NIGEL MAZLYN JONES "BEHIND THE STONE"

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Unseen friends Instinctively some learned what was missing from their childhood days. Some lost that child within and have been searching to re-connect ever since. So much is hidden from us that only speaks in dreams.

Loving is all We carry our hereditary, ancestral tendencies in our DNA and evolve with what we are given. Then our turn begins.

The dance of chance #1 This theme keeps cropping up for me, as though living is a dance of atoms and energy, laughter and sadness, love and hate. I choose steps to take in the dance, but lose the rhythm on the uneven dance floor sometimes. Mother Nature seems to call the best tunes.

Unconditional love Some say, "who needs it?" Some would say there can be no human progress without it.

In the mystery I’ve always loved the animal world and once worked at Gerald Durells’ Wildlife Preservation Trust. These and other events in my life have made me very grateful for being alive in this web of life. I am not moved by religious dogma, but I am enthralled by the mystery of being alive.

Behind the stone I am happiest in wild and natural landscapes. This is about one of my favourite places where land meets sea and sky and great stones stand.

Rocky Valley Cornwall is powerful, inspiring and mysterious. St. Nectan’s Glen waterfall starts a small river that plunges to the ocean and has cut its way through the hardest rock in Britain for thousands of years creating a valley. The river dissolves the hardest stone just as music can dissolve the hardest emotions. Half way down the valley on its short journey to the sea, humans carved two small maze patterns into the slate rock around four thousand years ago.

The visit This song is for all parents who have been excluded from their children. May the heartaches be healed.

A little love Is it really such a lot to ask ?

The falling Choosing free fall is great. Forced free fall is terrifying. Landing is always a problem. Seems that love can both crucify and crown us.

The dance of chance#2 Some celebrate life but half the planet’s humans have nothing to celebrate at all. Chance or fate, a little help from others is often welcome. Give and receive ? Why not ? After all we all live on the same spinning blob of matter, revolving in a vacuum with lots of other inexplicable suspended blobs.

Keep your head A letter to a friend.

The passing This is for someone I knew very well for a very long time.

One Minutes silence You could hit STOP and avoid the next event. Maybe.

A. D. E N D. U M ? Umm…. yes. I don’t believe in music just being entertainment for killing time. Time is short and getting shorter. This is a time to get real. We are either part of the solution or part of the problem. The time for being cynical, faint hearted, indifferent or sitting on the fence is over. This is a beautiful and mysterious planet with enough to sustain us all. We are beginning to sense, to put it mildly, that the planet is complaining about our treatment of her and each other. Those who discovered the smallest particle of matter gave us nuclear bombs and fallout. Now the same type of people have discovered the smallest particle of life itself and this time they are giving us genetics, dangerous crops and corporate greed. They are playing at being God and we are the guinea pigs. An old saying, "If we don’t stand for something, we’ll fall for anything. "

So…this album is for you…all you who came to the gigs and shared the music down the years, all who gave me space on their floors and sofas, shared food at their tables and light and warmth by their fires. You asked for these songs again and again so thank you for all the sharing. Long may you live.

(The Dance Of Chance # 2’ and ‘In The Mystery’ were originally featured in a BBC Radio Scotland programme called ‘The Song’ in a series called ‘The Beast That Can Talk’ produced by Keith Halden. ‘Keep Your Head’ was first featured live on the BBC 2 documentary ‘Festival’ about the Glastonbury festival). More on "Behind the Stone"