Tag: Johann Sebastian Bach

The Light Within: O/Modernt Chamber Orchestra Feat. Soumik Datta (Sarod) & Gurdain Rayatt (Tabla),The Wigmore Hall, 21 July 2024

Gurdain Rayatt getting ready

We don’t really patronise The Wigmore Hall for the wow factor. We quite like the fact that we are quite often amongst the youngest people in the audience. We like early music and we get a good dose of that from The Wig.

But we do sometimes book a concert at The Wigmore Hall that we think might have a wow factor and sometimes, like on this occasion, we call it right. It does tend to mean that we are bringing the average age up rather than down, though.

Here is a link to The Wigmore Hall stub for this concert.

We have seen O/Modernt before, under the enthusiast auspices of Hugo Ticciati:

O/MODƏRNT: Monteverdi to Tango & Monteverdi in Historical Counterpoint, Wigmore Hall, 3 July 2015

They like a bit of fusion, do the O/Modernt gang. On this occasion, it was an East/West fusion that they explored, as well as a temporal “Bach to Beatles” shtick.

Here’s what we heard:

  • Johann Sebastian Bach –  Contrapunctus 1 from Art of Fugue BWV1080
  • Pēteris Vasks – Concerto No. 2 ‘In Evening Light’ UK première I. Andante con passione • II. Andante cantabile • III. Andante con amore
  • Max Richter – On the Nature of Daylight
  • Soumik Datta  – Migrant Birds from Awaaz (arranged by Jordan Hunt)
  • John Lennon & Paul McCartney – Blackbird (arranged by Johannes Marmén)
  • Soumik Datta – 1947 from Awaaz (arranged by Jordan Hunt)
  • Jordan Hunt – Misremembrance
  • Wojciech Kilar – Orawa
  • Soumik Datta – Awaaz from Awaaz (arranged by Jordan Hunt)
  • John Lennon & Paul McCartney – Across The Universe (arranged by Johannes Marmén, plus sarod & tabla riff) – encore

To give you a feel for what we heard, here is a clip from O/Moderndt playing Distant Light by Pēteris Vasks. The piece we heard was the follow-up concerto by Vasks. It was a nice touch to have Vasks at The Wig for his premier – I even managed to congratulate him in person as we were leaving the hall.

The sarod, tabla and a heap of special furniture/equipment arrived during the interval for the second half of the show.

Soumik Datta getting ready

Technician “turning it up to eleven” for Soumik Datta and Gurdain Rayatt

There’s no video to be found of O/Modernt and the sarod & tabla fellas all playing together, but here is a 15-year-old clip of Soumik Datta and Gurdain Rayatt playing as a pair, which will give you a feel.

Here is a more recent recording of that pair playing together:

The most “wow” piece of the evening was Orawa by Wojciech Kilar. Here is that piece played by a more formal orchestra than O/Modernt.

The encore had to calm us down again, which it did. Here’s what Across The Universe sounds like in O/Modernt’s hands.

The sarod & tabla coda to the Across The Universe encore helped us all to float away from The Wig.

We heard several younger members of the audience saying that they had been blown away by the evening. This is surely the sort of thing The Wigmore Hall should be doing more often.

Viktoria Mullova (Violin) & Misha Mullov-Abbado (Jazz Bass), Late Night Concert At The Wigmore Hall, 5 July 2024

With grateful thanks to Misha, Viktoria and Bridget O’Donnell for allowing me to use their pictures from the evening.

We went to quite a few “Wigmore Hall Lates”, back in the day, but this is the first time we have ventured back at that later hour since the pandemic.

We were keen to see this much-lauded mother and son combination perform.

I had seen Misha’s dad perform more than 40 years ago – my first ever night at The Proms:

My First Night At the Proms: Me, Jilly & Claudio, 1 September 1983

All the more reason to find out what Viktoria and Misha are up to, musically. Further, we liked the sound of the Brazilian theme for the concert, which we sensed, correctly, would please us.

We enjoyed a light supper of charcuterie and stuff at The Wig before the concert. They do that sort of thing very well these days. While we were eating, the performers were setting up and photographing one another.

Here is a link to the Wigmore Hall stub for this concert.

The conceit of this concert, if indeed conceit describes this simple rationale, is that Viktoria and Misha perform a selection of the stuff that they like to play together. Their joy in playing this music really came across in performance.

We heard:

  • Blue Deer by Misha Mullov-Abbado
  • Brazil by Misha Mullov-Abbado
  • Shir Lelo Shem by Shalom Hanoch
  • Adagio & Allegro From Violin Sonata No. 1 in B minor BWV1014 by Johann Sebastian Bach
  • Moderato from Sonata in D for solo violin Op. 115 by Sergey Prokofiev
  • Sabiá by Antônio Carlos Jobim
  • Little Astronaut by Misha Mullov-Abbado
  • Shanti Bell by Misha Mullov-Abbado
  • O Silêncio das Estrelas by Lenine & Dudu Falcão
  • O Cabo Pitanga by Laércio de Freitas
  • Träumerei from Kinderszenen by Robert Schumann
  • Tico Tico by Zequinha de Abreu

Here is a lovely example, recorded a few years ago, of them performing one of the above pieces:

Their closing number, Tico Tico, is more than a bit of an earworm for me. Not least, because the Harris family gramophone records included a version of that song by Mickey Katz and His Kosher Jammers. Viktoria and Misha’s version sounded more like the above example and did not sound at all like the following recording:

I sense that Misha and family thought the event went well. Misha and Viktoria certainly look pleased in this green room photo.

Thanks again for allowing me to use your photographs, folks.

All The Bs: Biber, Benjamin, Byrd, Bach…& Brett – Brett Dean Concert, Wigmore Hall, 20 April 2024

“Don’t mess with my partitas, mate!”, Heinrich Biber

Hmmm, we were neither of us sure about this one. We really enjoyed bits of it, while spending some of our listening time hoping for certain pieces to end.

My bad in choosing it.

Here’s a link to the Wigmore Hall stub for the programme we saw. If that ever fails, you can find the pdf programme here.

I guess my eyes were caught by the names Biber, Byrd and Bach, without twigging quite how much contemporary composition we were also to hear. I also spotted that Lawrence Power and Sergio Bucheli were involved – we had very much enjoyed their lunchtime concert last year.

Imitations: Lawrence Power & Sergio Bucheli At The Wigmore Hall, Plus Other Activities, 24 April 2023

Queenslander Brett Dean comes across as a genuinely nice bloke who surrounds himself with musicians who like to play with him. His compositions, though, borrow from well-known composers and tunes, deconstructing and reconstructing them in ways that could only please ears wired differently from ours.

Brett claimed that the music in his concert spanned the 16th to the 21st century, only omitting the 19th century. I would dispute that claim. His “some birthday” piece of 1992 is a sort-of variations on the tune we know as “Happy Birthday To You”, which was first published in 1893 as “Good Morning To All” in “Song Stories for the Kindergarten” by Patty and Mildred J. Hill. While the Hill’s copyright is famously disputed, that tune is surely 19th century.

Here’s the oldest known version – let’s not even think about what Brett’s version looks like on the page

Anyway…

…here’s a nice recording of the first movement of Biber’s 7th parthia, which was the first piece we heard:

Janie and I both found George Benjamin‘s piece too weird for us. George kindly turned up to take the applause afterwards – turns out he’s a Londoner. Here’s a recording of it enabling you to judge for yourselves:

Byrd’s Fantasia pieces are lovely little vignettes. That segment was too short (or there were too few of them) for my taste. Here’s a nice example of one played by a consort of viols (almost certainly what Byrd had in mind) rather than violas and cello – which we heard and still sounded lovely:

The highlight of the evening, for us, was to see the young gifted harpsichordist/pianist Xiaowen Shang play with such joy and expression. For us she played Byrd’s Earl of Salisbury pavan and galliard, plus The Bells – both favourites of mine – on the harpsichord. Below, a video of her playing a lovely piece of Bach on the piano:

The Earl of Salisbury pavan is such a favourite of mine. Xiaowen played it beautifully, if a little twiddley for my taste. Below is Janie’s hand-held recording of Reuben Ard playing it on the electric virginals at Hampton Court Palace last year, for my Gresham Society event there:

Let’s not talk too much about the things Brett Dean did to Byrd’s beautiful pavan and his take on Bach’s Brandenburg Concerto No 6. Imagine PDQ Bach in a really bad mood, unable to make jokes.

“There’s nothing funny about feet either” (Janie, attrib. PDQ Bach)

It seemed to take an age to segue from Brett’s “treatment” to the concerto itself, which was a rather glorious and suitable choice of closing number for a concert that focussed to a large extent on the idea of two violas. By the time the concerto finally arrived, we thought we’d more than earned some ear candy.

Here’s a lovely rendering of the Bach by some sensible Dutch people who don’t mess with it:

“Is that it?”, asked Janie as the applause rang out for the Brandenburg.

“I do hope so”, I said.

“Will they play an encore?”, Janie persisted.

“I do hope not”. They didn’t.

Soul Strings, Indian and Western Music Across The Centuries, Wigmore Hall, 7 January 2023

With thanks to DALL-E for collaboration with the image

Janie and I were very excited about this concert ahead of time; we hadn’t been to an evening concert at the Wigmore Hall for yonks.

Here was an opportunity for us to see sarod masters Amaan Ali Bangash and Ayaan Ali Bangash (Amjad Ali Khan‘s sons) again, this time playing with Jennifer Pike, a young violinist about whom we had heard much but not previously seen live.

The concert included an excerpt from a Bach Partita, folk music from Bengal & Assam and then a couple of Amjad Ali Khan’s ragas, both of which arranged beautifully for violin and sarod.

Here is a link to the Wigmore Hall stub for this concert.

I believe an hour-long version of this concert is to be repeated later in the month in Scotland for broadcast on Radio 3 – if/when so I’ll add a link.

There was a preview of this concert and the two others that the Ali Khan Bangash family are undertaking at the Wigmore Hall on Radio 3 the day before our concert, on In Tune. Here is a link to that programme, which should work for a few weeks after the date of posting.

To give you a feel for Jennifer Pike’s wonderful interpretation of a Bach Partita, here is an excerpt from her performing a different Partita:

To give you a feel for the brothers Amaan & Ayaan Ali Bangash playing together, here is a duet recorded a few years ago. No Jennifer Pike of course and a different tabla player – we saw Anubrata Chatterjee.

The music was beautiful, but I must admit that we struggled a little to understand the ancient and modern connections as explained. For example, the notion that the sarod pieces were basically in the Lydian mode, although I think that term could only apply perhaps to the tuning of the strings, not how the music is composed or played. We could however hear wonderful relationships between the instruments and the notion (explained in the notes) that underlying melodies in the ragas are utilised in similar fashion to cantus firmus styles in late medieval, Renaissance and even Baroque music made sense.

Anyway, it was all beautiful music, deployed in virtuoso fashion, leaving us thrilled with our night out at The Wig, as is so often the case.

Howay, Wey Aye, Man! – A Canny Interview With Jordi Savall Followed By A Canny Concert, L‘Europa Musicale: From The Renaissance To Baroque, Hespèrion XXI, St John’s Smith Square, 12 May 2019

Janie and I have seen Jordi Savall with his various Hespèrion colleagues several times over the years and have bought quite a lot of his recordings. To the extent that we are fans of anyone, we would consider ourselves fans.

Yet I had always assumed that Jordi was pronounced “Yordee” and not, as we learnt at this event, “Geordie“. Haddaway! Yes, really.

How did we find out? Because there was a short interview session an hour ahead of the concert, hosted by Robert Heason, who tossed a couple of open-ended questions at Jordi who then got on with the business of interviewing himself.

Gobby crack an’ all

It was actually really interesting to hear Jordi explain his way of thinking about early music and performance. He comes across as a very learned but likeable man who wears his expertise lightly. His comments on improvisation and the folk origins of serious music were especially interesting.

When the “conversation” ended, there was still nearly half an hour until the concert. We thought we’d take a picture of the instruments on the stage…

…but then almost immediately Jordi returned…

…and warmed up his fingers for a while on the stage…

Then we went to get some refreshments


“Gi’s a drink I’m gyezend, our lass”, (or words to that effect), said Ged.
“Are ye in a fettle, pet?”, (or words to that effect), asked Daisy

Aside: I realise that some folk who like to read about music are not aware that Ian and Janie are also Ged and Daisy. The origins of those pet names are explained here.

We saw “the nice couple” from the front row of many concerts previously reported, sitting a few seats away from us during the talk, but when we returned to our seats it transpired that their booked seats for the actual concert were right next to ours this time. Nice.

Of course the music was gorgeous. Here is a link to the SJSS resource so you can see and read about the concert.

We had seen Andrew Lawrence-King with Jordi before, in The Celtic Viol concert at The Wigmore Hall six years ago…

The Celtic Viol, Jordi Savall, Andrew Lawrence-King & Frank McGuire, Wigmore Hall, 9 June 2013

…but not with Xavier Díaz-Latorre, who I don’t think we’d seen before at all. His guitar and theorbo playing was excellent.

Below is a really nice video that shows Jordi and Xavier’s skills, though not one of the pieces we heard:

Below is some Jordi viol solo work, including some pieces we heard:

The entire concert is due to be broadcast on BBC Radio 3 on 5 June 2019, so enthusiasts can hear everything we heard.

It was a really interesting and lovely concert. It is always a treat to see Jordi Savall and his pals perform. And now we know to pronounce the name “Geordie”, which is very important.

After saying goodbye to the nice couple…

…aw’s clamming, as was Daisy…

…so we picked up some shawarmas on the way home, to round off a very enjoyable evening with a tasty supper.

Tabea Debus, St John’s Smith Square, Lunchtime Concert, 12 April 2018

I was determined to get to SJSS and see this concert, as I had earmarked this particular concert as an interesting one for some time.

Here is a link to the SJSS page for the concert.

Just in case that link no longer works, here is a scrape of that page.

The week had somewhat run away with me, though, having ruled out much of the previous work day unexpectedly for Hazel Jacobs’s funeral, followed by the Middlesex CCC AGM, which also had a somewhat funereal feel to it this season.

Anyway, I got to the office after an early meeting at the LSE and managed to get my office stuff done by the appointed hour, so I was able to hot-foot it to SJSS on time.

A jolly looking harpsichord

I thought Tabea Debus came across really nicely – showing great enthusiasm and academic interest in her instrument and the topic of the concert, while projecting also the poise and folksiness of a true show-person. A star in the making.

She has previous at SJSS and they in fact made a short vid for her first mini-residency as a young artist a couple of years ago – see below:

The concert I saw was mostly Telemann – the theme being the subscription lists Telemann developed during his masterful music business career, plus the high-falutin’ composers who were among his subscribers and friends; Bach, Handel and Blavet.

Below is a video of Tabea performing some delicious Telemann, but not the stuff we scoffed that lunchtime:

Tabea also played a couple of modern works which were part of a commission commemorating the 250th anniversary of Telemann’s death. One of those, Frank Zabel’s “…fizzling out” was extraordinarily complex-sounding and must be a real challenge to play.

Then on to a music lesson for my humble skills – although Ian Pittaway seemed surprisingly pleased with my simple transcription of a Loqueville Rondo.

Then on to punish myself with two real tennis singles matches at Lord’s – 135 minutes unbroken is too long for an old geezer like me.

But I digress.

That lunchtime at SJSS was an hour supremely well spent.  I’ll be looking out for Tabea Debus’s name again, that’s for sure.

Finns Ain’t What they Used To Be, Helsinki Baroque Orchestra, Wigmore Hall, 6 January 2018

OK, this baroque concert didn’t really have that dreadful pun as its title – but it did have a tongue-in cheek humour to it, certainly in the first half, which was dedicated to Telemann’s work.

Here is a link to the programme and basic information from the Wigmore Hall site.

Both of the Telemann pieces are relative rarities, new to the ears even of Telemaniacs like me and Janie:

  • Ouverture burlesque in B flat major TWV55:B8
  • Trauer-Music eines kunsterfahrenen Canarienvogels (Canary Cantata) TWV20:37

The Helsinki Baroque is a very together orchestra; seemingly a group of dedicated musicians who enjoy playing with and riffing off each other. We suspect that Aapo Häkkinen is metaphorically “gentle yet strong glue” for this Finnish combo.

Carolyn Sampson was the soprano for the evening. She stood right in front of us and sang magnificently.

The Canary Cantata – in full “Cantata of Funeral Music For An Artistically-Trained Canary Whose Demise Brought the Greatest Sorrow to his Master”, really is a most unusual piece.

Click here (or the embedded YouTube below) for a recording of a young American soprano, MaryRuth Lown, singing the piece;

My so-called friends who thought my German singing sounded like Yiddish in my Innsbruck Ich Muss Dich Lassen performance the other week should click through and hear this aria.

Gresham Society Soirée, Barnards Inn Hall, 14 December 2017

It begins with the following line oft-repeated:

O weh! mein Canarin ist tot

…which means, for those who need a translation into lingua franca…

Oy vay! in drerd mein feygele.

…but I’m diving too deep into detail. Actually if you want to read the whole cantata in English, click through the YouTube link above (not the embedded vid) as a full translation is there on YouTube. Weirdorama lyrics.

The second half of the concert was more “regular” in terms of familiarity and style, but still hugely interesting and enjoyable. J S Bach for this half:

  • Concerto in D major for harpsichord BWV1054 (from Violin Concerto in E major BWV1042)
  • Cantata: Jauchzet Gott in allen Landen BWV51

I don’t think I had heard that concerto with the harpsichord as lead instrument before; I have recordings of it on violin and piano.

The cantata was spectacularly good; Carolyn Sampson on top form, as was Nicholas Emmerson on baroque trumpet, going red in the face trying to get such a complex string of notes out at pace on that challenging instrument.

The encore was a complete change of mood, from the jubilant Bach “Jauchzet Gott” cantata to the mournful Handel “Eternal Source Of Light Divine” cantata.

The encore was also a triumph; albeit a calming one rather than an uplifting one. Here is a YouTube of Iestyn Davies singing it:

All in all, it was a wonderful gig; a delicious start to the year for our concert going.

I cannot find a YouTube of Carolyn Sampson with the Helsinki Baroque Orchestra, nor of that orchestra performing any of the pieces we heard, but the following YouTube gives a feel for that orchestra’s work at that scale (16 or so members) on a work of that period with a fine soprano…

…while the following is a YouTube of Carolyn Sampson with a different super orchestra – The Sixteen:

The Well Tempered Clavier, András Schiff, BBC Proms, Royal Albert Hall, 7 September 2017

It’s years since we have been to the proms. I used to go regularly, even before I met Janie.

Then in our early days together…indeed for many, many years, we would take The Duchess (Janie’s mum), as she liked the place and the concerts. But once the Duchess went off the idea of going out to concerts, we focused our concert-going on smaller, more intimate venues such as The Wigmore Hall and St John’s Smith Square.

Anyway, Janie called me excitedly earlier in the week, as she was with Joyce Ma, who had excellent tickets for this concert and couldn’t use them. Would we like them?

It was hard to say no to such a kind and generous offer. We both love Bach and we both thought it would make a real change for us to visit the Proms again.

Further, as Janie was spending the day with Charlotte and I was spending the day at Lord’s with Chris – it was a very practicable arrangement for Janie and I to meet up and go on to the concert via a scrub and change at the flat – click here.

This concert was the very first time that the whole of Book One of The Well Tempered Clavier had been performed at the Proms. Interesting choice for a late night concert, as the 21:00 start meant for a 23:00 finish.

Imagine my delight when we entered the hall and I realised that Joyce had chosen pretty much exactly the seats I would have chosen myself “back in the day”, when I used to choose my seats with a connoisseur’s precision.

András Schiff performed the whole of The Well Temered Clavier Book One from memory, which seemed the most extraordinary feat in itself to me. He also performed with a wonderfully light touch and supreme confidence.

Michael Church in The Independent gave the performance a rave five star review – click here.

Fiona Maddocks in The Guardian also went for five stars – the Schiff is reviewed right at the end of her composite piece – here.

Boyd Tonkin at theartsdesk.com also gave a rave review and shows some lovely photos – here.

Both Janie and I nodded off at times – that is a compliment in a way because the music was so relaxing. In truth, The Well Tempered Clavier is not, to my taste, the most interesting work for listening rapt with attention. But it is delightfully easy on the ear if you listen to relax. This performance was a classic of a classic; it was just wonderful to end our day with it.

Janie took her own photos when Schiff took his well-deserved standing ovation and bow:

More…more…more…

No encore? Humph…just kidding!

A very special evening – thanks again, Joyce!

Ferio Saxophone Quartet, St John’s Smith Square, 8 December 2016

Slightly scruffy look for SJSS, even at lunchtime

You don’t see a lot of all saxophone combos. So much so, that when I saw the Ferio Saxophone Quartet concert listed for Thursday lunchtime on a day that I had kept clear for a client meeting that had been deferred until the new year, I thought, “I’ll give that a try”.

Naturally, I cut things a bit fine, trying to finish off some work before heading off for SJSS and then realising that I hadn’t really allowed much margin for error on timing.

Fortunately a Circle Line train came quite quickly. Then, at South Kensington, all of a sudden I could hear a Saxophone combo on the train, playing Hit The Road Jack very well indeed. I looked along the carriage and there indeed were several saxophonists giving it plenty. I managed to snap a couple of them with my smart phone camera.

“Perhaps the Ferio lot are also cutting it a bit fine for the gig,” I thought, “although they look a bit scruffy for SJSS, even at lunchtime.”

Between Sloane Square and Victoria, the combo played Blue Moon very well indeed. But clearly they weren’t the Ferio lot, as the “Anonymous Saxtet” got off the tube at Victoria, after relieving me and others of our small change (voluntarily I hasten to add).

I concluded that saxophone combos are like buses and tubes. You wait what seems like a lifetime for one, then two come along one after the other.

In the end I got to SJSS just a tiny bit late, but in true lunchtime concert fashion they let us latecomers slide in at the back of the hall and then move forward after the first piece. The first piece was a Bach Prelude and Fugue and I reckon I caught most of the Prelude as well as the Fugue.

When I moved forward between pieces, a kindly couple made extra space for me so I could remove my hat and coat quickly, take up an excellent seat and then they also gave me a look at their programme (I picked up my own copy at the end). I’m sure that nice couple would even have shared their sandwiches with me had they brought sandwiches, but they hadn’t. SJSS lunchtime concerts are not really “eat your sandwiches in the concert” type lunchtime concerts.

This was the Ferio String Quartet Concert I heard – link to SJSS site here.

Just in case SJSS archiving isn’t up to snuff, here is the same page saved on Ogblog.

They were very good indeed, the Ferio Saxophone Quartet. I especially enjoyed their arrangement of Grieg’s Holberg Suite, which was the centrepiece of the concert really.

The concert was very well attended – 150+ people, I’d guess, perhaps even 200 if you count the sniffly but very attentive outing of schoolkids.

The Ferios are doing a short residency at SJSS and there are a couple more gigs to go next spring. Here is a link to a short vid the quartet made about the concert I heard and their residency.

The next concert, on 23 April 2017, is all British music entitled Best of British, which seems to me a wasted opportunity. Left up to me, that concert would have been named:

Yes, Sax Please, We’re British…

…but unfortunately such marketing matters never seem to be left up to me. I can’t imagine why not.

Brad Mehldau, Wigmore Hall, 17 December 2015

What in the name of Jove possessed me to book a concert at the Wigmore Hall on the last Thursday before Christmas?  Surely I knew that, despite all the plans to work less, Janie would be up to her eyes in overwork, running late and all the related stress that brings.

At 18:57, when she still hadn’t got to the flat, I really thought we were in trouble. But then she arrived and good fortune got us to a single yellow line (parking therefore permitted) within striking distance of the hall within striking distance of the appointed hour.  Even time to order interval drinks – just!

This was the gig – click here.  Actually that doesn’t explain it very well.  Brad has been commissioned to write a three piece programme inspired by The Well-Tempered Clavier.  the centrepiece of the performance was Brad playing the Well-Tempered movements that inspired him followed by the commissioned pieces.

The programme explains it better (see below).  But even that doesn’t fill you in on the other stuff he played:

  • An improvisation before the interval inspired by the C major Prelude
  • An improvisation after the third commissioned piece, based on the G major Allemande (Brad omitted to say where this came from – unlike the others, clearly not the Well-Tempered – I think it must be the slightly earlier G Major Partita – perhaps he expected us all simply to know)
  • An improvisation following the F minor Prelude and Fugue
  • An improvisation following the E flat major Prelude, the improvisation also being a variation on Martha My Dear
  • An improvisation around Pinball Wizard, with no Bach in sight.

Anyway, Janie found it all a bit scholarly, but the chance of Janie being well-tempered about anything, least of all a clavier, was always going to be low at the end of such a day.  In truth, I found Brad’s “straight” playing of the Bach rather wooden, almost as if he couldn’t bear to “swing it at all” when playing the actual piece, so that the jazz variation would come to the fore.  In reality, Bach masters swing it quite a bit on the keyboard stuff.  I liked the commissioned works and the first three of the improvisations; less so the Martha and Pinball ones.

There was a heavy mee-jah presence in the hall, so Brad is clearly perceived to be a jazz master worth seeing by the cognoscenti still.  I would have enjoyed it more on a Saturday night in January, though.  Fighting through the after-work Christmas shoppers does not set us up ideally for a evening of Bach, jazz, jazz-Bach or Bach-jazz.

Brad 17 December 2015