Monthly Archives: January 2025

by

Reflections of a 1990s genebanker

Since I started this blog in February 2012, I have written a number of stories about rice genetic resources and their conservation at the International Rice Research Institute (IRRI) in the Philippines, one of the centers of the Consultative Group on Agricultural Research (CGIAR).

Written over several years, there is inevitably some overlap between the posts. I have now brought them together. Just click on the red boxes below to read each one or expand an image.

I was privileged to manage the International Rice Genebank at IRRI (the IRG, formerly known as the International Rice Germplasm Center or IGRC until 1995) for a decade from July 1991, as Head of the Genetic Resources Center (GRC) [1].

The IRRI campus at Los Baños, 70 km south of Manila. The Brady Laboratory (second from left) houses the genebank cold stores.

There are twelve CGIAR genebanks, and IRRI’s is one of the largest. It’s certainly the oldest. In April, IRRI will celebrate its 65th anniversary [2]. For almost six and a half decades, IRRI has successfully managed the world’s largest collection of rice genetic resources (farmer or landrace varieties, improved varieties, wild rice species, genetic stocks, and the like).

There’s perhaps no crop more important than rice. It’s the staple food of half the world’s population on a daily basis. The genebank is a crucial resource for plant breeders who use the germplasm to sustain and increase agricultural productivity, with the aim of reducing hunger among the world’s poor.

IRRI released the first of the semi-dwarf varieties in the 1960s; many others have followed over the decades, with increasingly more complex pedigrees.

Pedigree of rice variety IR72 showing 22 landraces (boxes with bold lines) and one wild species, Oryza nivara. In contrast, IR8, the first of the widely-grown modern semi-dwarf varieties (indicated by the arrow) had only three landraces in its pedigree.

When I joined IRRI, there were just over 70,000 seed samples (or accessions as they are known in genebank parlance) in the genebank.

During the 1990s, the collection grew by about 30% to a little over 100,000 accessions. This was quite remarkable in itself, given that the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) had come into effect in 1992, and for for at least a decade or more thereafter, many countries were reluctant to share their national germplasm until benefit-sharing mechanisms had been worked out. It says a lot about the mutual respect between national programs (particularly in Asia) and IRRI that we were able to mount a significant program to collect rice varieties and wild species. But more on that later.

Today the collection is approaching 135,000 accessions, safely duplicated in the Svalbard Global Seed Vault (SGSV, under the auspices of the Government of Norway and the Crop Trust). Prior to 1991, and for at least the next decade or more, duplicates samples were also held in so-called ‘black box’ storage at the National Laboratory for Genetic Resources Preservation in Fort Collins, Colorado. I’m not sure whether IRRI has continued its arrangement with Fort Collins now that the SGSV is open.

When the SGSV vault was opened in 2008, IRRI deposited more than 70,000 accessions, the first to be registered in the Vault. Since then, IRRI has made six more deposits, for a total of 133,707 accessions, almost the entire collection.

Given the amount of publicity that the SGSV has received, one could be forgiven for not knowing that there are many more genebanks around the world.

Inevitably there has been some misguided (as far as I’m concerned) criticism of the SGSV that I attempted to rebut in the next post.

The IRRI genebank became the first genebank of the CGIAR system to be identified by the Crop Trust for in-perpetuity funding that will ensure the availability of the conserved germplasm decades into the future.

The fact that IRRI was able to deposit so many accessions in the SGSV and receive in-perpetuity funding is due—in no small part—to the many changes we made to the management of the genebank and its collection during the 1990s. And which pre-emptively prepared it for the changes that all the CGIAR genebanks would eventually have to make.

But I’m getting ahead of myself just a little.

Although I had been involved with the conservation and use of plant genetic resources since 1970 (when I arrived at the University of Birmingham to attend the one-year MSc course on genetic conservation), I’d never worked on rice nor managed a genebank when I joined IRRI in 1991. All my experience to date had been with potatoes in South and Central America, and several grain legumes while teaching at Birmingham during the 1980s.

1991 was a fortuitous time to join IRRI. I was recruited by Director General Klaus Lampe (right), who had been appointed by the institute’s Board of Trustees in 1998 to revive the institute’s fortunes and refurbish its ageing infrastructure.

Lampe was very supportive of the genetic resources program, and it helped that I had a senior position as a department head, so was able to meet with him directly on a regular basis to discuss my plans for the genebank.

Before 1991 quite a number of staff retired, including the previous and first head of the IRGC, Dr Te-Tzu Chang (known universally simple as ‘TT’). TT and I had very different management styles, and I was determined to involve my genebank staff in the changes that I believed should be made. I spent six months determining how the genebank operations could be significantly enhanced.

As I said, Klaus Lampe was supportive, approving recruitment of junior staff to help with the considerable backlog of seed samples for cleaning and registering in the genebank, as well as including the genebank in the institute’s program of infrastructure refurbishment and equipment upgrades.

These two posts describe many of the changes we made, and include a video about the genebank that I made in 2010 just before I left IRRI.

I was fortunate to inherit a great group of staff, totally dedicated to the genetic conservation cause, and much more knowledgeable about rice than I ever became [3].

I quickly identified Ms Flora ‘Pola’ de Guzman (all Filipinos have a nickname) as a potential genebank manager, and she continued in that role until her retirement a couple of years back. When the in-perpetuity agreement was signed in 2018, Pola was given a special award, recognising her 40 years service to the conservation of rice genetic resources.

Inside the International Rice Genebank Active Collection, with genebank manager Pola de Guzman

I asked Renato ‘Ato’ Reaño to manage all the genebank’s field operations. Ato has also now retired.

One of the key aspects that had to be addressed was data management. As you can imagine, for a collection of 70,000+ accessions that I inherited in 1991, there was a mountain of data about provenance, as well data on morphological characters and response to biotic and abiotic stresses, across the cultivated rices (two different species) and 20+ wild species of Oryza. Essentially there were three databases that couldn’t effectively talk to each other. Big changes had to be made, which I described in this post.

It took almost two years, but when completed we had developed the International Rice Genebank Collection Information System (IRGCIS) to manage all the operations of the genebank. It has now been superseded by an international system based on the US-developed germplasm information network, GRIN.

That information situation also reminds of another information ‘bee in my bonnet’, which I wrote about here.

In my interviews at IRRI in January 1991, I stressed the need for the genebank to carry out research, something that had not been contemplated when the GRC position was advertised the previous year. In fact, I made it a condition of accepting a job offer that the genebank should conduct germplasm-relevant research, such as studies of seed survival, rice taxonomy, and the management of the collection.

I had concerns that we had insufficient information about the longevity of seeds in storage, or how the environment at Los Baños affected the quality of rice seeds grown there. We developed new seed production protocols, and post-harvest management in terms of seed drying. We installed a bespoke seed drying room with a capacity of over 1 tonne of seeds. In the 2000s (after I had moved from GRC to a senior management position at IRRI), seed physiologist Fiona Hay was recruited who improved on the seed handling protocols that we developed and which had already shown to be effective in increasing seed quality for long-term conservation.

Early in the decade, and with funding from the British government, we set up a collaborative project with my former colleagues at the University of Birmingham as well as at the John Innes Centre to study how molecular markers could be used to study the diversity in the rice collection and its management.

In 1994, we received a large grant (>USD 2.3 million) from the Swiss government:

  • to collect rice varieties and wild species throughout Asia, Africa, and parts of South America (essentially to try and complete the collecting of germplasm that had been little explored);
  • to conduct research about on-farm management of rice genetic resources; and
  • to train personnel from national germplasm programs in collecting, conservation techniques, and data management.

During the 1990s, IRRI had a special rice project with the Government of Laos, and a staff member based in Vientiane. Since little rice germplasm had been collected in that country, we recruited Dr Seepana Appa Rao to collect rice varieties there.

Appa Rao (right) and his Lao counterpart, Dr Chay Bounphanousay (left) sampling a rice variety from a Lao farmer.

Over a five year period he and his Lao colleagues collected more than 13,000 samples, now safely conserved in the International Rice Genebank. We also built a small genebank near Vientiane to house the germplasm locally.

My colleagues and I were quite productive in terms of research and publications. This post lists all the publications on which I was author/co-author, and there are links therein to PDF copies of many of them.

Every year, IRRI receives thousands of visitors, and when I first arrived at IRRI, it seemed as if anyone and everyone who wanted to visit the genebank was allowed to do so. On more than one occasion—until I put a stop to it—I’d find our colleagues from Visitor Services taking a large party of visitors, hordes of schoolchildren even, into the cold stores. With such large numbers it was not possible to keep all the doors closed, disrupting the carefully controlled temperature and humidity environment in the genebank and its laboratories.

I had to limit the number of visitors inside the genebank significantly, and ask my staff to take some of the load of attending to visitors. Nevertheless, I do understand the need to explain the importance of genetic resources and the role of the genebank to visitors, and build a constituency who can support the genebank and what it aims to achieve.

But it was a joy to meet with visitors such as wheat breeder, ‘Father of the Green Revolution’, and 1970 Nobel Peace Laureate, Dr Norman Borlaug.

With Dr Norman Borlaug in the IRG Active Collection in the early 1990s, before we transferred the germplasm to aluminum pouches.

Finally, let me say something about IRRI’s genetic conservation role in the context of the CGIAR.

In the early 1990s, the heads of the CGIAR genebanks would meet each year as the Inter-Center Working Group on Genetic Resources (ICWG-GR). I attended my first meeting in January 1993 in Addis Ababa at the International Livestock Centre for Africa (ILCA, now part of the International Livestock Research Institute or ILRI). I was elected chair for three years, and during my tenure the System-wide Genetic Resources Program (SGRP) was launched with the ICWG-GR as its steering committee.

Earlier I mentioned the CBD. There’s no doubt that during the 1990s the whole realm of genetic resources became highly politicized, with the CGIAR centers contributing to CBD discussions as they related to agricultural biodiversity, and through the FAO Commission on Genetic Resources for Food and Agriculture.

The organization of the genebanks in the CGIAR has undergone several iterations since I moved away from this area in May 2001 (when I joined IRRI’s senior management team as Director for Program Planning and Communications). My successor Dr Ruaraidh Sackville Hamilton enthusiastically took on the role of representing the institute in the discussions on the formulation and implementation of the International Treaty on Plant Genetic Resources for Food and Agriculture (ITPGRFA). The Treaty aims to guarantee food security through the conservation, exchange, and sustainable use of the world’s plant genetic resources for food and agriculture. It also focuses on fair and equitable benefit sharing and recognition of farmers’ rights.

In 2016-17, I led a review of the Genebanks CRP (CGIAR Research Program). Since then, the Genebanks CRP evolved into the Genebank Platform, and is now the CGIAR Initiative on Genebanks.

What I can say is that all the CGIAR genebanks have raised their game with respect to the crops they conserve. Working with the Crop Trust, standards have increased, and genebanks held to account more rigorously in terms of how they are being managed. Nevertheless, I think that we can say that the CGIAR continues to play one of the major roles in genetic resources conservation worldwide.

[1] GRC comprised two units: the genebank (my day-to-day responsibility), and the International Network for the Genetic Evaluation of Rice or INGER, which was managed basis by one of my colleagues.

[2] It seems like only yesterday that I was organizing the institute’s Golden Jubilee in 2010, after which I retired and returned to the UK.

[3] Three key staff, Ms Eves Loresto, Tom Clemeno, and Ms. Amita ‘Amy’ Juliano sadly passed away, as have several other junior staff.

 

by

Unsurpassed beauty, nature, and thousands of years of history: the value of our heritage charities

For many years, Steph and I toyed with becoming members of the National Trust. But as we were living overseas, and only coming back to the UK each year on leave for just a few weeks, we didn’t think it was worth the membership cost.

However, when I retired in April 2010 and we moved back to the UK, we became members in February 2011. Since then, we have visited 153 properties, mostly historic houses and gardens, but also some of the most beautiful landscapes protected by the Trust, such as the White Cliffs of Dover and the Durham coast. 

We received gift membership of English Heritage (which cares for 400 historic places) at Christmas 2014, and made our first visits as members by April 2015. We had visited Witley Court, Worcestershire near our home in Bromsgrove several times before becoming members, and Belsay Hall, Dunstanburgh Castle, and Rievaulx Abbey when visiting our younger daughter in the northeast of England. Now that we live near Newcastle upon Tyne, we have in fact explored more English Heritage sites than National Trust locally; compared to further south, there are relatively few National Trust properties here.

Visiting these heritage sites gives us a purpose to get out of the house, benefit our physical and mental welfare, and to explore and learn more about the history of this nation of ours.

Over recent years, we have also taken week-long breaks or longer in various parts of the country to visit many of the heritage properties there. Such as Scotland in 2015, Northern Ireland in 2017, Cornwall in 2018, Kent and East Sussex in 2019, Hampshire and West Sussex in 2022, North Wales in 2023, and East Anglia in 2024.

This map shows all the National Trust and English Heritage properties we have now visited. You will have to zoom in to see more of the detail. There are also links to properties managed by partner organizations like the National Trust for Scotland, Historic Environment Scotland, and Cadw in Wales, as well as a few other sites not affiliated to any of these.

On this page, you can find a list of all 239 properties we have visited, by region, with links to a blog post I wrote, perhaps a photo album, or the official website. In any case, my blog posts are lavishly illustrated by my own photographs. There are also regional maps.

Just under a year ago, I wrote about some of the favorite places we had visited. Today’s blog updates the numbers somewhat.

The National Trust was the vision of its three founders in 1885: Octavia Hill, Canon Hardwicke Rawnsley, and Sir Robert Hunter.

Last week, on 12 January to be precise, the National Trust celebrated its 130th anniversary, and launched a 10-year strategy to 2035, People and Nature Thriving.

Today, the National Trust looks after more than 250,000 hectares of farmland, 780 miles of coastline and 500 historic places, gardens and nature reserves.

And despite the best (or worst) efforts of campaign group and forum Restore Trust to undermine the credibility, management, and success of the National Trust as a charity, the National Trust is overwhelmingly supported by its members (as evidenced from the support at last November’s AGM held in Newcastle), and provides a warm welcome for its thousands of members and visitors at all its sites.

As I was drafting this post, I realised that I’d first visited a couple of properties, Dovedale in Derbyshire and Little Moreton Hall near Congleton, in Cheshire more than 70 years ago, and another, Biddulph Grange, decades before the National Trust acquired the garden.

The Stepping Stones in Dovedale. That’s me, on the right beside my mother, along with my brothers and sister and cousins. I reckon this photo was taken around 1951.

My father was the staff photographer at the Congleton Chronicle, and I remember visiting Little Moreton Hall with him when he took this photo and others of the Manley Morris men in 1954.

The Manley Morris Men at Little Moreton Hall on 8 May 1954.

As to Biddulph Grange, Dad (and Mum) would visit the hospital on Christmas Day and take photos of Santa visiting the wards. Even after we moved to Leek in 1956 and Dad was no longer with the Congleton Chronicle, they would return to Biddulph Grange each Christmas until the early 1960s.

And attend some of the social functions held there for staff and friends. When Steph and I visited Biddulph Grange together for the first time in 2011, there was on display an album of photos about the previous history of the property as a hospital. I recognised many as taken by my Dad. Including this one at a staff summer dance. My mother is standing, fifth from the left, on the fourth row. I snapped this one on my phone.

by

Two Bs, two Ps, seven Us, and nine Ds

Education is a wonderful thing, and my family and I have taken advantage of the opportunities a good education opens up.

As I read an email a few days ago from the University of Birmingham, announcing its 125th anniversary celebrations later this year, my mind wandered back to 1975.

That was when the university celebrated the centennial of laying of the foundation stone of the Mason Science College in 1875, itself a successor of Queen’s College, founded in 1825 as a medical college. HM The Queen visited the university in 1975 to celebrate that centennial, seen in this photo with the university Chancellor, Sir Peter Scott (on the right) and the Vice-Chancellor, Dr Robert Hunter (later Baron Hunter of Newington, on the left). I was in the crowd there, somewhere.

I was back at Birmingham for a few months (from the International Potato Center or CIP in Lima, Peru where I was working as an Associate Taxonomist) to complete the residency requirements for my PhD, and to submit my dissertation. I successfully defended that in late October, and the degree was conferred by Sir Peter Scott at a congregation on 12 December. In the photo below, my PhD supervisor and Mason Professor of Botany, Jack Hawkes is on my right, and Dr Trevor Williams on my left.

But I’m getting a little ahead of myself.

My first experience of Birmingham was in the late Spring of 1967, when I sat the Joint Matriculation Board Advanced or ‘A’ Level biology practical exam in the First Year Lab in the School of Biological Sciences. Many high schools took advantage of that arrangement if they had insufficient facilities in their own premises to hold the exam.

Going into my ‘A’ level exams I had ambitions to attend university. Not that I’d applied to Birmingham. That honour went to the University of Southampton where I had been accepted to study for a BSc degree in environmental botany and geography.

As ‘baby boomers’ my elder brother Edgar and I were the first in our family and among all our cousins to attend university. Once Edgar had persuaded our parents that he wanted to go to university (1964-1967) it was easier for me to follow that same path three years later.

I enjoyed my three years at Southampton. Although I’d registered for a combined degree in environmental botany and geography, my interests shifted significantly towards botany by my third and final year.

However, graduating in July 1970 and with just a BSc under my belt, I knew I’d have to pursue graduate studies to achieve my ambition of working overseas. And it was at the beginning of my final year at Southampton that a one year taught MSc course on the Conservation and Utilisation of Plant Genetic Resources was launched at Birmingham, under the leadership of Jack Hawkes. One of the lecturers at Southampton, geneticist Dr Joe Smartt, suggested that I should apply.

Which I duly did, and after an interview at Birmingham was offered a place for the following September, subject to funding being available for a maintenance grant and tuition fees. It was not until the course was about to commence that Professor Hawkes could confirm the financial support. By mid-September I headed to Birmingham, and the beginning of an association with the university that lasted several decades, as both student and member of staff.

I was awarded the MSc degree in December 1971. During that year, Hawkes (a world-renowned potato expert) had arranged for me to join CIP in Lima for just a year (which later extended to more than eight years) to help conserve its important collection of native potato varieties. An opportunity I jumped at. However, funding from the British government was not confirmed until late 1972. Instead of kicking my heels waiting for that funding to be confirmed, and concerned I might find a position elsewhere, Hawkes raised a small grant to allow me to begin a PhD project under his supervision, and that I would continue after arriving  in Peru.

A third cohort of students arrived in Birmingham in September 1971, among them Stephanie Tribble from Southend-on-Sea who had just graduated from the University College of Swansea (now Swansea University) with a degree in botany. By the summer of 1972 Steph and I had become an item.

In November 1972 she joined the Scottish Plant Breeding Station (SPBS) at Pentlandfield, south of Edinburgh, as assistant curator of the Commonwealth Potato Collection. She returned to Birmingham in December for the MSc degree congregation, just three weeks before I was due to fly out to Peru at the beginning of January 1973.

Well, things have a habit of turning out for the best. Once I was in Peru, I asked Steph to marry me and join me in Lima where I knew there would be a position for her at CIP. Resigning from the SPBS, she arrived in early July and we were married in the local registry office in Lima in October.

So that’s two botanists, three universities (Southampton, Swansea, and Birmingham), and five degrees (2xBSc, 2xMSc, 1xPhD) between us.

After another fruitful five years with CIP based in Costa Rica after I’d completed my PhD (during which our elder daughter Hannah was born), a lectureship opened in the Department of Plant Biology at Birmingham, so I applied. I flew back from Peru for an interview, and having been offered the position, I joined the university on 1 April 1981.

Much of my teaching focused on the genetic resources MSc course that was accepting ever more numbers of students from around the world. I remained at Birmingham for a decade, before deciding that I wasn’t really cut out for academia and, in any case, a more exciting opportunity had presented itself at the International Rice Research Institute (IRRI) in the Philippines. I joined IRRI as head of the Genetic Resources Center in July 1991, remaining in that position for almost a decade. In May 2001, I was appointed Director for Program Planning and Communications (DPPC), joining the institute’s senior management team, until my retirement in April 2010.

During the 1990s, I had an excellent research collaboration with my former colleagues in the School of Biological Sciences at Birmingham, and each year when I returned to the UK on home leave, I’d spend time in the university discussing our research as well as delivering several lectures to the MSc students, for which the university appointed me an Honorary Senior Lecturer.

As I mentioned before, Hannah was born in 1978 when we were living in Costa Rica. Once back in the UK her younger sister Philippa was born in 1982 in the small market town of Bromsgrove, about 13 miles south of the University of Birmingham in north Worcestershire.

Both girls thrived in Bromsgrove, enjoyed school, and each had a good circle of friends.

We upended their world when I took the position at IRRI and they moved to the Philippines with Steph just after Christmas 1991. Even more challenging was their enrolment in the International School Manila, which had a US-based curriculum, and eventually an academic stream based on the International Baccalaureate (IB). There’s no doubt that the first year was tough. Not only was it challenging academically, but living 70 km south of Manila, IRRI students were bussed into school each day departing around 04:30 to begin classes at 07:30, and returning by 16:30, or later if there were holdups on the highway, as was often the case.

Despite the bumpy start, Hannah and Phil rose to the challenge and achieved outstanding scores on the IB in 1995 and 1999 respectively.

From the outset, attending university had been part of our plan for them, and an ambition they readily embraced. Both took a gap year between high school and university. Hannah was drawn towards Psychology, with a minor in Anthropology. And she discovered that this combination was offered at few universities in the UK, opting to attend Swansea University in 1996. And although she was on course to excel academically, half way through her second year she asked if she could transfer to Macalester College, a liberal arts college in Minnesota, USA.

Macalester graduation in May 2000, with Hannah and Michael facing the camera.

Graduating Summa cum laude in May 2000 from Macalester, with a BA in Psychology and a minor in Anthropology, Hannah was then accepted into a graduate program in the Department of Psychology at the University of Minnesota in the Twin Cities.

She was awarded her PhD in Industrial and Organizational Psychology in 2006 with a thesis that assessed the behaviour and ethical misconduct of senior leaders in the workplace.

Hannah (right) with her peers in Industrial & organizational Psychology

That’s one psychologist, another two universities (Macalester and Minnesota), and two more degrees (BA, PhD).

Remaining in Minnesota, she married Michael (also a Macalester graduate) in 2006, became a US citizen, and has a senior position focused on talent management and performance with one of the largest international conglomerates. They have two children: Callum (14) and Zoë (12).

After a gap year, Philippa began her studies in Psychology at Durham University in 2000, graduating with a 2:i BSc degree three years later. Uncertain what path then to follow, she moved to Vancouver for a year, before having to return to the UK at short notice after the Canadian government refused to renew her work visa.

Post-graduation, outside Durham Cathedral.

She spent six months looking for a job, finally landing a research assistantship in the Brain, Performance and Nutrition Research Centre in the Department of Psychology at Northumbria University in Newcastle upon Tyne. After a couple of years she began her own PhD studies investigating the effects of bioactive lipids such as omega-3 fatty acids on cognition and brain health. She was awarded her PhD in December 2010.

Post-graduation with Steph and me, and Andi.

She’s the second psychologist in the family, with two more universities and two degrees (BSc, PhD) under her belt.

Philippa is now Director of the Brain, Performance and Nutrition Research Centre, and Associate Professor in Biological Psychology at Northumbria.

She married Andi in September 2010 (taking themselves off to New York to get married), and have two sons: Elvis (13) and Felix (11).

Two botanists and two psychologists. Who’d have thought it? Neither Hannah nor Philippa showed any interest in pursuing biology at degree level. Having two psychologists in the family we do wonder, from time-to-time, if we went wrong somewhere along the line.

by

Music stirs hidden memories . . .

Hidden but not forgotten. They are just lurking deep in the mind’s archive waiting to be awakened.

And that’s what happened to me just the other afternoon. I was listening to Classic FM. Well, just hearing really, not paying attention as I was reading a book at the time. High brow Muzak.

Pachelbel’s Canon in D major. A popular piece of music (number 35/300 in the Classic FM Hall of Fame 2024 chosen by listeners), by German composer Johann Pachelbel (right, 1653-1706), although its date of composition is not known with any certainty.

As I put my book down and listened more attentively, lots of memories resurfaced from my time in Lima, Peru in the early 1970s.

Here’s the twist, however. I’m not sure all those years ago if it was Pachelbel’s Canon or the  Adagio in G minor by ‘Tomaso Albinoni’ that I heard. Let me explain.

I’m guessing it was sometime between December 1973 and March 1974. So why should I zero in on those particular months?

I know it was post-July 1973 because that’s when Steph joined me in Lima. And before April 1975, because that’s when we returned to the UK for a few months. And in any case we had already given up our apartment in Miraflores after the October 1974 earthquake, and spent the next six months house-sitting for colleagues from the International Potato Center (CIP) where Steph and I worked.

I do remember it was a weekend, and the weather was glorious. Bright and sunny, and rather hot, typical Lima summer weather (unlike the gloomy, foggy days of the middle months of the year). We’d left our apartment to go shopping, and pick up copies of Time and Newsweek from a bookshop in the San Isidro district that we often visited. This particular bookshop or libreria was located in a small shopping center overlooking Avda. Paseo de la Republica/Via Expressa, just opposite the Petroperú building.

I don’t think it’s there any more. I’ve looked on Google Maps and Streetview and it looks like the area has been redeveloped in the intervening decades. I hardly recognise any of the surroundings.

Anyway, to cut a long story short, we also decided to browse the bookshop’s music section. And in the background, I heard this piece of music I’d never heard before. The Canon or the Adagio? I don’t recall. But both pieces were on the same vinyl that I purchased there and then! I’ve enjoyed both ever since.

Tomaso Albinoni (left below, 1671-1751) was a Venetian composer, but did he write the Adagio in G minor? Is it a musical hoax? Its composition is attributed to Italian musicologist Remo Giazotto (right below, 1910-1998), an expert on Albinoni. He is said to have composed/elaborated the Adagio based on a fragment of one of Albinoni’s manuscripts while others believe he composed the whole piece. Certainly Giazotto had the copyright.

I was totally unaware of this interesting back story. Nevertheless, it is a beautiful and much appreciated piece of music, that gained position 170/300 in the Classic FM Hall of Fame 2024. Enjoy this interpretation.