Image of Sunday Social in the garden with LLoyd Jeans talking about Jimi Hendrix and the Upper Cut Club

Walnuts, Fothergilla and Jimi Hendrix. Sunday 3rd August, 2025

There were six ripening walnuts on the walnut tree, almost occluded by the buddleia. Now there are none. I suspect squirrels have gathered them, as they were too big for birds, the size of ping-pong balls. I find one on the ground, just one. I decide to cut it up to see how much the nut has developed. I slice bits off, and have to grip it quite tightly, as it is reluctant to give up any of the light green flesh. I give up, although I can feel what would be the nut. At home, an hour later, I see that my finger tips are a deep brown. I instantly realise this must be walnut stain. I attempt to wash it off, but soap and water make little difference. I read it up, just in case it is poisonous. It isn’t, but is the same stain that you might paint on wood. That was earlier in the week, and the stain takes four days to wear off.

In the Fothergill bed, we have a fothergilla shrub, named after the eponymous plant collector who owned what is now West Ham park in the late 18th century. If there was any flowering of the shrub, it was at the nursery. Now it is in nondescript leaf. The flowers are described as ‘white bottlebrush’ in shape. The leaves though go orange, yellow and red before falling in autumn. There are quite a few hybrids of fothergilla which I suspect is what we have. The shrub is planted in a corner which  will have to be a temporary placement as it will outgrow the space allowed. Two on line sites I have found say it prefers slightly acid soil. So some thoughts on where to plant it and in what medium are needed.

Lloyd Jeans gave a talk today on Jimi Hendrix’s visit to Forest Gate and music in the area generally. The talk was well attended, around 60 in the audience. Hendrix came on Boxing Day 1966 to perform at the Upper Cut. He completed Purple Haze there, writing the lyrics backstage while waiting to go on, giving the song its first outing. The Upper Cut was off Woodgrange Road, in the short street opposite the library, where the mural has been painted commemorating the event. There’s no trace of the club. It has been obliterated by the huge ventilation shaft for the Channel tunnel and the Gateway estate. Prior to becoming the Upper Cut, the venue was a roller skating rink. I went there once with friends about 1964, and hated it. The floor was wooden and the noise of hundreds of skaters plus music was ear-splitting. I never went again.

Purple Haze begins:

Purple haze all in my brain

Lately things, they don’t seem the same

Acting funny, but I don’t know why

Scuse me while I kiss the sky


Purple haze is said to be a street name for LSD. Very likely, the words fit.  Though Hendrix said it was a love song.

Lloyd took us back to 1844 when John Curwen introduced the Do Ray Mee system of music for singers who couldn’t read music. He had learnt it from Anna Glover in Norfolk and adapted it. The system became popular all over the world. In the film Sound of Music, Julie Andrews, as Maria, sings it to the Trapp children. John Curwen set up the Tonic Sol Far academy in 1879 which was behind what is now Cherubim and Seraphim church on Earlham Grove.

The weather for the talk was windy with rain threatening. The large sunshade was shaking back and forth like a mast at sea. I wondered what would happen if the skies opened, as only half the crowd could fit in the shelter. But we were lucky. There were a few drips of rain but storm Floris held off for today at least.

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