My challenge in playing guitar with the youth band (honorary membership!) this morning at St Clement’s was that I am suffering with a blocked ear. In what is hopefully a last ditch move, the cold that has been haunting me seems to have taken refuge in my right ear, which provides a very unsatisfactory and unbalanced audio landscape. I couldn’t risk trying anything too ambitious but I think it went okay; I certainly did not see any glances to suggest I was wandering too far out of balance with everyone else.

I hope this will clear up by tomorrow evening when I am down to play bass for another jazz jam at the Red Lion in Brightwell-cum-Sotwell. Playing icing-on-the-cake electric guitar for the relatively simple songs we used this morning was one thing but laying down a key part of the musical foundation, keeping up with complex changes and, above all, playing by ear is going to seem even more like flying by the seat of my pants if my hearing is below par!