As it is the anniversary of the death of Beaumarchais I thought I’d post this beautitful aria by Mozart. There is method in my madness. Beaumarchais wrote the play around which the opera this song is from is based. The Marriage of Figaro forms the middle of a trio of plays by Beaumarchais centring around Figaro and Count Almaviva. The Marriage of Figaro was for many years banned by Louis XVI because it is so satirical of the aristocracy, eventually in 1784 the ban was lifted and within two years Mozart collaborating with Lorenzo da Ponte had written this operatic version. The Marriage of Figaro is one of the most popular of Mozart’s operas and the play on which it is based is still performed today and has lost none of its satirical impact. Anyway I guess I just like to have some contrivance to write a few words about different pieces and this is as good as any.

Dove Sono is one of the most beautiful soprano arias in all the operatic canon and this version with Kiri Te Kanawa is one of my favourites. The raw emotion that is in this aria and the fact that the Countess is lamenting the fact that her relationship with the Count has gone stale give it added pathos. This in an opera that is not particularly dark but rather more comic in general tone. This is Mozart at his very best putting moments of real depth and weight into the middle of a piece of genuine entertainment. I hope you enjoy it as much as I do.

Let me make it 100% clear that I am fiercely supportive of this change. I think it is about time that this was done and that there are numerous reasons for doing so, not the least of which is one of fairness and equity. Marriage is an ancient institution, the impulse of human beings to come together with another person to enjoy a deep and meaningful publicly acknowledged relationship is deep and long-standing. Marriage is not though a static institution, it has adapted in the past as different tastes and customs have evolved and then dissipated. Marriage is not the preserve of any individual religion or worldview it is a universal institution and is entered into in different ways in different cultures. In the United Kingdom marriage hasn’t been static either adapting over the years according to the prevailing wisdom of the time. I don’t see the adaptation of marriage now to include partners of the same gender to be anything other than a natural step in the development of marriage.

There is of course opposition to this proposal and much of it comes from a religious stand point. I can accept and appreciate that, it will not be to the taste of all religious groups with their tighter and more restrictive sense of morality. I suspect this is why the government is going out of its way to exclude religious groups from this new proposal. The first main argument against seems to be that it will change the fundamental understanding of marriage, I have kind of foreshadowed that above. In some senses they are correct it is about changing the understanding of marriage. The trap I think opponents fall into is that they presume that marriage has remained constant when it has been an institution that has constantly adapted. In the pre-Norman era it was common place for people to be engaged in two marriages; one a church marriage and the other a marriage of custom known as mare danico or Danish marriage. Even Harold II had this bi-fold situation and it wasn’t his church married wife that scoured the battlefield for his body. Indeed until relatively recently there wasn’t the facility for anyone to contract a non-religious marriage and that amendment to the definition of marriage didn’t destroy the institution but merely widened it to people who were rapidly secularising.

The second argument that is deployed is that if we open up marriage to two people of the same gender we might as well open up marriage to any combination of people. What about 3 people contracting a marriage or 2 people and a dog? Well here we are really getting into the realms of the absurd, because that is one part of the definition of marriage that nobody is changing. Marriage is still going to be between one person and one other. All that is being proposed is that it be changed from one person and somebody of the opposite sex. In that sense it is simply a widening of the scope of marriage rather than a change in the fundamental nature of marriage.

A third argument that is deployed and one that is slightly more seductive is that people of the same gender already have Civil Partnerships so don’t need marriage. The argument is that Civil Partnerships are to all intents and purposes the same so there is no need to make the change. It is superficially an argument with some attractions, however when I think about it it really isn’t a very good argument. It would be like a cafe deciding that everyone could have Heinz Tomato soup unless you are an emo in which case you get Boggs’ own brand Tomato soup. The cafe owner would be well within his rights to say to complainers that they are still getting Tomato soup but the fact would remain that they were being treated differently. In the same way people are perfectly correct to say that gay and lesbian civil partners have an officially recognised relationship in the same way that married people do, but it just isn’t the same and different people are still being treated differently.

That to me is the crunch argument I don’t want to be treated differently to anyone else. If as a society we have decided to recognise that some loving relationships are between people of the same gender then recognise it in the same way we have always recognised relationships through marriage. I don’t like the concept of equal but separate that is enshrined by having a different mechanism for same gender partners to opposite gender partners. It has overtones of apartheid, society doesn’t mind us getting together providing we stay in our own township. If you are truly equal then you cannot be separated from the institutions of society and if you are separated from those institutions you are not truly equal. I for one don’t want to be fobbed off with an own brand alternative to marriage, I want the real deal not a pretence at it. I can understand that for some people the concept of marriage is anathema and that they would prefer a civil partnership. This goes for couples of opposite genders as well as for those of the same. It is why in the final analysis I think the government should do the only credible thing when it promulgates its legislation. It should open up marriage and civil partnerships for everyone.

I’m not an expert on geography but I thought that the definition of an island was something that was surrounded on all sides by water. This is a definition that Gibraltar fails to meet. Whomever the BBC are employing to write their online copy needs to go back to remedial class!

I admit that I’m a bit of a fan of Celine, I know that many people don’t like her for who knows what reasons. I know that she is a better singer in French than English or rather the songs of hers that I’ve heard in French are better than anything I’ve heard in English. Celine has a cracking voice and a beautiful range and colour to her voice. This is probably one of my favourite songs of all time let alone of Celine Dion’s, I love the sentiments involved in the song. My French has withered on the vine for far too many years but even I can appreciate the power of a line like “Je m’inventerai reine pour que tu me retiennes”. This is for me one of the most impressively gorgeous love songs and in a language where asking directions has a certain frisson. I have to say that this is one of the best songs Celine ever picked up and recorded. Enjoy.

I was reading the reviews of today’s session and came across the Prime Minister’s saying that the Eurozone needs to “make up or break up”. This is interesting but not for the main reason that everybody seems to be focussing on. Everyone seems to be focussing on the comments by the Chancellor, with his sober finance ministers hat on, guarding and warning against speculation regarding the Eurozone. You can see why this is the case, the media love nothing better than a government split story and the splits that have juice are those between the two Lords of the Treasury. George Osborne with his political hat on would have seen nothing wrong with the comments of David Cameron today, the politics are unanswerable. There is political capital to be made over the Eurozone even if it will make his main governmental job a waking nightmare. I have a sense that Cameron rarely does anything that isn’t by design and so coming out with a harder line comment on the Eurozone is to me suggestive.

Cameron is a Eurosceptic by instinct but he is also an instinctive pragmatist. What many foolish Conservatives and commentators misread as Europhilia is actually Cameron charting a pragmatic course and knowing that a drawbridge up all out resistance to all things EU is both stupid and counterproductive. The use of the UK veto over the Fiscal Pact late last year is a sign that the Prime Minister is not afraid to unleash his sceptic side but at the right time and in the right way. I wonder therefore if the harder line that was road tested in PMQs today is a sign that Cameron is about to let out a bit of his inner sceptic? If he is I think it will be a very calculated move, and will not sate the desires of the more uncompromising Europhobes. I think though that Cameron is not daft, he will sense which way the Greece and wider Eurozone situation is going and the inevitability of an increase in a certain jingoistic anti-EU sentiment. I think that he therefore has the low cunning to use that to his advantage.

An increasingly sceptic tone from the PM will of course lead to howls of pandering to the right from all the usual sources. No doubt also it will stoke tensions with the Liberal Democrats. I think though that the calculation will be that the public will be largely onside and that being the case the tensions with the Lib Dems will be worth it. I don’t think the PM has any issue with annoying the Lib Dems but not unnecessarily and not when it will disadvantage him and his party. I could well be wrong and the PM may not adopt a more stridently sceptical tone in the coming weeks but I think it is at least a possibility and one that would probably be welcome by more than just the grumblers on the back benches of the Conservative Party.

I do love the ability to be able to knock out my thoughts on subjects and put them out there for whomever is interested. I also like the interaction in the comments. I certainly look forward to all that going forward. As anyone who has stumbled across this blog previously will know I blog about many things, quite a bit about politics but also my passions for music principally classical but also about history, science and well anything that takes my fancy really.

Finally it feels extremely good to be back!