busker

Lennon R.I.P.

I couldn't listen to Barbara Walters' 20/20 interview with the Chapman killer. His spooky voice. Those blubbery features and huge circular specs.

But I did catch his remark about the look on the patrolman's face as he carried the dying Liverpudlian aloft. Apparently, the honest rozzer uttered a "horrible" oath at the murderer.

Chapman sounded almost hurt and offended.

It must have taken some self-control for the policeman not to have drawn his own gun and dealt rough justice on the spot.

I'll tell you what'll be horrid - the treatment almost certain to be meted out by any number of people from across the world if the man ever swims into their ken.

Mark David Chapman flew up to New York to wait for Lennon outside his 'Dakota' apartment home. If news ever breaks that Chapman is anywhere  accessible, you'd have fans selling record collections and snapping up air tickets across the world  for the chance to corner this guy and deliver their own contemplative medieval revenge.

Imagine: Now's as good a time as any to say that if you want to hear a truly fine treatment of this fetching tune, track down Palle Mikkelborg's 1986 album of that name, track 5.

Mikkelborg's on trumpet and fluegelhorn, Kennie Knudsen on keyboards, and the great late Niels-Henning Ørsted Pedersen on bass - described by Oscar Peterson as "arguably the most inventive bassist in jazz".

Just the nicest guys. The trio was booked for Hong Kong's City Hall and, as shamefully often, ticket sales were so pathetically low that the organisers wanted to refund tickets and call it off.

But no, the lads didn't want to disappoint those fans that *had* turned up so we spread ourselves over the first few rows and enjoyed what amounted to a private performance complete with intimate banter and eyeball view of the musicians as they went about their musical tasks.