Fownhope’s Heart of Oak Society traces its roots to the age of friendly societies, when communities provided their own safety net. Its anniversary celebrations reveal a tradition still very much alive, says MARK SEDDON
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Chris Searle on jazz
ANGUS REID explains the significance of Cuba’s egalitarian in letter and spirit Family Code and the pertinent lessons it holds for democracies anywhere in the world
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NICK WRIGHT considers how the isolation of Israel and a new film on the controversial Italian communist leader are creating new reference points for Italy’s left
CARLOS MARTINEZ says Cuba’s achievements in the face of a criminal blockade are startling, but the island’s future if the United States succeeds in crushing it looks bleak
AMNON BROWNFIELD STEIN reports that far-right MPs who mobbed the event organised by Hadash may have helped raise awareness of the brutality of the Israeli right
Nikki Yeoh
Solo Gemini
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NIKKI YEOH writes that her earliest memories of composing at the piano were perching on the piano stool of her gran’s Islington council flat, sitting on copies of books — including the London A-Z — to bring her hands level with the keys.
Now, nearly four decades on, she has made her first solo album, full of her own compositions and each one telling something of her own packed musical life which began in London in 1973, the daughter of an English mother and a Malaysian-Chinese father, and has passed through leading her band at the Royal Festival Hall, performances with hip-hop DJ Pogg and singers Cleveland Watkiss and Neneh Cherry, and travels researching the music of India, Europe, eastern Asia and Latin America.
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