Jasper, name an important French post-impressionist 19th Century painter"
"Gauguin"
"Jasper, name the controversial cultural movement begun in Switzerland during the First World War"
"Dada"
"And the nickname of the 7th Century Catholic saint who founded Rebais abbey in France?"
"Dado"
"And have you been surfing Wikipedia again?"
"Brr-rrr Ga-Gaa Blip-Blop!"

Genius child - did I mention that I'm his father?

We've been on the road a fair bit, while Megan has been revising for her huge medical school exam this week. Jasper has now been on (I think) 16 airplane journeys, including three round-trips to the UK. This of course keeps my Mum and Dad very happy, (their only grandchild!) but the poor little guy isn't as immune to jet-lag as I thought he may have been. Meanwhile, we've found a new apartment to move to in July. Those of you that know how we have been putting up with this fifth-floor walk-up, with its dainty 78 steep stairs, will be glad to know that the new apartment building has one of those modern new-fangled inventions called an 'elevator' - hurrah! We will miss our roof-deck here though and I have a dozen-or-so outdoor plants needing good homes to go to!

Mar 07 '08
New York City

Cough, cough, (blows cyberdust off Diary page) - well, 2009 isn't quite here I guess. Nevertheless, umpteen apologies for not inventing a machine yet that can pause time, while you kindly fellows catch up on the waffle, banter, kerfuffle and all fine words weird and wacky from this prattling piano-player. Yes, I am now 57 years old and Jasper has finished college. How/what/where/etc the last few months have gone, someone please tell. I can tell you that I have missed sitting down to tap away to you all and that I am very grateful that there are still friends 'hanging in there' on the site!
Meanwhile, Jasper and I have just returned from a three-week trip of concerts in Europe. While I was on the road, he stayed at my Mum and Dad’s place on the Kent coast. Needless-to-say, emotions were high as I cruelly wrenched their only grandchild away from them the other morning, while we embarked on what became a 17 hour trip back to New York – urghh. Now with more than 10 flights in his log-book, Jasper is nine months old today. Blissfully, he’s a mellow sleepy guy on airplanes, and only wakes up to flirt with the air stewardesses. He’s also getting dragged to my concerts now, gradually! I was very proud of him during a house concert I gave in New York recently. Megan sat with him by the door at the back of the room, ready to leap out should he suddenly burst into tears/song/political rhetoric. However, he sat watching me in total silence while I played various Beethoven Sonatas, only proffering the odd “urgle” between movements. Next up, he must learn to reach Nirvana on Sorabji’s 94-day long ‘Opus Clavicembalisticum’. Then again...
And, speaking of Beethoven – Sony Masterworks will be releasing my recording of the Pathetique, Moonlight and Appassionata Sonatas later in the year – hooray! This reminds me to update this website with some more music to listen to – there’ll definitely be the option to buy/listen to stuff soon. I’m off on my own to Barbados this Sunday, where, (forgive me, Jasper) I am looking forward to catching up on some sleep. Poor Megan seems to have med-school exams every other day, but she and Jasper will arrive there next week for Spring Break. Lunchtime now for girth-expanding nine-month olds and more coffee for his weary Dad! Thanks as ever, for all your support. Calling all Mulligang in New York: I’ll be playing at Rockefeller University again on the 28th March; hope to see some of you there?

Sep 05 '07
New York City

Hi Mulligang - hope you've all had a great Summer - is it really over? Jasper is now an ancient 13 weeks old and, (an unbiased father writes) a very cool dude. There are some recent pictures of him on the gallery page. His features change so quickly: I’m quite convinced he had put false eyelashes on this morning when I woke up, and his talon-like fingernails need filing every couple of days. Of course, by “I woke up”, I of course mean when Jasper chooses to wake us, (and probably the neighbours). For him, sleeping only one and a half hour stretches at a time through the night sets him up very nicely for a relaxing 12 hours of sleep during the day, while his increasingly-raddled Mum and Dad attempt to function normally! I’m sure he has picked up these bad habits from Bruno, my Burmese Blue feline back in England, who shares Jasper’s preference for nocturnal one-sided conversation. More recently, Jasper has started singing loudly at dawn. However, which microtonal composition he happens to be quoting at the time he won’t tell.

It was very bizarre to see how much the little guy had grown once I'd returned home from playing with Josh Bell in Taiwan and Korea. A mere four days away and suddenly your newborn child is shaving and off to college. However, it was great to play with Josh again and I had no guilt lolling luxuriously in unbroken sleep during the almost 36 hours of round-trip flights! The concerts were really enjoyable, many fans remembering us from our last recitals there three years ago. Once again, we were lavishly spoiled with fine foods, although this trip we made sure that unrequested boiled dog soup wouldn't be on the table, (sorry, Rover).

It was good to catch up with friends over the Summer. The Leopard and his wife kindly flew over from England to visit for a long weekend and I found myself pretending I knew my way around the city, while in reality I was just another gawky tourist, stopping just short of buying a cockroach-infested hotdog on a street corner. A perfect Martini supped atop the Rockefeller Centre is definitely the best way to enjoy a night view of the city. We also visited friends in Rhode Island and Pennsylvania and it was so relaxing to get away for a couple of weekends. Jasper of course demands more luggage and precision time-keeping than a US President, and you really do wonder how it can take three hours to load/unload a car.

My recording of Ned Rorem’s Second Piano Concerto on Naxos, conducted by Jose Serebrier will soon be released. It is a wonderful work, devilishly-well written for a 12-fingered pianist, and very atmospherically scored for a huge orchestra – hope you will all enjoy it. In October, I record an exquisite work, Characteristics, composed by my friend and Pulitzer Prize-winner, Paul Moravec. Also watch this space for exciting developments with the jazz quartet’s Playlist album and an album of Beethoven I recorded in Italy recently. Am currently in talks with SonyBMG, and about to decide which grower of organic bok choi to use for my pre-concert dressing room needs; orange M&Ms are so last season.

Jun 09 '07
New York City

Please welcome...........

Jasper Paul Mulligan

to the Mulligang! He was born June 7th, here in New York City, weighing 8lbs 1.2oz. We were expecting him around June 20th, but he decided to join the party early! Megan is well, I'm speechless with happiness and the little guy is a bundle of joy. Pictures to follow, (once clearance has been granted by his team of lawyers). More news soon! Love from us all.

Jun 03 '07
London, Italy, Bulgaria

Sheesh – too long no waffle. Have just returned to scorchingly hot New York (hooray!) where a very patient Megan is due to give birth in a few weeks, (help!) I’ve been away for a month, shopping, lazing around, watching paint dry, etc. The trip started with an annual concert held at London’s Royal Albert Hall by Harrow Young Musicians – a truly unique group of 800+ students, conducted by my good friend and fine conductor Mark Gooding. The concert featured the music of Gershwin, a lot of which Mark and I had arranged for the various groups to play. Despite today’s streamlined methods of communication, it turned out that bashing notes down the transatlantic dog’n’bone to oneanother worked out best! During the concert, while I was playing the second movement of the Gershwin concerto, I shall never forget the swell of literally hundreds of musicians filling the hall with ‘the big tune’. It was also a privilege to play alongside the incomparable presence of baritone Keel Watson and trumpeter Guy Barker, who truly raised the bar on Miles Davis’s interpretations of the ‘Porgy and Bess’ melodies.
The following week I recorded a new cd in the Italian town of Sacile - home of the Fazioli Piano factory and exquisite Fazioli concert hall. Jaques Samuel Pianos of London have been good friends for many years, (my Steinway beast is from there), and they kindly organised the trip. We were there to record some little-known Beethoven tunes: the C-minor WoO 80 variations, Opus 57 ‘Appassionata’, ‘Pathetique’ sonata opus 34 and the ‘Moonlight’ sonata, opus 27. Warning: muso-waffle ahead! Beethoven didn’t provide the nicknames ‘Appassionata’ or ‘Moonlight’. ‘Moonlight’ came to stick after a critic pictured the opening movement as moonlight reflecting on Switzerland’s Lake Lucerne. ‘Appassionata’ was tacked on by a publisher, at the printing of a 4-hand version of the sonata some ten years after Beethoven’s death. Of course, now we all know that Beethoven really called his opus 57 sonata ‘the hot frittata’. An unforgettable moment occurred during the recording when the engineer “somehow” (I will never know as he never told me), managed to erase an entire session’s work (cue: muted trombone wail). This meant re-recording a whole sonata - d’oh! (Actually “d’oh” was the most polite word on my mind at the time). Aside from this, it was a wonderful experience, recording my favourite composer’s music in such great surroundings.
Most recently, I went for the first time to Sofia, Bulgaria, at the invitation of Alexis Weissenberg, who was born there. The French director Alain Casabona, (who made the documentary “I Like Music” about Weissenberg’s life), organised a week of various events and I felt very honoured to be asked to give a recital for a gala evening at the Philharmonic hall. I performed Weissenberg’s ‘Sonate en Etat de Jazz’ and Beethoven’s ‘hot frittata’ sonata, and finished up improvising on some Weissenberg songs, written for his opera ‘La Fugue’. The concert was filmed and there were many musicians in the audience, simply curious to hear Weissenberg’s music for the first time. As well as being a master musician and composer, Alexis has also created dozens of collages over the years, depicting various musical and musicians’ predicaments in a bitingly satirical way. These were exhibited just outside the hall and are now on permanent display in the re-named “Foyer Alexis Weissenberg”. It was a very moving week too, particularly to see Alexis being presented with Bulgaria’s top cultural medals of honour and various awards. He continues to be the dude of dudes, and it was great to see so many of his friends, particularly his daughters Maria and Cristina again. I gave several interviews for radio and television, the most memorable of which was appearing on Bulgarian breakfast tv. Following on from me were a group of gypsy political activists expressing their views with a Korg synthesizer, wailing and a honking clarinet – fun but surreal! I was touched to receive huge bouquets of flowers from the Bulgarian President and Minister of Culture, which I gave to a local hospital for new Mums and babies, at the suggestion of Alexis’s friend Dominika. Alas, no time to be the Brit tourist, as it bucketed with rain all the time. Hope I can go back soon.
Now it’s good to be in the crazy heat of Manhattan, awaiting the arrival of in a couple of weeks. Yep, he has been given a name, and we’re pretty sure we’ll stick to it once he’s born. Then again, we might just look at him and say “He looks more like a Dingbat Archibald to me”.

Mar 22 '07
New York City

These past few days I've been on 'stroller inspection' in our local park. Yep, the little guy is soon to be making some noise on planet Earth and it was time to research, delve into and generally compose a four-act opera and thesis on the joys of buying a stroller/carry-cot/car-seat/all-in-one baby transportation system. What is a bassinet? Is it a slightly smaller member of the bass clarinet family? Eegads, the sheer choice for buying a baby stroller here, let alone the planet of products that is BabiesRus is overwhelming! Back in my day, (cue 'old fart' music), you got your pram, (mine was suspiciously similar to the one in "Rosemary's Baby": black and ominously omenous) and the choice was 'square' or (at extra cost) round wheels. I'm sure that was it. When you grew too big for the pram, too bad, your growth would be stunted. Not that I can remember of course, but I'm meant to be 6'2". Rest assured, while Megan has been ticking the boxes towards becoming a brain-surgeon at medical school, I have NOT spent many months looking into which model and in which subtle hue of uber-trendy urban titanium-finish the Mini-Mulligan stroller will be, unlike some parents-to-be that really do seem to lose sleep over this, according to the various websites I've skimmed through! BUT, then again, being a slightly style-conscious bloke from London, our little guy is not going to be seen by his fellow newborns in anything but the most over-the-top mobile metropolis, complete with SatNav and tea-maker attached. Incidentally, the neighbourhood where we live is truly the "Dog and Baby Zone" - DAB-Z? "Hi, I've just moved to Dab-z, it's the new Noho-boho-ville" etc etc. It's amazing how you do suddenly notice all these strollers when you're a Dad-to-be on a mission. Three or four wheels? Pirelli or Michelin tyres? Wi-Fi or HDTV-enabled?
After a hot style-tip from my god-daughter Poppy's Ma, I narrowed my sights on a Micralite stroller/carry-cot/all-in-one system, (I really don't think it has a shorter name!) This morning there was victory in the Ebay arena, and a Micralite was nabbed! I shall apologise to our son later on that we did not spend ten squillion dollars on his first stroller. Now I must find out about Armani's tailor-made diapers...