Tag: Hille Perl

Dreams And Dances Of The Sun King, Hille Perl, Lee Santana, Wigmore Hall Lunchtime Concert, 30 April 2018

I booked this concert (along with others from the Wigmore Hall spring programme) before Christmas.

Strangely, Janie and I went to the cinema a few days later and saw Happy End…

Happy End, Curzon Bloomsbury, 23 December 2017

…in which Hille Perl makes a cameo appearance as the viola da gamba and sexting interest…

…it really isn’t often you’ll see those two terms – viola da gamba and sexting – in the same sentence.

Then, recently, DJ kindly bought me an electric ukulele in the style of an oil can:

…inducing me to comment to Ian Pittaway, after my last baroq-ulele lesson, that I now no longer know whether I seek to emulate Lee Santana or Carlos Santana.

Anyway, Janie and I were very excited that we would be seeing this remarkable couple, Hille Perl and Lee Santana, playing at the Wigmore Hall.

Here is a link to the Wigmore Hall resource on the concert we saw.

After such a build up and such high expectations, it wouldn’t be surprising if the concert turned out to be a disappointment, especially as we needed to brave unseasonably awful weather to get to The Wig. But no such thing – we were truly entranced by the music and their performance as a couple. It really was a beautiful concert from start to finish.

We found their style of remaining on stage throughout and looking so captivated by each other’s music making was quite touching. In particular, when Lee Santana played a few solo pieces on a slightly smaller theorbo; a “théorbe des pièces” to be precise, Hille Perl looked transfixed. As were we – what a sweet sound that solo instrument version of the theorbo had – I don’t think we’d ever heard one of those before.

You don’t have to take our word for this if you are coming to this Ogblog piece soon after the event. It was broadcast by BBC Radio 3 as a lunchtime concert and is still available for most of May 2018 – click here.

Hille Perl and Lee Santana concluded the concert with Les Folies d’Espagne by Marin Marais, which is the very piece that Hille Perl plays solo in the movie Happy End. If you want to see what Hille Perl and Lee Santana look like playing together, here is a little embedded vid of them playing that very piece together:

They played us an encore on the afternoon which was unexpected and unannounced. I’m pretty sure it was O’Carolan’s Dream, which you can see/hear them play on this embedded vid:

The afternoon was an absolute treat; a super way to enjoy a Monday off work!

Happy End, Curzon Bloomsbury, 23 December 2017

Reading about this Michael Haneke film in the Curzon brochure, it sounded very interesting and right up our street. Strangely, we have often noticed reviews of Haneke films and thought that they sounded like our cup of tea, but this (I think) is the first we have actually got off our butts and gone to see one.

We’ll be looking out for more Haneke films (including some of his earlier ones) after this experience. We thought this was a really superb movie.

Here is the IMDb entry for Happy End.

Talk about dysfunctional families – this high-falutin’ French family really takes the biscuit. They reminded me a bit of families you sometimes find in Francois Mauriac novels – just a more modern version.

Haneke tends to work with an ensemble of favourite actors and actresses, so it won’t surprise Haneke fans to see Isabelle Huppert  and Jean-Louis Trintignant, for example. A nice little cameo role for Toby Jones too.

Janie and I thought the stand-out performance was Fantine Harduin as the little girl, Eve, at the centre of the plot. Remember where you first saw her name!

Bass Viol (Viola Da Gamba) With Seven Strings, By DasBee, source https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File%3AViola_da_gamba_basso_7.jpg

So why the picture of the rare seven-string bass viol and a name check for Hille Perl, one of the leading exponents of that instrument? Well, it is only a sub-plot but a rather full-on one; it is not all that often that you’ll see the terms sexting and viola da gamba in the same sentence…or in the same subplot. That subplot put the gilt on the gingerbread for early music lovers like me and Janie.

Fabulous movie, highly recommended by both of us.