As we approached the end of term, I was pondering how best to wrap things up here and announce our immediately pressing news, prior to taking a few days off. Then, in the wake of our final Avant-Garde! session - WHAAM! - it hit me…

Pop art… pop…

Holy blog post theme, Batman!!

First up - our immediate news.

Call up the drum-roll hound, because laydeez and gentlemen… I’m delighted to announce that…

…Wright History is going Unplugged*

* [“Unplugged” (aka “acoustic”) has been a shorthand for in-venue courses at Wrightington Towers for some time, alluding - as some of you will instantly know - to the now-standard term for a popular beat combo performing without electronic amplification.]

(aka venturing into the world of face-to-face courses)!

First, we offer unto to the Denizens of Pickering and its environs: Great Archaeological Discoveries.

And for the Denizens of York and its environs, voila, a Short & Sweet day school, by way of experiment:

The Age of Charlemagne.

We know that some of you will be disappointed that we’re not offering “unplugged” courses in each of Robert’s pre-Lockdown venues. Please know that that’s not because we don’t want to or don’t care!

By now, I think that you all know that registration fees for WEA courses are heavily subsidised, that the tutor’s fee for the number of WEA courses Robert can physically do per week does not provide a living wage, and that in-venue freelance courses entail additional costs (room hire, etc.). You’ll understand, I know, that we can only offer freelance courses which have a chance of enough registrations to at least break even financially.

Registration numbers for previous Pickering courses suggest that there should be sufficient interest to make a course viable, but alas that’s not the case for any of the York venues individually. Numbers for all York venues combined, however, suggest that one course for all Yorkies could work. We’ve spent a lot of time umm-ing and aah-ing as to whether the inconvenience of a bit more travelling would be outweighed by the benefit of having a course as you prefer it, and concluded that the best way to find out is to offer a day school as a test-case and let you decide!

Guppy’s is the obvious choice for this experiment, as it is central and accessible in terms of public transport, but we’re happy to go with the consensus as to the venue for future York courses. We hope that this experiment will work out, so that we can offer “unplugged” courses as well as our “plugged” courses!

My pop art/pop theme is relevant here...

Whilst you may not all have (or indeed wish to have) your respective fingers on the pulse of popular music, many of you will know that the electronically amplified/unplugged frontline often evokes strong loyalties and emotions.

Bob Dylan famously found this, waaay back in 1966 (see here. Should that induce some strong nostalgia within you, by the way, you may also enjoy this).

[Fun related fact: This is responsible for my name, give or take an ‘h’.]

There is of course something especially pleasing about an acoustic set (as demonstrated by the success and longevity of MTV’s Unplugged sessions) - and that’s as true of a face-to-face course in a venue in which one feels comfortable as it is of an intimate, stripped-back version of a favourite song.

Perhaps inevitably, thinking in terms of unplugged led me down a pleasingly nostalgic rabbit hole. For those d'un certain âge, “unplugged” instinctively = Nirvana’s cover of Bowie’s The Man Who Sold the World, but my rabbit hole started with searching for another song - relevant to this post - from that poignant set (on which more anon), which led me to unearthing some other gems, which some of you may also enjoy…

The very first Unplugged escaped my attention at the time (I was but 22, and far too cool for mainstream music, plus newly-married and investing in a new business in a new city with my new husband, so I’ll cut 1989-Joanna some slack on this occasion), but 2022-Joanna rather enjoyed this gleefully lo-fi and cheeky rendition of Squeeze’s very very cheeky Pulling Muscles by Messrs Difford & Tilbury. My rabbit hole took me through fondly-remembered and missed-at-the-time delights, such as The Cure’s “definitive” version of The Walk (The Kazoo Mix. From around 18:53 here. I remember watching this when it was broadcast, and thinking that (a) nobody who saw this could possibly think that Robert Smith takes himself as dourly seriously as is often assumed; and (b) he does not, as he claims in this song, “remember EV’ry-thinnng”), REM’s Losing My Religion (I found REM very grating then; it was my then-spouse who was the fan, and this set made me wonder whether I was being a bit too up myself), Annie Lennox clearly having a ball with It’s Alright or Little Bird, Eric Clapton’s emotionally raw Tears in Heaven (caveat videor. No less heart-breaking, I found, with the passage of thirty years), Paul McCartney’s rather sweet We Can Work it Out (in which he eventually did), the surprisingly gentle rendition of Don’t Look Back in Anger during the infamous Oasis (minus a “sore-throat”ed RKid) set, George Michael’s Star People ‘97 (I wasn’t a fan at the time, but it’s so perfect for the present weather that it’s now officially on my summer playlist. See also Fastlove), and Rod Stewart’s Reason to Believe (played with Ronnie Wood for the first time, apparently, since they recorded it 22 years earlier, when “me wife was only one”. Hmmm…) or the brilliantly bonkers, bouncy, and be-blousoned Stay With Me (in which he does indeed “Sit down, get up, get down”. Frequently).

This is, of course, a personal and selective musical tour, and will not include something for everyone.*

*[not least Robert. Online videos of the Unplugged Elgar, George Formby, Max Jaffa, or Morbid Angel sets continue to elude me. I’ll update you should I find them…]

I was, however, subconsciously inspired to explicitly include music in my cultural musings by a recent request - for which thank you! - for including an explicit focus on music in an embryonic course on C20 arts and culture. The connections made here suggest to us that it would indeed be rather fun to take culture in the round.

…Which brings me to the starting point of this post…

The unplugged number for which I entered the rabbit hole is Nirvana’s painfully ethereal Something in the Way, which is still more painful and ethereal in this version.*

*[Caveat videor: if you continue watching beyond the song itself, this becomes painful in a different way. With apologies for evoking a controversial campaign… Just Say No, kids. And further apologies to those of you who are - or have children who are - of a certain age, for the inevitable and unwelcome earworm. If you can’t resist scratching the itch, this link’s for you, by way of apology, so that you don’t have to besmirch your browser history…. You’re welcome]

Searching for it, I discovered via Professor Google that the song has had a recent bounce thanks to its use in The Batman (2022) and its trailer (2020) and a heavily trending meme. I’d been unaware of this until now because like most of us, I have my own particular Luddite boundaries. I only occasionally dip into Twitter (always wearing a full hazmat suit) and have yet to venture into the realms of TikTok.

But lo! It transpires that Something in the Way encapsulates our central point in this post even more than I’d initially thought.

Essentially… notwithstanding the feelings of betrayal and selling out evoked by Dylan going electric, unplugged and plugged music continue to have a fruitful relationship. Equally - albeit on a far less fiercely contested or emotive level - there is a place for both “unplugged” and “plugged” Wright History courses.

And as I’ve come back to Batman, riddles and “plugged”…

Riddle me this, O Denizens of Wright History….

What kind of fool decides to introduce a new element to the business model before she’s caught up on sleep from having finally almost beaten what she’s already doing into a manageable shape?

Uh-huh. That’s right…

We are, however, very pleased that I am that kind of fool, and glad that we took the plunge!

The response to our addition of catch-up recordings since April has been overwhelmingly positive, and we know that several of you have enjoyed courses which you wouldn’t have been able to attend without the catch-up option. Thank you all so much for your patience and understanding when I dropped the occasional ball over the term. We hope that you agree that any bumps along the way, as I was getting to grips with the practicalities of this new venture, were outweighed by the benefits of being able to catch up on the sessions at your convenience.

Having survived the term’s experiment more or less intact, I’m happy to confirm that all online Wright History courses will be recorded until April 2023.* Hurrah!

*[and almost certainly beyond, but we’ll continue to monitor how useful it may be to you all thereafter over the coming months.]

In other news… you’ll be glad to hear that Robert has been enjoying some well-earned downtime. His enjoyment has been considerably enhanced by the recent weather, and some lovely daytrips with my mother and daughter during mum’s recent visit to Wrightington Towers. He’s even become sufficiently relaxed to pick up on his painting!

I plan to join him soon (i.e. in taking a few days off; not in a car-picnic in Whitby). I’m hoping to be able to wrap up the more pressing elements of Wright History in time to virtually attend a conference in my erstwhile field, which includes some fascinating-sounding papers that will help me to remain at the cutting edge of the field in my own Wright History courses (as and when I can do them), prior to slumping completely for a wee bit.

As an interim Duffywatch update…

She’s been experiencing a love-hate relationship with the weather. She can’t resist basking in the sun whenever possible, but is no better than Robert at working out when she should retreat to cool off a little! She was less than impressed by our Heath Robinson Snood ‘n’ Freezer Heatstroke Begone Device (patent pending) attempt to cool her down, but it did the trick. I’m not ruling out doing something similar for Robert…

We are, however, being more indulgent than we might otherwise be, as her operation is getting ever-closer (27 July). I’ll do a post-op Duffywatch post to keep those of you who are interested updated [Edit: This is now up, here]. There’ll be an overnight stay which will, no doubt, be more traumatic for us than for her. Fortunately, we’ll have the first session of Great Archaeological Discoveries to divert us from the inevitable angst.

…Which reminds me… There is still time to register for the online iteration of Great Archaeological Discoveries. All sessions will be recorded, so you won’t have to miss any sessions if your summer plans are more exciting than trying to enforce strict and complete post-operative rest on a lurcher!

Well that’s it from Wrightington Towers for now. In addition to the post-op Duffywatch update, we’ll be in touch again with more news anon (spoiler alert: two new Short & Sweet Saturdays courses ahoy, plus a new ‘After this Term’ schedule so that you know what we’re currently planning for beyond the September term).

In the meantime, whatever your plans, we hope that you all have a wonderful summer, and we look forward to seeing you on the other side of it if not before!