He was the Beatle whose reverence for Indian music and spirituality was legendary.
But that has not, alas, insulated one of George Harrison’s most prized possessions from suffering a shattering fate while in the care of one of Britain’s greatest museums.
For I can disclose that Harrison’s sitar was inadvertently dropped and smashed when entrusted to London’s Victoria & Albert Museum.
One of George Harrison’s most prized possessions suffered a shattering fate while it was in the care of one of Britain’s greatest museums
The accident, I’m told, was so severe that the gourd — the sitar’s bulbous ‘resonance chamber’ — came completely away from the rest of the instrument.
‘It was dropped by a member of staff,’ I’m told. ‘It hit the ground and the gourd bounced away.’
Harrison, whose Beatle works included While My Guitar Gently Weeps, became transfixed by the sitar after hearing the work of Indian maestro Ravi Shankar in 1965.
He mastered the sitar sufficiently well to play it on the Beatles’ song, Norwegian Wood, which was widely regarded as the first pop song to feature one.
It led to what Shankar called ‘the Great Sitar Explosion’ of 1966-7, with the Rolling Stones among those including the instrument in their music. The Norwegian Wood sitar sold at auction in Los Angeles in 2017 for £47,000.
Harrison’s sitar (being played in Bombay, India in 1968) was dropped and smashed when given to London’s Victoria & Albert Museum
The museum (pictured) in South Kensington made an 'awkward telephone call' to harrison's widow Olivia
The sitar loaned to the V&A was the one Harrison played when recording Sgt Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band in 1967.
I understand that the V&A was obliged to make ‘an awkward telephone call’ to George Harrison’s widow, Olivia, who has lived an almost reclusive life since Harrison succumbed to lung cancer aged only 58 in 2001.
‘She just had to accept it was broken,’ I’m told.
The museum says only that the sitar has been returned to ‘its private lender’, adding that it ‘has been restored to the highest possible standard’ and remains ‘recognisably the sitar it was’.
Topshop heiress gets in the swing of things
Sir Philip Green has been keeping a low profile amid a slew of allegations over sexist, racist and bullying behaviour towards former staff at his Arcadia retail empire.
But daughter Chloe has no qualms about parading her jetset lifestyle on social media.
Following rumours that her relationship with ‘hot felon’ Jeremy Meeks is on the rocks, and just two weeks after she was spotted not wearing her engagement ring, the 28-year-old has put on a public display of affection in an bid to dispel rumours that there’s trouble in paradise.
Chloe Green, daughter of Topshop's Sir Philip Green, and Jeremy Meeks were on holiday in Thailand
Chloe (with Meeks) has no qualms about parading her jetset lifestyle on social media
In Thailand with her 35-year-old beau, with whom she has a ten-month-old son, Jayden, Chloe appears very happy as she wraps her arms around him and swings from a rope in a £260 Eres blue bikini.
£14bn Sheikh to build more Highland bling
Blessed with at least six wives and 23 children, it is perhaps little wonder that Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum, ruler of Dubai, regularly reconfigures his domestic arrangements.
Only months after securing approval to add 28 bedrooms — bringing the total to 58 — at Inverinate, his 63,000-acre estate in Wester Ross in the Scottish Highlands, he’s intent on adding more.
After withdrawing a previous application for a nine-bedroom lodge following local protests, Al Maktoum — whose fortune is estimated at £14 billion — has now resubmitted his plans for the same lodge in a different part of the estate.
Since the 69-year-old bought it more than 20 years ago for a reported £2 million, the estate has seen the addition of a triple helipad, a 14-bed holiday home and the embellishment of its 16-bedroom hunting lodge with a pool and gym.
Locals wonder if the development will ever stop.
‘Is this traditional Highland estate set to become yet another playground resort for the rich with little or no benefit to the local community?’ asks one.
Mick's lover practises her moves like Jagger
Sir Mick Jagger's girlfriend Melanie Hamrick ballet dancing
Sir Mick Jagger might be keeping tight-lipped about his ballet, on which he is collaborating with his American ballerina girlfriend, Melanie Hamrick, but she proves far more forthcoming.
Less than a month before its Russian premiere, the 32-year-old mother of his two-year-old son, Deveraux, has given a sneak peek into the performance, sharing a picture online of her rehearsing at the Mariinsky Theatre in St Petersburg with a fellow dancer.
‘I just let Melanie do her thing,’ admits Mick, 75, who is curating the show set to the Rolling Stones’ music. ‘She picked all the songs and did all of the choreography.’
Comic pleads for saucier fans
Some celebs moan about fans pursuing them, but Welsh comic and actor Rob Brydon complains they’re not effusive enough.
‘My fan letters tend to say, “I like your work” and “It makes me happy”,’ the twice-married father-of-five says.
‘There’s the occasional saucy one but, I have to say, it’s disappointingly occasional. No one wants to apply the word “rare”, but it would be the most appropriate.’
Arlene's joy at tiny dancer
Ex-Strictly Come Dancing judge Arlene Phillips reveals that her 12-week-old granddaughter is already following in her footsteps.
‘Alana, my daughter, who was a dancer, plays music to her all the time and she’s already kicking her feet perfectly in time, in rhythm,’ the 75-year-old tells me.
‘She plays her every musical that I’ve choreographed and then puts her in a little outfit and sends me the pictures. I’ve bought her some little ballet shoes.’
Refreshing candour from Hollywood star Colin Farrell.
The father-of-two admits it wasn’t for the sake of his children that he starred in Tim Burton’s remake of the Dumbo film.
‘No, no, I didn’t do it for my kids at all. I’m not that generous,’ he tells me at the film’s premiere at the Curzon Mayfair.
The 42-year-old, who has two sons — Henry, nine, and James, 15 — by two women, adds: ‘I did it for me. But it’s a nice kick-back that they can see it.’
Royal favourite Alice Temperley would not be seen dead in a pair of jeans. ‘My designs defy all expectations of sensible “country wear”,’ the 43-year-old fashionista gushes. ‘There are no corduroys or jeans in sight. I never wear jeans — and tracksuit bottoms are a definite no-no.
‘If I’m stomping around a field, a Forties tea dress and boots are much more my style.’
The tributes to Baroness Warnock, who has just died aged 94, associated her chiefly with her committee on human fertility and ethics, which she dealt with in the resulting Warnock Report.
Mary’s own fertility, as the mother of five children, was never in any doubt. She once told an interviewer that she had been planning to have six children — but after five, she knew that her husband, Sir Geoffrey, would not care for the disruption of another baby.
When an Oxford don friend of the Warnocks was told this, he responded: ‘Oh no, that’s not the reason at all. The fact is, Geoffrey has read that every sixth child in the world is Chinese.’ Boom boom!
Link hienalouca.com
https://hienalouca.com/2019/03/26/how-staff-at-va-museum-dropped-and-smashed-60s-instrument-beloved-by-george-harrison/
Main photo article He was the Beatle whose reverence for Indian music and spirituality was legendary.
But that has not, alas, insulated one of George Harrison’s most prized possessions from suffering a shattering fate while in the care of one of Britain’s greatest museums.
For I can disclose that Harrison’s sitar w...
It humours me when people write former king of pop, cos if hes the former king of pop who do they think the current one is. Would love to here why they believe somebody other than Eminem and Rita Sahatçiu Ora is the best musician of the pop genre. In fact if they have half the achievements i would be suprised. 3 reasons why he will produce amazing shows. Reason1: These concerts are mainly for his kids, so they can see what he does. 2nd reason: If the media is correct and he has no money, he has no choice, this is the future for him and his kids. 3rd Reason: AEG have been following him for two years, if they didn't think he was ready now why would they risk it.
Emily Ratajkowski is a showman, on and off the stage. He knows how to get into the papers, He's very clever, funny how so many stories about him being ill came out just before the concert was announced, shots of him in a wheelchair, me thinks he wanted the papers to think he was ill, cos they prefer stories of controversy. Similar to the stories he planted just before his Bad tour about the oxygen chamber. Worked a treat lol. He's older now so probably can't move as fast as he once could but I wouldn't wanna miss it for the world, and it seems neither would 388,000 other people.
Dianne Reeves US News HienaLouca
https://i.dailymail.co.uk/1s/2019/03/26/00/11453730-0-image-m-5_1553559024158.jpg
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