My Top 10 Christmas Carols: No 8

8. In Dulci Jubilo: Trad German, arr. R.L. Pearsall.

Everyone knows the tune to In Dulci Jubilo - it was given the prog-rock treatment by Mike Oldfield and is frequently heard in the hymn Good Christian Men, Rejoice, nowadays sometimes rather mindlessly rendered by the PC brigade as Good Christians All, Rejoice. But few if anyone knows who originally wrote it, although its origins appear to be Germanic.

The carol was a regular staple of our Nine Lessons services at St Mary's, Hitchin, so this one is dedicated to Hugo Richardson, Mike Baxter and all my old friends from the choir, in fond remembrance of all those Christmas Eves when we belted it out together.

My Top 10 Christmas Carols: No 9

9. Shepherd's Pipe Carol: John Rutter

This is the first of four compositions by John Rutter in my Top 10. His carols tend to fall into two groups: jaunty and bright (Star Carol, Jesus Child, this one) or gentle and richly melodic (Mary's Lullaby, the Nativity Carol, Love Came Down at Christmas). The South African-born composer has cornered the market in quintessentially Christmassy choral music over the past 30 years and I could easily have named six or seven of his works in my list.

Today's choice is dedicated to the composer himself. Christmas literally wouldn't be the same without him.

My Top 10 Christmas Carols: No 10

10. The Truth From Above: Ralph Vaughan Williams

Okay, there will still be some politics on this blog over the next fortnight...but in the run-up to Christmas I'm going to be giving over some time and space to one of my other lifelong obsessions: English choral music.

When most people speak of "Christmas carols" they tend to mean the likes of Hark the Herald, Once in Royal, O Come All ye Faithful and so on, but technically speaking they are hymns. Carols, in the traditional sense as still preserved in the service of Nine Lessons and Carols, are sung by the Choir, not the congregation.

So over the next 10 days I will be listing my top 10 carols, together with YouTube videos of each. I hope that those who are familiar with this genre of music will enjoy this diversion from the usual agenda, and that those who are not familiar with it will also give them a listen. My No 1 choice will be revealed on Christmas Eve.

The first of my choices, at No 10, is The Truth From Above. This was one of the many traditional English folk tunes, their origins lost in the mists of antiquity, which were rediscovered and rearranged by the brilliant English composer Ralph Vaughan Williams, who died 50 years ago this year.

In addition to listing my favourites, each day I will dedicating my choice either to a person who has influenced me in my love of English church music, or alternatively someone for whom a particular carol has a certain significance or meaning.

My first carol is dedicated to the memory of Colin M. Howard, my former Choirmaster at St Mary's Hitchin, who sadly died of cancer earlier this year aged 63. By bringing me into his choir in 1975, Colin opened up for me a world of Christmas wonder which has never faded.

Coming home

I don't often write about my "real world" career on this blog, but this little announcement today seems worthy of mention. As the story says, I've been doing the job in an acting capacity for nearly six months so it's great to have it made official.

A colleague recently said that this job seemed like a bit of a "homecoming" to journalism for me after a few years doing different sorts of new media stuff. The truth is it's not an entirely journalistic role - there's a fair bit of commercial stuff in there too - but it's certainly the most journalist-y job I've had since I was political editor of The Journal.

Editing HoldtheFrontPage was a role I'd quietly fancied for some time, while never really expecting it to become available, so I'm really pleased to get the opportunity. After 22 years in the industry, I feel I know it pretty well by now, so hopefully I'll be able to bring some of that experience to bear in our coverage.

Now that I'll be writing about the media on a full-time basis I would expect to see more journalism-related stuff on this blog from time to time, in particular the interplay between politics and journalism which is an area which has always fascinated me. But I'll still be keeping in touch with political developments via my Journal column so hopefully things won't change too much!

Hors de Combat

I think I probably owe my readers some sort of explanation as to why it's all gone rather quiet over here of late - rest assured I haven't given up blogging, but I have been rather unwell, as a result of which I simply haven't had the energy or the inclination to think about politics, or much else for that matter.

One rather sad consequence of this was that I had to abandon my annual October walking pilgrimage to the Lakes which has continued, on and off, since 1993. It's been mostly off in recent years - last year I couldn't make it as we were moving house, and this year I was laid-up in bed. Maybe next year....

I'm slowly on the mend now, I hope, so hopefully things will be back to normal round here pretty soon. I gather there's some cotton-picking little election taking place somewhere this week, and I'm sure I'll have something to say about it before too long.

Digital Team of the Year

I rarely blog about work stuff, but last night our company, Associated Northcliffe Digital, was named Digital Team of the Year at the Newspaper Society Digital Media and Advertising Awards. Its stable included the memorial site Lasting Tribute which I helped launch last year, green platform Big Green Switch, and my current baby, journalism jobs and news site HoldtheFrontPage.

Since our original entry went in, these sites have been split between different parts of the business so the team no longer exists in the same form, but I'm sure the good work will go on. Congratulations all.

More on this (with pics) from work colleagues and fellow bloggers Lactose and Alex.

They just can't get enough

I have never been a particular fan of electro-popsters Depeche Mode, with the notable exception of their brilliantly haunting 1990 single World in My Eyes, but I am a fan of Rhodesian Ridgebacks.

My sister, who shares her home in Arizona with a few of the creatures, has put together a video which apparently parodies a recent Gap commercial (although I wouldn't know myself.)

To cut a long story short, if it wins a competition against some other videos for the highest number hits in one month, the Arizona Animal Welfare League, which provides a temporary home for nearly 2,000 dogs and cats every year, will get $1,000.

So if you like Ridgebacks, or Depeche Mode, or just want to help animals, please give it a whirl. After all, it's for charidee.

Those Top Ten Journal Moments

My old colleague Graeme Whitfield recently celebrated ten years on the staff of Newcastle's Journal by naming his ten most memorable Journal moments on his blog.

I well remember hearing about some of the hilarious newsroom incidents he describes although being based down in Westminster I unfortunately never witnessed them in person.

Anyway, even though I only managed seven and a half years on the staff, Graeme's piece has inspired me to do the same and list my own Top Ten Journal Moments.

Here they are.

1. Going more than 40 hours without sleep as New Labour came to power on 1/2 May 1997. I was officially on duty in Newcastle from 2pm on May 1 and we wrapped up the final edition of our election special 14 hours later at around 4am. I then caught the first train down to London and was outside No 10 for Blair's triumphal arrival later that morning. It was exhausting, but the sense of watching history in the making was intoxicating.

2. Sitting in the Commons Chamber in March 2003 and listening to Robin Cook's masterful resignation speech.

3. Being on Prime Minister John Major's plane during the 1997 election campaign when smackhead novelist Will Self was caught jacking up in the toilets mid-flight. We were en route to a photocall with Margaret Thatcher in Middlesbrough.

4. Falling asleep in a fishing boat moored on Brighton Beach after a rather heavy night during a Lib Dem Conference. It was a long walk back to my hotel and the boat seemed a rather comfy place to lay my tired head.

5. Having an argument over the phone with my old editor about how much space to give Labour conference coverage which culminated in him threatening to "fill the paper with pictures of Kylie's arse" instead. I was laughing so much I couldn't think of a witty response.

6. Cherie Blair's attempts to get me to go soft on her husband after I interviewed him during the 2001 election campaign by sharing a bag of chips with me and telling me what a great paper The Journal was. Or maybe she was just being nice.

7. Alastair Campbell accusing me during a lobby briefing of having asked the Governor of the Bank of England whether he had stopped beating his wife. Being subjected to a full-frontal personal attack by Campbell signified your arrival as a lobby hack and, for me, this was the best bit of the whole Eddie George saga.

8. Spotting a North-East government minister lighting-up on the Commons Terrace in 1997 a few days after his press officer had told me he had given up smoking.

9. My ingenuous wife handing Nick Robinson her mobile phone so he could snap a picture of the two of us together outside No 10 following a Downing St reception. To his eternal credit, he took it.

10. A Labour press officer's unusual reaction when I told him Peter Mandelson had been involved in a traffic accident in his constituency in 1997. The accident turned out to be quite minor, but the press officer in question was so alarmed he spontaneously cracked one off.

The "Where were you when.....?" meme

A week or so ago Bob Piper tagged me with the meme asking what were you doing when Princess Diana died, Thatcher resigned, the planes flew into the twin towers, Lineker scored, and Kennedy was assassinated.

Long-standing readers of this blog will know where to find at least three of the answers, but here for the record are my responses, although I'm not going to tag anyone else as this one has been round the block a bit already.

1. Diana's death.

Visiting my mum's. "I'd gone there for the weekend to help her with the garden, but the news from Paris put paid to that. By 11am the following morning I was at my desk in the Commons helping my paper, the Newcastle Journal, put together its Diana coverage. I ended up writing a piece about how the marriage turned sour, though I'm not sure what qualified me, as political editor, to do that one."

More HERE.

2. 9/11

In my old room in the Press Gallery (now the property of the Daily Mirror, I gather.) "We switched over to Sky News and watched as the plumes of smoke rose from the first tower, convinced we were watching the aftermath of a terrible accident. Then the second plane appeared. "Look, there's another one!" exclaimed a regional newspaper colleague. Almost as he said it, the other plane smashed into the second tower. For a moment, there was silence in the room, then someone said slowly "That was deliberate," and we all hit the phones to our head offices."

More HERE.

3. When Lineker Scored

The Rifleman's Arms, Bridge Street, Belper. "Germany scored a freak goal, an Andy Brehme free-kick that struck Paul Parker and looped over Peter Shilton's head, and we began to resign ourselves to the loss of our improbable World Cup dream. And then...and then...in the 81st minute, Gary Lineker got hold of a long through-ball, held-off the German defence and squeezed the ball into the far corner. The pub went wild. More wild than any place I have ever been in my life."

More HERE.

4. Thatcher's resignation

I was surprised to find I have never blogged on this, but the bizarre truth is that I was stuck on a train on my way to a job interview, so although I was the political reporter of the Derby Evening Telegraph at the time, I never actually covered the story for them! I remember two people getting on the train - possibly at Leicester - and saying that she had resigned. Unlike many lefties I felt no elation at her departure - I had wanted to see Michael Heseltine win as I thought it would mean much more enlightened government, but his chances disappeared the moment she quit.

5. Kennedy's Assassination

I was just over a year old, and don't remember it. I guess I must have been at our old house in Kenton, North London, where I spent the first eight years of my life.

Holidays open thread

In case you're wondering.....I'm currently taking a two-week break from work, blogging, blogging league-tables, email, and anything else that involves sitting in front of a computer screen when I should be spending my time with the kids/in the garden/putting up shelves. Thankfully, there's absolutely nothing happening politically that is worth writing about, so those of you that come here for the incisive political analysis are not missing anything.

For those of you who come here for other reasons...we have once again been making use of the old Vango Diablo 900 (blame the credit crunch) and have so far had two very pleasant camping trips, one here in Derbyshire with some Sheffield friends, another down in Sussex which we combined with a visit to a friend's wedding and my brother-in-law's 40th.

We're now back at home enjoying what is left of the summer and today the weather has finally picked up. The farmer has been haymaking in the fields beyond our garden for the second time this year, and it briefly feels like midsummer again.

Barring a sudden change of Prime Minister, I am unlikely to be updating the blog again before September is upon us, so feel free to use the comments to raise any issues of interest, or even to tell me this blog is not as good as it used to be.

A quiet departure

Autumn is meant to be the time for those, but Brockley Kate has chosen high summer to hang up her laptop. A shame, as she was one of the better writers in the 'sphere, but blogging should never become a chore, and if it's not fun any more, she's right to walk away.

I actually voted for Kate in the Witanagemot Club Awards as the blogger I'd most like to have a pint with, solely on the strength of this post last October which revealed that we share a mutual passion for the Lakes.

A story with a happy ending

Clara's duck went swimming one day
Over the pond and far away.
Clara went "wah, wah, wah, wah"
And her little duck came swimming back.

With apologies to the original, and thanks to the staff at Nottingham's Dunelm Mill.

Tears are not enough

Michael Vaughan's wept at his decision to stand down as England cricket captain. Jeremy Paxman cried when he discovered one of his ancestors had been sent to the workhouse. Tough-guy Aussie PM Bob Hawke shed tears about his daughter's drug addiction.

The BBC has been asking visitors to its site today "What makes men cry?" Here's my list of anniversaries, films, songs, books, and memories that have turned on the waterworks in recent years.

1. Good Friday.

2. Leaving my old home last November. The rest of the family had gone on ahead to the new house leaving me to say my final farewells to the place that had been my home on and off for nearly 20 years. I was fighting back the tears as I said goodbye, but I think they were tears of love as much as grief.

3. Thinking about how much I still miss my grandad, who died when I was 12.

4. That bit in Love Actually when, having declared his (unrequited) love for his best friend's girl (Keira Knightley), Andrew Lincoln walks away from her home telling himself: "Enough, enough now."

5. Thomas Hardy's Christmas poem, "The Oxen"

6. The opening lines of "I Trawl the Megahertz" by Paddy McAloon. "We start with the joyful mysteries before the appearance of ether, trying to capture the elusive: the farm where the crippled horses heal, the woods where autumn is reversed, and the longing for bliss in the arms of some beloved from the past."

7. The closing line of the hymn "I Cannot Tell, How He Whom Angels Worship," to the tune of "Danny Boy."

8. Listening to recordings of Winston Churchill saying: "We shall go on to the end. We shall fight in France, we shall fight on the seas and oceans, we shall fight with growing confidence and growing strength in the air, we shall defend our island, whatever the cost may be. We shall fight on the beaches, we shall fight on the landing grounds, we shall fight in the fields and in the streets, we shall fight in the hills; we shall never surrender."

9. "Abraham, Martin and John," by Marvin Gaye. Has anybody here seen my old friend Martin...?

10. Heroism, literary and real. Sydney Carton's at the end of A Tale of Two Cities, Bigwig's at the end of Watership Down, the real-life heroism of my parents' generation who saved this country in WW2. I think this and No 1. are linked, somehow.

An ultimate weekend

Apologies for the light blogging over the past week or so, but strange as it may seem at this particular political juncture, I've been taking a break from following the travails of Mr Gordon Brown to organise my daughter Clara's dedication, which took place on Saturday.

Rather than have her baptised, we held a simple but moving service to say thank you to God for her and to ask His blessing on her life. Hopefully she will come to baptism when she is old enough to explore the claims of Christianity for herself.

Highlights of the service included a perfect solo rendition of John Rutter's setting of All Things Bright and Beautiful by my nephew Myles, a reading from Proverbs 3 vv 1-18, which contains all the advice necessary for a happy and fulfilling life, and some beautifully written and heartfelt prayers from her four godparents.

It was followed by a barbecue in the garden of our Derbyshire home for which we were blessed by the best weather of the year so far. When we bought the place last November, we hoped it would prove to be a "party house," and Saturday certainly bore that out.

Over the past week, my wife and I have also celebrated our seventh wedding anniversary with a trip up to Grassington in the Yorkshire Dales, which included some wonderful walking in Wharfedale and a shopping trip to Harrogate.

Never fear, though....I'll be back on the Brown stuff before long.

Happiness is...

..a pint on the terrace of the Queen's Head, Belper, early on a Friday evening in June.

And now for something completely different

An old friend of mine recently made me very envious by taking a three-month sabbatical from his job and using some of the time to drive across the United States. I was delighted to discover he has also started a blog in which he shares his experiences of the journey.

It's an anonymous blog so I won't use his name here, but he is in fact the Anglican vicar who married Gill and I nearly seven years ago, someone who has been one of the greatest and most positive influences on me in my Christian life over the past decade or so.

The blog, entitled Honk If You're Lonely, is part travelogue, part spiritual diary, and is as fascinating and inspirational as its author's perfectly-crafted sermons. If you're into that sort of thing, you can read it HERE.

Was Navratilova the greatest?

Well, according to a Top 100 list of all-time Wimbledon champions in today's Times, she was. But are the men's and women's games really comparable - and would Martina have been quite as successful had the women's game in her day been as competitive as it is now?

The Times has attempted to introduce an objective criteria for measuring greatness, but for me, things like this are a subjective judgement. The greatest players I have seen at Wimbledon in all my years of watching the tournament are as follows:

Men

1. Rod Laver
2. John McEnroe
3. Roger Federer
4. Pete Sampras
5. Bjorn Borg
6. Ken Rosewall
7. Andre Agassi
8. Boris Becker
9. Jimmy Connors
10. Ilie Nastase

Women

1. Serena Williams
2. Martina Navratilova
3. Steffi Graf
4. Justine Henin
5. Billie Jean King
6. Venus Williams
7. Martina Hingis
8. Margaret Court
9. Chris Evert
10. Evonne Goolagong

There are three names on my list who never actually won the Wimbledon title - Rosewall, Nastase and Henin - but all three graced the game with their artistry and richly deserved to lift the crown.

Laver and Serena top the list simply because, in my view, they were unbeatable at their respective peaks - complete tennis machines both.

The last days of the Raj?

As a fellow University College London alumnus I naturally wish Raj Persaud well in his efforts to save his career amid accusations of plagiarising other peoples' work. Whatever else you say about him, he has certainly put psychiatry on the media map.

That said, I can't say I am hugely surprised that Persaud has found himself in a situation where his skill for self-publicism appears to have backfired on him.

In my first year, he was chair of the UCL Labour Club, in which capacity he demonstrated an easy charm and ability to bullshit which was almost pre-Blairite in its magnitude. I thought then that he could have gone a long way in national politics had he chosen to.

Later, he signed my nomination papers for an elected student union post only to tell me afterwards that he had voted for someone else. This too, I later came to learn, was a fairly commonplace practice among political types.

So farewell then, Shoot! magazine

In an announcement which will surely cut deep into the hearts of fortysomething British males everywhere....IPC has announced that Shoot! magazine is to close after forty years.

I first started getting the mag at the age of eight in 1971 and until I discovered girls about seven or eight years later, the arrival of the latest fortnightly edition was the most eagerly anticipated event in my calendar.

The line-up of star writers in those days comprised the cream of British footballing talent - Bobby Moore, George Best, Billy Bremner, Alan Ball and Kevin Keegan.

The fact that they were not necessarily always positive role models for us young readers - Bremner and Keegan were sent off for fighting in the '74 Charity Shield, while Ball was sent off while playing for England earlier the same year - only added to its appeal.

My most treasured issue was perhaps the 1978 World Cup special which contained a number of confident predictions about Scotland's likely progress in the tournament, but I must have stopped getting the mag soon after that.

It's a shame that, like Camberwick Green and Trumpton, it won't be around for my own son to enjoy.

Colin M. Howard 1944-2008

I realise this post will probably be of little interest to those who visit here primarily for the quality of the political analysis (!) but this is my online diary as well as my political blog and I could not let today go by without noting the passing of my former choirmaster and music teacher Colin Howard, who has died in Cape Town aged 63.

As this obituary from the Cape Town Opera website reveals, Colin died on 26 May after a battle with cancer. His death was only brought to my notice earlier today.

Colin was organist and choirmaster of St Mary's Church, Hitchin and Director of Music at Hitchin Boys' School in the 1970s, and one of the greatest men I have ever met. He taught me moreorless all I know about classical and choral music and being a part of the choir in his time was one of the most important and formative experiences in my life.

Alhough he did bring to the role a huge sense of fun, he never forgot that the work of a church choir was primarily about glorifying God. I cannot improve on this description of him that appears in his Cape Town Opera obituary.

"He believed there was a place in church for a wide spectrum of music, performed to the highest standards, to the glory of God. He also felt strongly that church musicians should be people concerned with spiritual growth, willing to be team players in helping to realise the multifaceted demands of being involved in the church."

Colin was one of two or three teachers to whom I owe a very great debt. I regret I never got the chance to tell him so to his face.