Tag: Johannes Brahms

Friends of Wigmore Hall 30th Anniversary Celebration Concert, 12 July 2023

Igor Levit in 2019 – Bundestagsfraktion Bündnis 90/Die Grünen, CC BY 2.0

You find out who your friends are when you go to this sort of concert…

…or more realistically, The Wigmore Hall management finds out who its friends are.

Frankly, I booked this concert because I fancied hearing the Liszt transcription of Beethoven Seven, which, in the end, Igor Levit decided not to perform. Never mind. This is the concert programme he chose instead.

Anyway, the “Friends Party” aspect was secondary in my mind.

Janie and I didn’t know that the Friends of Wigmore Hall had been going for 30 years. We are mere arrivistes at the place, starting our adventures there a mere 25 years ago, in 1998, with this concert:

..for which we befriended the place and then attended pretty regularly (several times a year, pandemic aside) ever since.

We previously saw Igor Levit at The Wig nearly 10 years ago:

Igor Levit, Wigmore Hall, 27 December 2014

After saying some fine words about how important the Friends of Wigmore Hall is to the hall and how important the hall is to his artistic life, Igor Levit played Schumann and Brahms instead of the Liszt.

After the concert, maintaining the Brahms and Liszt theme (did you see what I did there?) a drinks reception with Champagne for those who like alcoholic fizz and sparking elderflower presse for those who, like me, prefer their fizz non-alcoholic during the day.

On departure, Janie and I decided to thank John Gilhooly, who has been running the place extremely well for years, for the party.

John Gilhooly BIcam123, CC BY-SA 4.0

Janie and I confessed to not having been supporters for all 30 years. John told us that we didn’t look like those who had been supporting for 30 years. Perhaps he underestimated our ages and wouldn’t have guessed that we have supported for 25 of the 30.

We then chatted briefly about John’s campaign to try to introduce a younger audience to the Hall, which Janie and I applaud. John then made a slightly off-colour remark about the reception being a bit of a legacies marketing campaign event…”but not directed at you two, obviously”, he said.

So I suppose we’d better remove The Wigmore Hall from our bequests list, then. 😉

Seriously, a very enjoyable concert and event.

Sargent Cancer Care For Children Concert At The Wigmore Hall, 26 September 2000

Actually Julian Bream had to drop out of this concert at the last minute, so we got everyone else, but not him. We also got all the other pieces, but not the Bach Cello suite on the guitar.

I made no note about a replacement piece, so I suspect we had a shortened concert. This is what we heard:

  • Thomas Tallis – Loquebantur
  • John Taverner – Quemadmodum
  • William Byrd – Tribue, Domine 
  • Fryderyk Chopin – Ballade No 1 in G minor, op 23
  • Johannes Brahms – Intermezzo in A major, op 118 no 2 –
  • Franz Liszt, Richard Wagner – Isoldens Liebestod
  • Leos Janacek – String Quartet no 2

My only other log note is that we bumped into James Davidson, who was (or probably by then, had been) the Director of Finance at Cancer Research Campaign, one of my earliest Z/Yen clients in the mid 1990s. He lived nearby in Notting Hill Gate and used to address me (in the street or at CRC) as “Lord Harris”, because he said my fee rates were so high. When we asked him for a testimonial to put on our spanking new Z/Yen website, he said:

expensive, but worth it…

…which we thought at the time was as good as it gets.

I suspect that this Tuesday night charity concert was expensive but worth it too.

Sadly, Julian Bream never recorded his live party piece of playing the BWV1012 Cello Suite on the guitar, but here’s a recording of a fine guitarist, Paulo Martelli, who has recorded his playing of part of it live:

So there’s the stuff we didn’t see or hear.

Here’s a recording of the Tallis Scholars singing Loquebantur, which is wonderful:

Here’s the Gesualdo Six singing Taverner’s Quemadmodum

Back to The Tallis Scholars, as there is a vid of them singing The Byrd:

PHILLIPS: Hey, are you looking at my Byrd?

There’s not a lot of Martin Roscoe to be found on-line – but here is Krystian Zimerman playing the Chopin:

I don’t suppose the Janáček string quartet much pleased us. Here’s the Amphion String Quartet doing their level best with it:

The things we do for charity.

Dvorak, Lutoslawski & Brahms At the Proms, Royal Albert Hall, 30 August 1997

I think The Duchess must have chosen this one. I don’t remember her being partial to a bit of Brahms, but she must have been. I am quite partial to Brahms too.

We heard:

  • Antonín Dvořák – Overture ‘Carnival’
  • Witold Lutosławski – Cello Concerto
  • Johannes Brahms – Symphony No 1 in C minor

The BBC stub for this prom can be seen by clicking here.

In truth I don’t remember this particular concert well. I was familiar with the Dvorak and Brahms pieces but not the Lutoslawski one. I’m not sure I am much the wiser having heard it.

Rick Jones was impressed:

Tadaaki Jones StandardTadaaki Jones Standard 01 Sep 1997, Mon Evening Standard (London, Greater London, England) Newspapers.com

A Bit Of Schumann & Brahms, Royal Albert Hall, 4 September 1993

Janie’s first encounter with Günter, was this. Possibly Pauline’s too, although she “will have done all that” with Janie’s father decades earlier, no doubt.

Günter Wand had a close working relationship with the BBC Symphony Orchestra for the Proms for a long time.

Here is a link to the BBC stub for this Prom.

We heard:

  • Robert Schumann – Symphony No. 4 in D minor
  • Johannes Brahms – Symphony No 1 in C minor

It was good.

Robert Henderson in the Telegraph also thought it was good:

Wand Prom Henderson TelegraphWand Prom Henderson Telegraph 08 Sep 1993, Wed The Daily Telegraph (London, Greater London, England) Newspapers.com

So that proves it.