Category: Music

Byrd: The Popish Organist, The Cardinall’s Musick, Wigmore Hall, 7 October 2011

Oy! Are You Looking At My Byrd?…

…was not the title of this concert by The Cardinall’s Musick…

…although Andrew Carwood does always give his concerts a title. Perhaps he’ll use my suggestion some time soon.

Still, this exceptional group of singers tends to fill the Wigmore Hall whenever it appears, for good reason.

Here is a link to the on-line programme of music for the evening.

We’d seen them perform before and had even previously seen one of their concerts at which Andrew Carwood explained the sectarian political backdrop to the music in those Tudor times…

…it must have been like the politics of Brexit but with capital punishment in place of the earhole bashing.

No wonder these Tudor composers took solus in lamentations and such Jeremiad material.

As usual with such concerts, it was fascinating to hear the contrast between the lesser and the better known composers; Tallis and especially Byrd being the better known and better represented composers on the night. The better known fellows deserve their status in my view; certainly for this type of music.

Here (click through for more details) and below is a vid taster of The Cardinalls Musick singing Tallis Lamentations and other such sacred works:

A wonderfully relaxing concert at the end of a busy week at work.

Charlotte Bonneton & Karim Said, St John’s Smith Square, 29 September 2011

Mum, Angela, Janie and Me

Late in life, mum formed an unlikely friendship with the young, extremely talented pianist, Karim Said. I can’t remember exactly how it came about.

I know I recorded some BBC4 programmes about young musicians, which mum loved and watched over and over. Karim was one of those featured artists.

I think mum then watched those programmes with Angela Broad and I’m pretty sure Angela knew Karim, perhaps because he was one of the Tabors’ sponsored artistes…so the rest is history…

…anyway, mum and Angela had been to see and had met Karim before this gig. Mum and Karim had also had some exchange of correspondence, I seem to recall.

A very young Karim, I think from mum’s earlier outing with Angela to see him

Mum the groupie. I don’t suppose artistes at Karim’s stage have that many groupies either.

When this concert came up, it was most fortuitously located and timed for me; lunchtime at St John’s Smith Square. As a friend of the venue, I get a fist-full of free passes for those lunchtime concerts. I was also able to organise my work around a visit to Church House that morning, which was maximally convenient.

Here’s the order of play:

Charlotte Bonneton And Karim Said at St John’s Smith Square. The violinist and pianist perform Beethoven’s Sonata For Violin And Piano No 3, Boulez’s 12 Notations For Solo Piano and Faure’s Violin Sonata No 1 In A.

My taste in music did not/does not always coincide with mum’s and Angela’s, but on this occasion we were as one. We all enjoyed the Beethoven and the Fauré; we none of us liked the Boulez, which seemed in any case to make poor Karim’s fingers bleed.

“I’m going to tell him if no-one else will…” said Angela afterwards, in the matter of the commercial sense (or lack thereof) in Karim pursuing the work of composers like Boulez.

No matter.

Mum had a cracking good time. Karim was extremely pleasant and attentive after the concert. He even introduced us to his fellow musician, Charlotte, making mum ever so pleased by describing mum as his friend.

Curious about Karim? Here is a link to his website…

…and here he is performing something that is to my taste – click here or below:

Chris Thile & Brad Mehldau, Wigmore Hall, 16 September 2011

At a very geeky level this is an exciting Wigmore Hall concert, because this was our first concert of the 2011-2012 season, which was the first season that Wigmore Hall archived fully on-line.

So here is a link to the on-line archive page for this concert.

In truth, Brad Mehldau concerts tend to be a bit geeky anyway. The fellow has so many influences and blends so many styles in with his jazz piano, the concert is almost like a music quiz.

Back then, I was less fascinated by the mandolin than I am now at the time of writing (January 2018)…

…but I have long been intrigued by the instrument and it was very interesting to hear it used as a jazz pairing with Brad’s inimitable jazz piano style.

I think technically Brad was no longer the curator of the Wigmore Hall jazz seasons by the time this concert came around, although it might have been, technically, the tail end of his 2010/2011 commitment to the venue.

I seem to recall that I enjoyed this concert more than Janie did…

…I also seem to recall that we both felt that we had “done” Brad Mehldau now, this being the third of his we had been to, unless the concert works or partner musicians were the main attraction for us…

…but I relented four years later for the sake of Bach, much to our chagrin- click here or below:

Brad Mehldau, Wigmore Hall, 17 December 2015

But I slightly digress. This Thile/Mehldau concert in September 2011 was a goodie in my book.

Paco Peña, Wigmore Hall Late Night Series, 3 June 2011

After a day watching test match cricket at Lord’s with friends…

England v Sri Lanka Day One, Lord’s, 3 June 2011

…what could be a more fitting conclusion than a late night concert at the Wigmore Hall?

Back then, I used to describe Lord’s and the Wigmore Hall as the last two places on the planet where stewards refer to me as “young man”.

Now (as I write in late 2017) I’m afraid that not even the stewards at those two places call me “young man” any more.

But I digress.

This was a lovely short concert of Paco Peña and friends making glorious music together.

I’m pretty sure that Janie picked me up and whisked me back to Sandall Close after the concert – this was our penultimate weekend there. Another story.

Telemann And The Gypsies, St John’s Smith Square, 20 May 2011

We didn’t book much of the Lufthansa Festival that year, sadly, as the programme was excellent, but we did book this one superb concert by Ensemble Caprice.

No problem buying CDs of the music we heard at this one:

We also invested in Vivaldi and the Baroque Gypsies from the same stable – click here.

I still listen to these albums quite a lot. The Telemann is the more interesting but both are good.

We miss that Lufthansa Festival now its gone – the scaled down spring baroque festival at SJSS is a very modest affair by comparison. A shame we mostly missed out that year but at least we got to see one good’un in these visitors from Montreal, Ensemble Caprice.

Mare Nostrum, Wigmore Hall, 2 May 2011

We had the joy, honour and privilege to see the marvellous Hespèrion XXI that spring, little knowing that it was to be one of the last few concerts Montserrat Figueras was able to give.

The concert was entitled Mare Nostrum, a celebration of early music cross-fertilisation between eastern and western traditions of music, spanning from Byzantium to Al-Andalus and Sephardic traditions of music.

Janie and I both remember the concert being an absolute delight. Here is a link to a very good music OMH review.

Available for download by clicking the image or through all major outlets

I also remember being slightly irritated on the night that none of the music we heard was available to buy on CD, as the relevant music was to be on a “forthcoming” CD. I would have been more sympathetic had I known that Montserrat Figueras was struggling with her health at that time.

I satisfied my crazy craving for Hespèrion XXI music at the time by procuring:

I resolved to seek out the Mare Nostrum album when it came out, but of course clean forgot about it and then went through a phase of not buying music, because I had so many CDs.

But today (29 December 2017), recalling how wonderful that 2011 concert experience was and how moving we had found this east-west fusion early music, I naturally could not resist the temptation to download the Mare Nostrum album. I’m so glad I did.

Janie and I have been thoroughly enjoying listening to the music and recalling that very special concert from 2011.

We have seen Jordi Savall and Hespèrion XXI several times since. We always enjoy those concerts, but feel very lucky to have experienced their live sound while Montserrat Figueras was still on the scene.

Mr Corelli In London, The English Concert & Maurice Steger, Wigmore Hall, 4 April 2011

What a beautiful concert this was.

I love a bit of Corelli under almost any circumstances, but these adaptations of Op 5 concertos for the recorder have an especially soulful and melancholy  timbre.

In the absence of Janie, I snapped up one of the CDs during the interval, as I was so sure she’d love the sound, which she did. We still both listen to this recording rather a lot. Indeed we are listening to it as I type.

Also available as a download now, from Amazon (click the pic) or elsewhere

It isn’t all that often that book to go to the Wigmore Hall on my own. But I really liked the look of this concert and Janie really didn’t fancy a special trip into town on a Monday evening, even for the Wigmore Hall. She was, at that time, normally still working long Monday clinics at her place.

The diary suggests I had worked a long day myself that day, ending up at Lord’s late afternoon, perhaps for a meeting about the Middlesex business plan. I’ll guess that it was the day of the AGM and that I therefore skived the Middlesex AGM that year for this concert.

What dedication to the early music cause and oh boy was it worth it.

The little available on-line about this concert and project can be found through the search term linked here.

The upshot of Janie missing out on this one was probably, in the longer term, good news. Since then, if I say that I shall nevertheless go alone to a concert that I really fancy, Janie usually then relents and agrees to come with me.

Fela! by Jim Lewis & Bill T Jones, Olivier Theatre, 11 December 2010

We don’t normally do musicals. But this one sounded interesting and different so we booked it.

Set in Nigeria in the late 1970s, it is basically a tribute to the life, music and politics of Fela Kuti.

It was at the National, so of course no on-line resource to help navigate all the whys and wherefores of the show. This search term – click here – should find the (mostly rave) reviews and other resources you might want.

I’m not sure we need a subsidised National Theatre to import this sort of hit show from Broadway and make a hit of it in London, but anyway I’m glad it was on there and I’m very glad we saw it. This was just the sort of boost we needed so soon after Phillie’s passing. A life-affirming show, but with real grit too.

Here’s the trailer vid:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rO-hibM20mU

Manuel Barrueco, Wigmore Hall, 24 October 2010

This was an excellent Spanish guitar concert at the Wig, performed by the Cuban guitarist Manuel Barrueco.

The link below is a preview on Hispanic London, which includes the programme:

A celebration of Spanish guitar with Manuel Barrueco

(Preview scraped to here if the above link no longer works).

This concert was just the sort of thing we needed at the time – I think we had spent most of that weekend in Oxfordshire with Tony and Phillie.

One or two of the pieces were quite challenging but mostly it was relaxing classical guitar music of the highest order.

Here’s a short vid of the fella:

 

Scottish Ensemble, Wigmore Hall Coffee Concert, 17 October 2010

We fancied this concert, which melded Vivaldi’s Four Seasons with Piazolla’s Four Seasons Of Buenos Aires.

So despite its scheduling in the Sunday coffee morning slot, which throws our tennis plans awry, we gave it a try.

A different, wrinkly audience on a Sunday morning. Some perhaps as keen on the gratis coffee (or a glass of sherry if you prefer) as the music.

The music was performed serviceably (I think we’ve heard the Piazolla Seasons done with more flare since) and we were glad to have experienced the Wiggy Coffee morning thing…but it isn’t really our type of gig.