Cheryl Beer's European Diary

A Song Writer's View of Lake Lucerne, Switzerland

2012-01-02T09:55:00.000-08:00

Imagine it is 6am, not a great time for musicians, trust me! Usually just going to bed! But up and out into the cold air, which embraces like an early morning dip in a polar bear's hunting hole! Magical, yet frost bitten! Huddled in the bus with warm woollen knits, waiting...

and then in that early morning haze, to be so incredibly awestruck by the magnificence of the world's simple pleasures! Whilst sat on the boat, gliding across the silvery water, cutting through the mist like a knife through soft butter ... I write this to the sweet strum of my ukulele...

That I

A scrap of nothing

A scraggamuffin from nowhere

Should see this wistful mist

Smoke curdling

Glass like shimmer

The clouds mirrored

Wrapped around mountain peaks

The immensity of space

The slowness and stillness

Of peaceful pace

The icy lake morning

Kissed through my face

The worry of the day

Now replaced

By the gentle break

And me,

The breeze from nowhere

Of nothing

Should in this moment

See everything at once

My tears

Welled from the same spring

Bring me closer to myself

Than I have ever been

Clean from within

Broken free

From all expectation

The Captain of my own moment

Me, a scrap of something

Part of this

Nature's kiss

A blissful parting

From that which has laid

Un-rested

The suns own daughter

Tested

Shining now

A beacon

for the tomorrows I shall live

From this moment

A Tour Poem for an Australian Friend

2011-12-31T08:55:00.000-08:00

Whilst on tour we met lots of wonderful people from many parts of the world, all with their intricate stories.

One woman from Australia told me about an Aunt of hers' in the UK who was very elderly and thought she had no family. Then her relatives from Australia found her ... it inspired me to write this ...

Counting pounds

Pennies played

Life's bills still unpaid

81, 82, 83 ...

With nothing

But the moths from her purse

To keep her company

Her mind's eye wanders

To sun cut skies

How time flies

Now others watch

Their loved ones play

Their children laughing

But not she ...

81, 82, 83

Alone, apart

A longing lost

Within her heart

No postcards from

Dream like climes

Now falling on harder times

The morning mist monotomous

Cutting through her day

Then, just when

Her wishes fade to nothing

Like the colours of the sun

The clouds lift ...

And one by one

Lost actors

Dance upon her stage

She knows them not, and yet

She has known them always

For their eyes

Are her eyes

They share the same blood

Heart full

They dance and sing

And bring down under

To her front door

Alone no more

Her heart melodic

With the riches

That her purse ignores

She bathes her last years

In the oppulence of kinship

Stunning Outside Sculpture Gallery at Laguna, Switzerland

2011-12-31T08:25:00.000-08:00

Poetic Thought:

Why not

Make every space

A beautiful place to be?

A People's Gallery

Wistful walkways

Where sculptures

Please the passers by

With lakeside views

And mountain skies

Touring Thoughts! We are one of the SAME!

2011-12-30T14:46:00.000-08:00

Extra thoughts written in my little book whilst on the tour in Europe …

What strikes me is how we are all the same! Our streets, systems, order, our shared sense of routine. We all eat at the same times, wear the same clothes, sleep in the same way.

We all have the same name, letters different maybe, but a short tag in a slightly different flavour; Children walking in snake like lines 2 by 2 as if slithering into Noah’s Ark, conforming in the same way, non-conforming in the same way; pick pocketing in the same way. A cast iron cauldron of global ingredients from the same family with slightly changed texture or taste, size or symmetry.

We all live in houses, drive cars, cycle bikes. We all have glass windows, front doors, personal belongings. We all have family, friends and loved ones. We all have the same hands and feet. We may live and die in different countries but we do it in the same way.

So the question is why do we want to focus on being so utterly different from one another? Same blood, same earth under our feet, same sun, moon, sky, stars.

Why can we not celebrate being the same?

Just imagine if we all woke up one morning and collectively thought, ‘My word, we are all the same!’ The consequence of this would be immense. If we are all the same, then we are all part of the same one and if we are all part of the same one then why would there be a reason to hurt ourselves? There would be no justice for fighting, stealing or beating ourselves; no explanation for jealousy hatred or loathing for where is the use in expressing these things to another if they are the same and part of us?

Some animals already get it! Take the bee colony. It understands that it is ONE or the dolphin; she swims as one with the ocean, or the tree that grows at one with the soil. It doesn’t go out of its way to cause the soil pain. Why would it!

Any creature that believes itself to be more important than the universe is at risk of self destruction. It is conceited to think we are the keepers of the earth. We are not keepers, we ARE the earth. It is almost too big for us to comprehend that we are so small.

Green, yellow,

red, orange, brown,

but still leaves

Still falling, falling

Strumming & Humming in Paris

2011-12-30T13:34:00.000-08:00

Our last stop, Paris!

Joining the street performers at The Trocadero was something I had wanted to do since visiting Paris 20 years ago! So it felt very special indeed, humming and strumming whilst gazing down at The Eiffel Tower, negotiating the traffic to stroll under L’arc De Triumph, finding the Cafe Rouge where I did a short set before running at top speed to catch our bus out to the cheaper side of Paris, Clichy, where we were staying. As we ran along rue de la 'something or other' I turned to my left and found

I was walking down the street alongside Paul O’ Grady! He looked beautifully tall and sleek like a Siamese cat. I didn’t speak to him, I felt like it would have been an invasion of his space.

We missed our bus and sat catching our breath on the steps of the Grand Opera House when a black limo and police pulled up. A very important looking woman got out followed by TV cameras. We got up and moved around the side of the Opera House and stood by some railings.

I could hear singing and chanting coming closer, and with that, 100’s of people of all different ages and from all different walks of life, came down the road together with banners, protesting against cruelty to animals. They stopped to do a street performance in the middle of the main road. The front row stopped quite literally in line with me at the break in the barriers. Some teenage girls were in the front and were beckoning me to join them, ‘Vien ici!’ and before I knew it I was in the front line chanting and singing with everyone else! I really got a sense, as in Amsterdam, that people are coming together to make change happen. There is something very powerful indeed about people power.

And so my dream tour concluded with the bundling of everything back into the bus and back to old Blighty. It took me about 2 weeks to settle back into being home. Off course, it always lovely to walk through your own front door, make a cuppa, snuggle into your bed, but there is something equally as soothing in being away from the structures of everyday life, no phone, no internet, just music, travel, writing and song. I can feel in my blood and in my bones that it won’t be long before the next adventure!

There'll be blue birds over .....

Poetry in Pisa

2011-12-30T13:21:00.000-08:00

We took time out to zip to Pisa! How can you go to Italy without seeing it! I have been enthralled by it since I first saw it in a book as a small child. It was far out! My only feeling was that it felt somehow wrong that such a wonderful cultural and historical piece of architecture would be surrounded by so many stalls filled with cheap trinkets and travelling sale people trying to persuade you to buy a hand drum or hand bag! Right outside the gate in a re-furbished old building is Mc Donald’s! Yes, Mc Donald’s! But if you find a quiet place, close your eyes and ignore the ugliness of 21^st Century Capitalise, you can really appreciate the enormity of where you are.

A poem written by Cheryl Beer sat underneath the Leaning Tower of Pisa

Tell the people

We might be built differently

But we won’t fall down

Not until we are ready

Not until it’s our time to fall

Build me a tower

So tall

That Kings and Queens

And one and all

Will travel far

To dress and dine

For Summer time

And Italian wine

With columns built

On wooden stake

Stacked higher than

A wedding cake

And build they did

On marsh soil

Foundations soon

To twist and coil

And sink into the boggy earth

Giving birth …

To a sinking feeling!

Then make it stand

With greater weight

One side to other

Make it straight

So build they did

Columns longer

Weighing more

To stretch it out

From top to floor

But still it beat

Their human thinking

Engulfed by nature

And still sinking

A hundred years

A hundred more

They could not

Stand by and ignore

Their beauty tall

About the land

Losing her height

In soft quick sand

More than a lifetime’s conundrum!

So fill her boots

With heavy lead

Tie her down

Concrete instead

Of wooden piles

For miles they travelled

Wise men a-gasp

To try to stop

Her sinking fast

And then

She

Stopped!

Stood still

Leaning just so far until

She could lean no more …

Without exploding to the floor

And now they queue

Like humans do

To wonder at

This trick of nature

Balanced

A stack of cup and saucers

On the head of the high trapeze

Balanced

A tall giraffe

Bent upon her knees

As if shifted by the breeze

A tower of strength in Pisa

So if you choose

To travel there

Be sure that you take extra care

Buy trinkets sold on market stalls

A keepsake safe

In case she falls

Pisa Thoughts

Build me a tower

To bend and shake

That never falls

And just in case

I trip and make

My own mistakes

Know that I am

Only leaning

When barely seeing

Is still believing

Poem written by Cheryl Beer in the streets of Florence …

2011-12-30T13:11:00.000-08:00

Walk in the steps of Dante

If I walk

With his sandstone

At my side

If I walk

With his limestone

Beneath my feet

If I compose statuesque

A melody so sweet

If I sing for him on cobbled square

Bronzed in marble

Half prepared

Will I walk in the steps of Dante?

If I let go of ink and pen

My mind racing to the page

Then back again

Read my words in different tongues

Less vulgar

Touched by everyone

To change the face of language known

Where greatness painted

Once at home

Will I walk

Will I walk in the steps of Dante?

No …

For my words fall

Like a sideshow

Of cheap trinkets

Sold on bartering streets

Destined to adorn

The fridges and key fobs

Of those whose feet

Will never trace his steps

Florentine Thoughts …

Do the things you love

And trust that the Universe

Will embrace those things with you

Don’t worry whether or not your creativity is good enough;

Embrace that which makes your heart sing and be what you are

Venice & Florence

2011-12-30T12:44:00.000-08:00

I was very excited to go to Italy. The passion, the romance, the pasta!

We arrived in Venice and I was not disappointed! I arranged with the Gondola company to play ukulele and sing on the canals.

So I joined the squeeze box and vocalists and felt like part of their world. Easing our way through thin watery alleyways and manoeuvring around impossible corners, the walls towering around us, held us tight in the now that is also part of yesterday and of Venice tomorrow.

The tourist trade is littered amongst the main streets so we headed off to more secluded spots to chill and busk.

From Venice we went onto Florence, equally as beautiful and where I felt almost re-incarnated! There is something about Florence, I think it’s the history, the centuries of creatives who have fallen in love with it that makes it so very special to me.

To stand alongside some of the most beautiful sculptures on streets walked by ancient poets and artists, and sing is one of the most uplifting things I have ever been part of. Actors outside Dante’s House, Artists painting and musicians feeling every note of every melody in the limestone walkways and sandstone walls. If I were to lose myself in the world, undoubtedly it would be in a little apartment close to Santa Croche Square.

Austria & Switzerland

2011-12-30T12:13:00.000-08:00

We buckled up and made our way to Austria, Innsbruck. It was all systems go for Christmas and many street performers were already set up when we got there.

The in thing in Europe, in terms of street performance, seems to be posing as a statue for many long hours! Some of the artists were outstanding. It must take them hours to prepare and to stand for almost the whole day in the brisk winter sunshine, well I take my hat off to them! For me, I stayed sheltered by the wooden market huts and kept my jumper on, thank you very much!

Austria is very beautiful indeed, again so clean. By this time, I wondered if perhaps our country is actually quite dirty and that is why the litter free crisp and pristine streets were such a surprise to me!

There are smoking cafes in Austria for those who want to have a drink and a ciggie. That seems like quite a good compromise to me. That down a back lane, smokers can huddle together in the warmness of a bar to have a quick cuppa and a puff, rather than have to loiter in the cold and drop their butts on the floor!

If I thought Austria was beautiful I was in for more sharp intakes of breathes when we got to Switzerland! Maybe more so because I hadn’t really known what to expect. I love the way that they make spaces into beautiful places, with art work and sculpture so that artefacts that we would normally insist need to be locked in glass cupboards to stop them being graffiti tagged, are part of street galleries overlooking the most beautiful lakes.

I played on the little balconies overlooking the river which make fabulous performance spaces off the main thoroughfare.

We travelled onto Lucerne to spend the evening. Whilst in town I found a great project called Supentag, which re-distributes the left over food from the hotels and restaurants to re-distribute and raise funds for those who are on a low income. I played ukulele whilst dinners sat in the candle lit tents.

Very early the next morning we made our way to the quayside so that we could see Lake Lucerne in its full glory. It was kissed by the bight sun and the icy fingers of a mist that hovered gently above the still waters. If peace and calm were a place, this would be it! Swans and boats slide together across the water with no effort, even the cold felt magical.

The laid back captain was excited as we were to see the mists rolling on the water in the sunrise. I was completely lost in the moment and as I stepped back to dry land I thought to myself, I am definitely coming back here one day.

The Rhine

2011-12-30T11:54:00.000-08:00

We decided to book a trip down The Rhine ...

Up at the crack of dawn and off down to this very beautiful river. She stood calm and seemingly unperturbed by the human traffic of inquisitive time travellers, almost unaware that they were merely echoes of the thousands who had been absorbed by her beauty throughout the centuries.

It was the most amazing experience. The Rhine is littered with castles and folk legends from way back when and I would love to go back and spend time finding out all the stories and writing songs about them. The Rhine has tolerated humans for many centuries! It felt truthfully like being outside of yourself, as if your life had stopped on the quay side with the lines of coaches, whilst you floated on a daydream….

Poetic thought: Are humans the tolerated disease of nature?

How clever are we

To surgically cut

Tarmac viens into her skin?

How clever is she

To flow strong

For so long

She need not notice

This cancer traversing

Through her watery fingers

Pilgrims, are we

At her feet

Awestruck

Breath taken

Time travellers

Her tolerated disease

Next stops Rothenberg, Cologne & Munich

2011-12-30T11:46:00.000-08:00

Next stop off was Rothenberg and I had been in contact with a chap that runs an acoustic folk music session, but we weren’t going to be there at the right time for this, so he very kindly arranged for me to do an acoustic day session.

Rothenberg was re-built by the Germans after the WW2 to show their cultural and historical context within and to the rest of Europe. It is truly beautiful. But for me, it is a little too beautiful! It reminded me a bit of Camberwick Green with its huge mechanical clock with chiming figures. To be fair, it was November and all the Christmas decorations were up. I couldn’t really feel a sense of real history. With the shop windows adorned with everything a tourist would want to see, it felt a little bit Disney for me! I feel awful saying this because the people were so welcoming and warm, and how can you complain that a place is too clean! It’s just a personal thing I suppose, that I felt more at home in the back streets of Florence than here.

Next stop was Cologne, where we had a sleep over. I didn’t have a performance booked here, but I spoke to the Hotel Manager and he very kindly gave me a spot in the foyer.

The following day we headed off to Munich where I had a meeting with a representative from an online TV/video company. We were running bit late! They had asked me to do an acoustic set in an Art House Cinema Café. When we were approaching I thought/hoped we had gotten the wrong place because it was right next door to a Sex Shop! The films in the cinema’s had just finished and everyone coming out looked like a student so I guessed it must be quite hip and happening, the cool place to hang out!

The little show case went really well! They so love acoustic music in Munich! But I guess it was the right crowd for my self penned songs!

We arrived in Munich in the dark and left so early it was still dark too, so in a way, it could have been any city. It felt like Cardiff late at night in the week. But the following morning, we were about to see Germany from a completely new perspective!

Occupy Amsterdam 11.11.11

2011-12-30T11:37:00.000-08:00

We then headed into the City centre to the Peace Rally. Tents were huddled together on the pavement fenced off and banners mast high. It was quiet and peaceful. I sat down by the information stand and a guy, who I am assuming was one of the organisers, saw my ukulele on my back and said, ‘Music, now that’s what we need.’

I said that I could play if he liked and sat at the entrance of the site doing my thing. I felt an enormous sense of collective, of meaning, so privileged to be a tiny spec in the huge picture that will undoubtedly create change. People Power! There was a TV crew filming and they interviewed the chap that had asked me to play so that’s when I twigged that he must have been instrumental in organising the march later that week.

A song written by Cheryl Beer whilst at Occupy Amsterdam

If you want peace

Then you gotta

Work for Justice

You gotta work for justice

If you want Peace

And if you want love

You gotta work for Peace

You gotta work for peace

If you want love

So stand up

To the 1 in a 100, To the 1 in 100

You gotta stand up

And I will stand up

To the 1 in 100,To the 1 in a 100

I will stand up

Stand up for peace

When I got home I recorded this in my studio and made a little film for Youtube in support of Busk Against the Cuts in Cardiff and Disability Arts Cymru made it their Video of the Day.

We had to leave to catch our bus onto Germany and so did a quick whiz around the shops to buy little gifts for our friends and family back home. The obligatory clogs key rings!

Anne Frank's House

2011-12-30T11:22:00.000-08:00

... And just as I thought I couldn’t be anymore inspired, as the canal boat turned the corner, the guide said, ‘And this is the house of Anne Frank …’ which is now a museum. I went cold and without any warning I felt myself weeping, tears fell down my face. She had played here on this cobbled street, looked out of these windows, no doubt cycled along these paths. The guide told us that Anne’s Father had been interviewed and asked why he had allowed publication of something as personal as his daughter’s diary and he had said that it was her childhood dream to become a published writer. I was so moved by this:

A poem written by Cheryl Beer whilst passing Anne Frank’s House

Collecting Beautiful Sentences

He asked, Sweet child

When you grow older

What do you think

You will do?

She said, Papa

I will collect with my pen

Beautiful sentences

Telling and true

The journalist calls

Readers enthralled

My words threaded

Like beaded jewels

Dear Child,

A writer such as you

Can hold a dream

That may split the seam

Life is not always as we dreamt it

Once true

Oh papa, she laughed

Your wisely old words

Fall like stars sewn

To the soles of my feet

Dream slumber outnumbered

By nightmares encumbered

Engraved on canal cobbled streets

A young girls’ daily retreat

Secrets leaked

Like blood from her pen

Etched into life’s paper chase

Her closest friend

And now, just as then

Tombstone stooped

Brick built, eyes green framed

Lest we forget

An attic forlorn by fame

Such can be the bitter taste

Of dreams come true

They asked

Why did you share her diary?

Her hope, fear, panic and pain

Why did you look

Why did you

Open her book

Papa hung his head and said

Let me explain

It’s my last gift for my little girl

The last thing that I can do

To leave her memory as a writer

Peace campaign fighter

Make her childhood dreams come true

I won’t see her skip through tulip fields

Or float on the canal with the wind

I won’t see her grow

And in my heart I know

Her story shares more than I can give

Through her words

My Anne can live

In the memories burned

And the lessons learned

Out of the mouth of this babe

Rings a message so close and true

We must teach those who come

To live and love each other as one

Be they Dutch, German, Nazi or Jew

Skinny Bridge Poem in Amsterdam

2011-12-30T11:19:00.000-08:00

A poem written by Cheryl Beer on the canals of Amsterdam

It is said that if you kiss your loving whilst passing under skinny Bridge, you will marry him and love each other forever!

Skinny Bridge

There are 88 beautiful bridges

But only one is skinny with love

If he turns to another

I wouldn’t bother

His heart isn’t true enough

There are 88 beautiful bridges

But one stays clear my head

If he won’t kiss me there

I’ll leave myself bare

And sail with another instead

We saw the 8 beautiful bridges in a scattered row. Now there’s a tongue twister in Dutch!

Achtentachtig practige grachten!

Living the dream ...

2011-12-30T11:16:00.000-08:00

It has been my dream since I can remember to tour as a musician across Europe and see all the places that I imagined or read in books as a child; pictures of leaning towers, smoke cradled morning lakes, monstrous mountains … and to be inspired to record my journey through song and poetry enabling me to share my experiences through my creativity.

Life seems to creep by without you even noticing it and I realised this year that climbing over the 45 bridge took me closer to half a century, and still I hadn’t realised my dream. So, I set about making it into a plan….

When we got to Calais we were met by the bus and whizzed off through Belgium before getting to the Hotel in Amsterdam. I arranged to play in the Hotel Bar to a very warm welcome! Almost everyone was from a country other than the Netherlands! I met a chap from New York who is a Graphic Designer and has done a fair bit of high profile album design work. He said some very kind things about my CD designs and it’s amazing to think my work has toddled back to the States with him.

One of the Bar staff told me about a Peace Rally in Amsterdam being held in support of the now global Occupy Campaign, so we decided to go and have a look the following day.

We woke up to a glorious buffet breakfast, Jeff had a full on cooked up mayhem and I stuck to fruit before heading out to the Canals. The Trip was breath taking! We passed under The Skinny Bridge, where if you kiss your loved one, it is reported that you will stay together forever … mmm!