Black Sabbath, Holst & travel — a tribute to Ozzy

West Australian

23-07-2025

As we travel, we collect pieces of a jigsaw, without even having the lid.
That picture may only emerge later, unexpectedly.
And this is how a jigsaw came together.
It's mealtime and I'm flicking through Emirates' entertainment system, looking for something not-too-long to watch. I stumbled across a music documentary about the heavy metal band Black Sabbath.
They're not really my cup of tea, but emerges is the story of a bunch of Birmingham boys who invented a whole musical genre, and remained down to earth, and friends, despite the excesses of the era and frontman Ozzy Osbourne.
Musically, it's actually pretty interesting. There are complex time signatures and key shifts. Guitarist Tony Iommi's instrument was tuned lower to slacken the strings under his missing finger tips, which were cut off in a work accident.
This is the 50th anniversary year of the Black Sabbath's genesis. They have sold more than 70 million records, won two Grammys and been inducted into both the UK Music Hall of Fame and the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.
The chaps are actually endearing and their story inspiring. I feel like I've found the corner piece of a jigsaw puzzle.
Future note to self
— Things to see and do in
Birmingham
. Brindleyplace and the canal quarter (Cinderella story with bars and restaurants), Birmingham Museum and Art Gallery, Jewellery Quarter (more than 200 listed buildings), Cadbury World, just about any Indian restaurant, and Moseley Bog for a walk. (Yes, really. A bog.)
I'd always thought the name 'Black Sabbath' came from the band being from the Black Country (so-called for the heavy-industry history of England's second city), but it was actually taken from their first song.
And here's the second piece of my jigsaw.
Despite his name, Gustav Holst was an English composer born in 1874 in rather elegant Cheltenham, 80km from Birmingham.
The descendent of a Swedish family (by way of
Latvia
and Russia), he's most famous for composing The Planets suite, written in 1914 — Mars, Jupiter, Mercury and all the other known planets of that time given their characters.
Mars, the bringer of war, is the first and perhaps most dramatic, opening with a primitive rhythm with an
irregular 5 /4
time signature. It develops into an ominous low riff of three notes, based on the note G. An eponymous anthem.
Black Sabbath bass player Geezer Butler recalls being in a recording studio in the early days of the band, and being a 'medium-sized fan of Holst's The Planets' he was trying to play the opening to Mars. Then next day, guitarist Iommi came in and played it differently — extending the second note upwards. He was playing G, A and Db — a flattened fifth. He was playing the devil's chord, the 'diabolus in musica', and a sequence that had been forbidden by the church for centuries. He was actually playing what became the signature riff for their first famous song, Black Sabbath.
As we travel, we collect pieces of a jigsaw, without even having the lid.
That picture may only emerge later, unexpectedly.
And this is how a jigsaw came together.
There's a refrain in the middle of Holst's Jupiter which, separately, became known as Thaxted. It was once best known for its use in the hymn I Vow To Thee My Country, but it has become rugby union's theme.
It was morphed again, into the anthem World in Union, first heard at the 1991 Rugby World Cup, held in England.
Rugby union is widely recognised by being invented by William Webb Ellis in 1823. The 2023 Rugby World Cup, to be held by France, will mark its 200th anniversary.
Note to self
— Things to see and do in
France
. Paris cafes, the D'Orsay Museum, the Eiffel Tower, Palace of Versailles and stroll the gardens of Luxembourg Palace and the little streets of St Germain and Les Puces
flea market
, of course.
But here comes another part of that jigsaw …
For sometime in 1899, Holst, then still an aspiring composer, was in London and visited the British Museum's Reading Room. He asked for several books, including works by the 5th century classical poet Kalidasa.
Though having to earn a living playing trombone for the Carl Rosa Opera Company and in a popular orchestra called the White Viennese Band, Holst, who went to the Royal College of Music in London, had become interested in Hindu spirituality.
He wanted to set some of its most important texts to music but didn't like the clunky translations he'd found and came here, to the British Museum to find precious early versions.
He later told his daughter that he'd never felt more foolish than the moment the huge tomes were brought to him, and he found they were in Sanskrit.
He surely felt less foolish after he learnt Sanskrit at University College London, specifically so that he could translate them himself.
Holst did, indeed, set many of India's most famous early texts to music. There was Sita, a three-act opera based on part of the epic Ramayana poem, composed between 1899 and 1906. In 1908, Holst wrote Savitri, a chamber opera based a story from the Mahabharata. He wrote Hymns from the Rig Veda, and based other works on texts by the great Indian poet Kalidasa.
Note to self
— Things to see and do in
London
. British Museum, Victoria and Albert Museum, Science Museum, Natural History Museum — all free. But don't forget the Royal Academy of Music Museum and perhaps The Musical Museum, which has one of the world's best collections of self-playing instruments, including a massive Wurlitzer. It's in Brentford, near Kew Bridge railway station.
Phrases in the poem by Kalidasa which follows will be recognisable the pieces of many jigsaws.
For Kalidasa wrote this, possibly more than 1600 years ago …
'Listen to the exhortation of the dawn!
Look to this day!
For it is life, the very life of life.
In its brief course lie all the verities
and realities of your existence.
The bliss of growth, the glory of action,
the splendor of beauty;
for yesterday is but a dream,
and tomorrow is only a vision;
But today well lived makes every yesterday
a dream of happiness,
and every tomorrow a vision of hope.
Look well therefore to this day!
Such is the salutation of the dawn!'
Kalidasa poet probably lived from around 350 to 460AD and, I think, it is widely accepted (and logical) that he was associated with the informed era of Chandra Gupta II (who reigned from around 380AD to 415AD). His work flourished in the 5th century.
I have been collecting Kalidasa's works for years. It takes me to backstreet book shops in odd little towns in India. It takes me into tight little conversations with intellectuals and locals on the streets, who just read and know the poet.
I see the Encylopaedia Britannica sites him as 'probably the greatest Indian writer of any epoch'.
Note to self
— Things to see and do in
India
. In Mumbai, visit the main railway station,Chhatrapati Shivaji Terminus, and Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj Vastu Sangrahalaya museum in South Mumbai, join Bollywood Tours and a one hour boat trip from Gateway of India to Elephant Island, with its 5th-century temples cut from the rock. Fly one and a half hours north east to the
Ujjain
in the state of
Madhya Pradesh
to visit the Kalidasa Academy, with its museum of Sanskrit theatrical arts and outdoor theatre, and the nearby Gadkalika Temple, dedicated to Goddess Kalika, who is associated with universal energy. It is said that Kalidasa, who had no formal education, acquired his knowledge and literary skills through blessings from the goddess, because of his complete devotion to her.
The final part of this jigsaw comes when friend and outback travelling companion Grady Brand sends me a picture of a page from the book Legend of the Kimberley, about flying doctor Lawson Holman, compiled by Janet Holman.
Found among Dr Holman's papers was this quote – another version of Kalidasa's word — which is published in the book:
'Yesterday has gone, it is no more than a memory.
Tomorrow is the future, for which you plan and hope.
Today is life.
Make the most of this day, for in it is all the truth and reality of your existence; of heartache and happiness of learning and experiencing new things; the joy and the glory of action; the splendour of beauty.
Today well lived makes every yesterday a dream of happiness and every tomorrow a vision of hope.
Such is life.'
— Kaladasa
It sang out to Grady, and he sent it to me.
And that sent me, immediately, back to the red dust and blue sky of the Kimberley.
I've always had an affinity for Derby, out there, surrounded by the sun-crazed mudflats, with that huge tide driving its rhythm, and its wide streets lined with big boabs.
It marks the west end of the Gibb River Road, opened as a beef road in the early 1960s and now, usually, busy with mobs of tourists.
At the start of the road, among boabs and the woodlands of this pindan country, is Holman House, built by Owen Ah Chee about 1915, and where Old Doc Holman, as Lawson Holman was affectionately known around here, lived in the 1950s. Doc died in 1993, aged 64, but is still a legend in these parts, remembered for his outstanding commitment to the health of the town, its outlying communities and the patients of the Derby Leprosarium. Holman House is recognised as a State heritage icon — just like the man who lived in it and 'invented' his own blood bank. For Old Doc Holman set about categorising Derby residents into blood groups. When blood was urgently needed, he rushed to the compulsory donor and bled them.
I'm leaving Derby, driving east on the Gibb River Road, as I have so many times, with country music drifting out of the windows and bulldust drifting in as sneezy as snuff.
And I'm playing country music (of course). And I'm playing Kris Kristofferson (of course). It's a digital version of his greatest hits, which I've been playing since the 80s, after I spent some time with Kris and wrote about him.
And he sings …
'Yesterday is dead and gone
And tomorrow's out of sight …'
Another piece in the comforting jigsaws that help me make it through the night.
Note to self
— Things to see and do in
Derby
and the
West Kimberley
. Do the flight out to Horizontal Falls in a seaplane; it's worth the money. Fish and chips on the jetty, visit Derby pioneer cemetery, and the grave of PC William Richardson, who was killed by Pigeon, and graves overtaken by antbed mounds. See if Sandy is still doing the best boab nut carving in WA. Set out on the Gibb River Road and have a swim Bell Gorge. Live life to the full
+ Legend of the Kimberley, Lawson Holman — Flying Doctor is published by WA's Hesperian Press ($35 plus postage.
hesperianpress.com
)