This is the first of a couple of stumps which need removing. Due to location it’s next to impossible to get any machinery near to drill them out.
Here’s a pic of the beginnings of a trench round the offending stump.
I had to dig this trench much deeper and then hack away the roots from below with a matock and digging spike. Finally it was winched out.
I was far to knackered after to take any pics. I’ll take some work in progress shot on the next stump 
New year, new wall.
If you read the earlier post on the back sleeper wall you’ll get the general idea. Dig some (deep 
) pis to take some upright sleepers, buried a 3rd of their length. Concrete sleepers into those and then bolt other sleepers onto the front. Simples! Not nice carrying all these up the garden slope though 
Pic of part completed wall
Another angle. Here you can see a recess for steps – more pics of that to follow.
View to the back wall. Still some filling/levelling to do but getting there.
This is a version of Stardust with which I am sure many brass band enthusiasts are familiar – we added a little extra on the front here though. This was played on an Edwards Bass Trombone.
My rendition of the trombone solo from Bolero from a 2007 concert. Generally I”m pleased with the sound – though a couple of notes got away! : (. Hardly surpising though as the program also contained Ride of The Valkurie, Star Wars and a chop smasher by a local composer. So after 3 hours of rehearsal and all of the concert 1st half I was pleased with this result – it could have been so much worse!!!
Here is the last of my transcriptions of Kid Ory, this time from 1953. In many ways this is similar to the others but it does represent a difference in style from the other Kid Ory solos that I have transcribed.Harmonically the solo remains very simple – for example the 1st and 3rd bars simply outline the 3rd and fifth of a Bb chord. In the main he still sticks to chord tones (aside from that rather daring 6th in the 5th bar!!). Simple rhythms and repetitions are again the order of the day.Whilst this solo does retain some trademark smears & growls it also presents a new side to Ory’s playing. The tone is much softer and rounder – a gentler approach all round. There is also a more refined vibrato in play on the long notes – gone is the wide, uncontrolled sound from previously transcribed solos. Having heard this solo I can’t help wondering why he didn’t use this sound more often as I certainly find this more appealing than the brighter/brasher approach.
So what have I learned from transcribing these 4 solos by Kid Ory? Well from a technical trombone point of view – not a lot. Harmonically also these do not present a challenge. However the benefits are there to be seen. My training/experience does give me a better technical grasp of the instrument and harmony than Ory perhaps had but this is not neccesarily a good thing. I have learned that when playing this style of dixie/trad jazz I am far too busy in what I am trying to play – and also further outside of the harmony than I need to be – simplicity in both seems to be the key. I’ve also taken on board some ideas on sound and approach – those little smears and growls which crop up so often for Ory maybe something that I introduce in future for jazz of this style.
With the glazing a conservatory roof gone we had left an area which used to house the wet room and kitchen.
This needs to be completely demolished before we can begin any of the new build. The first area to go was the slate tiles on the roof. I was intending to save these but unfortunately those that aren’t broken or cracked are mostly shot. They simply crumble in the hand. Not a huge issue as there are no where near enough to cover what will be the new roof and the almost certainly would not tie in with the new slates in any case.
With slates gone the roof timbers were next. This wasn’t too tricky as these joists were not fixed at all well at the top and simply lifted away . . . .
Having taken off the roof joists there remained a very large supporting beam at the bottom of the roof structure to be removed. A small section of wall that seemed to be supporting this was doing no such thing. I’m still wondering how it was still standing – I barely touched and the whole thing fell down!
As with all these jobs you need some sort of supervision. . . . .
Just uncovered the floor in the old kitchen/wet rooom. As if the grey carpet wasn’t bad enough, we discovered this lovely lino underneath. Would you believe someone actually chose this!!
It’s taken a while but finally instead of smashing, breaking, stripping and generally demolishing we’ve actually started to build something!!
Having dug out the bank at the back of the garden we could now move onto building a retaining wall along the back. I decided to make these walls out of railway sleepers. I got a very good price from one of our local timber merchants (perhaps they couldn’t believe how many we needed!!). It’s also much easier for me to build with wood than bricks. Whatever I decided to use the job of hauling the materials up the sloping garden was going to be a pain in the a***, and so it proved.
Anyhow I carried enough sleepers up the garden to make a start. Having marked out I used some sleepers as giant fence posts, burying a 3rd of their length in the ground. This mean digging holes almost a meter deep in the ground. The first foot was easy digging through clay soil. Then came the more difficult ’shaley’ slate. This had to be broken up with a heavy duty digging spike before it could be lifted out. As if that wasn’t enough at the bottom of several holes were large granite field stones (you can see some of them on the right of the 2nd picture). These stones only revealed themselves after I had dug down most of the way – too late to shift the post to another location. More digging . .. . . .
Finally holes were dug and posts concreted into place. Postcrete is great for this – pour a couple of bags into the hole, add water on top and tamp down. Job done. . . .. . .well except for levelling, not easy with posts this size.
I did eventually get all the posts up and you can see I’ve started fixing other sleepers to the front with coach bolts. I’ve also got some metal straps in their for extra support, 300mm screws are also added at ’strategic’ points.
After the large (£800!) electric bill we received the storage heaters around the house had to go.
Disconnecting the electrics was the easy part. All the heaters were connected into an ‘off peak’ fusebox. With luck there was nothing else in this fuse box so once this was split from the main consumer unit the whole box could go.
Removing the actual heaters was much more of a problem. Having not removed any before I wasn’t aware of the weight of these things. I though, ‘just unscrew it from the wall and carry it away, job done’. The first part of this worked, however carrying it away was never going to happen. I didn’t realise these things are full of fire brick each one weighing a tonne. So, removed the cover from each heater and then removed the bricks one by one before carrying the case out seperately.
And one gone:
Next step after removing the insides of the conservatory was to remove walls and roof.
Roof was a bit tricky and needed the help of the father-in-law. You can’t really tell from the pics but the roof was re-inforced glass -the kind with a wire mesh buried inside. This means it doesn’t shatter but also means they’re very heavy. Second problem was with the way that it had been fixed. The glass had been slid into rebated channels in roof beams. These had then been covered with lead, silicone and all sorts of other muck. Finally screws through the lot held it together. After a few expletives and some digging to find the screws the roof started to come off:
Next down were the glazing units at either end. We did this carefully so that the units can either be re-used or sold. They’re actually in good condition – a rarity on this house. Removal was straightforward, unscrewed some frame anchors and foam was about all that was holding them up.
This left one side of glazing holding up some roof beams.
Quick coupla cuts with the reciprocating saw through the roof beams and all was done. . . . . .for now . . .
