Briggflatts
AND Other Poems

Basil Bunting said: "Poetry is written to be heard and not to be read in silence." His own readings of his own work is useful for a full appreciation of his musical poetry.

TAPE 1: STUDIO SET
TAPE 1 SIDE A
1. Briggflatts 59-74
Parts I, II &
III
RUNNING TIME: 30.04
TAPE 1 SIDE B
2. Briggflatts 75-81
continued: Parts IV, V &
coda
3. Selected Odes
'Dear be still' (I:9) 105
'Narciss, my numerous cancellations prefer' (I:11) 107
'An arles, an arles for my hiring' (I:12) 108
'On the Fly-Leaf of Pound's Cantos' (I:37) 132
'Mesh cast for mackerel' (I:22) 119
'The soil sandy and the plow light' (I:31) 126
'Let them remember Samangan' (I:32) 127
'These tracings from a world that's dead' (I:34) 129
'Stones trip Coquet burn' (II:10) 144
RUNNING TIME: 29.32
Italicised numbers above are the page numbers
of the poems in Complete Poems by Basil Bunting
(Bloodaxe Books, 2000). Those in brackets are
the poem numbers in his two Books of Odes.
TAPE 2: LIVE SET
TAPE 2 SIDE A
4. Selected Odes &
Overdrafts
'Now we've no hope of going back' (II:12) 146
'You can't grip years, Posthume' (Overdrafts) 161
'Snow's on the fellside' (Overdrafts) 221
'A thrush in the syringa sings' (II:1) 135
'O, it is godlike to sit selfpossessed' (II:7) 141
'You idiot' (II:4) 138
'All the cants they peddle' (II:9) 143
'Stones trip Coquet burn' (II:10) 144
'Carmencita's tawny paps' (II:8) 142
'Southwind, tell her what' (I:29) 124
'You leave' (I:28) 123
'Two hundred and seven paces' (I:26) 122
'At Briggflatts meetinghouse' (II:11) 145
What the Chairman told Tom (II:6) 140
RUNNING TIME: 27.07
TAPE 2 SIDE B
5. Villon 25-29
6. The Spoils 47-58
RUNNING TIME: 34.22
THE RECORDINGS
1-2. Briggflatts
This is the earliest studio recording of Briggflatts (without the
accompaniment of Scarlatti sonatas on harpsichord). Made in
1967 at the home of Stuart and Deirdre Montgomery, Southampton Row, London, it was recorded by John Cassidy and produced for Stream Records on an LP record by Fred Hunter. It was reissued on cassette by Keele University in 1988.
3. Selected Odes
From a series of recordings made by Bunting of his own poems and the work of other poets under the editorship of R.K.R. Thornton at the University of Newcastle upon Tyne in 1974. This selection from the Newcastle recordings has its first public airing on this cassette.
4. Selected Odes &
Overdrafts
Keats' House, London, 1979: the complete reading.
5. Villon &
6. The Spoils
The Air Gallery, London, spring 1977: from a longer reading recorded by Tom Pickard.
All the recordings except the Newcastle one are selected from the
eight-cassette edition of readings, lectures and interviews (1967-1984), The Recordings of Basil Bunting, published by Keele University in 1995.
Details are available from Richard Swigg, English Department, Keele
University ST5 5BG (E-MAIL: enaol@keele.ac.uk). Recordings 4, 5 &
6
are reproduced with the permission of the Poetry/Rare Books Collection, University Libraries, State University of New York at Buffalo.