Bianca Bohl, Cobden Club, Monday February 25

The Grand Hall of the Cobden Club in Ladbroke Grove looks more like a film location than the usual sticky-floored dive that most gig-goers are used to.

This is probably appropriate for Westminster student, Bianca Bohl and her 6-piece band.

Bohl's ensemble fill the high ceilinged hall of this private members club with sumptuous music fit for the cinema.

Audience members, numbering around 100 are drawn to the candle lit, leather furnished areas set back from the stage.



This creates an awkward gap between the crowd and the band.

You can tell the German front-woman feels this distance when she says, “I feel like a reverend up here”.

Her black necktie on white shirt and wide brimmed Stetson hat do nothing to dispel the image of a Southern preacher and nor do biblical lyrics such as, “change your ways and repent”.

Pinning down the Bianca Bohl sound is a difficult task but the array of instruments employed by the band may go some way to explaining their expansive music.

Piano, trumpet, trombone, cello, violin, slide guitar and the more traditional drums, bass and guitar all featured here.

It takes a fine touch to blend this many sounds and musicians without muddying the waters and the classically trained Bohl has this touch, with each element of the music giving something extra to the overall sound.

Bohl's voice has a sweetness and range which comes into its own as she hits the higher notes.

Parts of the gig are quiet enough to hear a pin drop, while others are loud and almost rabble rousing like the gypsy-esque ending, reminiscent of Gogol Bordello.

The sound swells from the quiet to the loud effortlessly, as if this tight band is being conducted.

Their togetherness bridges the physical gap between the musicians and the crowd, who offer rapturous applause at the end of the performance.

This blog can also be viewed at www.thewordfromwestminster.blogspot.com

War, what is it good for? Jobs in journalism.

This week, my colleagues and I, studying journalism at Westminster University, have been up to our nipples in exam stress.

The tidemark of stress didn’t quite reach our necks and if I’m honest, only reached my nipples if I ducked down a bit.

Reporting week, as it is known, consists of only one exam in the traditional sense, which was on media law.



We spent the rest of the week turning over reports from surveys, speeches and press releases in a very short space of time.

The culminating event in all this occurred today and it involved a man from NATO fielding our questions about the deployment of peacekeeping troops to the conflict zone in Northland.

You may not have heard about the conflict in Northland and the current problems enforcing the arms embargo on the Jumblez insurgents but don’t worry, that’s because it’s all made up.

Confused?

Each year, NATO runs exercises to train its personnel.

The exercises use hypothetical scenarios, occurring in fictitious, invented war zones.

These are big training operations, using around 30 vessels, some of which are huge warships, with helicopters buzzing around and everybody getting very excited indeed.

It sounds like the kind of thing that an 11 year old billionaire would organise.

Anyway, to make the situation more like a real war zone, they take 5 or 6 student journalists with them to report on events.

Today’s exam was our chance to impress the guy that decides which students will go on the exercises - Lt Cmdr Rupert Nichol.

He answered our questions in a role play about the deployment of NATO troops in a prelude to the training exercise, which will run in June.

One former student, Tamer Al Mishal, who got involved in the NATO training, went straight into the job of Gaza correspondent for the BBC after he left Westminster.

So, reporting week is now over and we go out on work placements on Monday to do some real journalism, by which I mean, making coffee.

This blog can also be seen at www.thewordfromwestminster.blogspot.com

Medical Journalism Awards

On Monday night, I attended the Medical Journalism Awards.

Being the only person at Westminster University doing medical journalism, I was invited by my tutor to come along on my own to gorge myself on canapes and free booze.

If you're wondering whether it's possible to "gorge" yourself on tiny canapes, I can confirm that yes, it is.

Without wanting to detract from the awards themselves, I learnt some valuable life skills on Monday, mostly revolving around eating canapes.

As I arrived, it was easy enough to get myself a glass of wine because they were given to us on the way in.

I found it equally easy to get my glass filled up when it was empty.

However, despite occasionally spotting distant plates of food, wafting among the guests like butterflies (butterflies that I wanted to eat, desperately), trying to actually get my hands on some grub felt like chasing rainbows (tasty rainbows - like skittles but not like skittles, more like burgers).

The main reason I was told to come along to the awards was so that I could 'network'.

My current situation was making this difficult as the mighty booze/food-scales-of-dignity were becoming alarmingly unbalanced due to an empty stomach.

Mild panic set in as it seemed that the food had dried up.

Looking around, all I could see were empty plates or dead, moldy, inedible butterflies if you prefer.

The booze kept coming.

Now, I know what you're thinking - "why don't you just stop drinking?"

Ok, good idea but ringing in my ears were Andrew Marr's words - "Journalism and alcohol go together like betting and racehorses".

Whether this was criticism of his profession or advice to aspiring hacks, I can't be certain but I thought it was best to play safe and get really pissed.

Anyway, just in time, loads more food started pouring into the elegant hall where the awards were held and this time I was ready to stop being polite and elbow my way to the nosh.

I think this took the edge off of my slurring and I could start talking to potential employers again.

Some thoroughly delightful people who had done the Medical Journalism course at Westminster were there and one of them was Ashley Mckimm, who started the website JuniorDr.com.

He has already sent me an email offering me some work which is rather splendid.

It just made me think about the opportunities that this course offers, having seen what former students have gone on to do and also the chances I am already getting to write in professional publications.

If anyone comes across this blog after googling medical journalism or something, feel free to get in touch to ask me what the course is like.

It's a wonderful opportunity to do something completely different away from your medical school and even if you don't become a journalist, it will give you great writing and presentation skills which are invaluable to a doctor.

I'll try and write a little bit more about the great stuff we are doing on the course in the future.