Tag: Julie Cooper

Christ On This Cross: A Meditation On The Crucifixion, The Cardinall’s Musick, Wigmore Hall, 11 April 2022

This was our first concert experience of live music since before the start of the Covid pandemic.

There’s nothing like a bit of “Lamentations of Jeremiah” and “Stabat Mater” to cheer us up in a time of pandemic and war.

Actually Janie and I are big fans of The Cardinall’s Musick. Also, we thought that one hour concerts would be a good way of getting back on the bike in terms of concert going – this is the first of a few we are going to see this spring season.

Here is a link to the programme we saw, which was a delicious mixture of Renaissance music suitable for the start of Holy Week.

Mostly familiar stuff, such as Byrd, Victoria, Tallis and Palestrina, plus some rarer material such as the Lamentations of Jeremiah by Gerónimo Gonzales – a composer so obscure that even Andrew Carwood couldn’t find him in the Grove or on Wikipedia.

But that just means that Andrew didn’t look hard enough – there are about 100 listings for Gerónimo Gonzales on Facebook. Our 17th century composer geezer is bound to be one of those – no?

The concert was broadcast on Radio 3 as a lunchtime concert and also was streamed, so you can watch it all on Vimeo if you wish – embedded below.

https://vimeo.com/696602289

You can even, if you look very closely indeed, grab a glimpse of Ged & Daisy at the very front on the right hand side – my bald patch glistening next to Daisy’s mop of reddish hair.

We enjoyed a snack lunch at Euphorium in St Christopher’s Place, then went back to the flat for a while before venturing into Piccadilly/St James’s to Boodle’s.

Last year I gave an on-line talk for that club, under the auspices of Oliver Wise…

Playing The Odds: A Real Tennis History, Yours Truly In Conversation With Oliver Wise, Boodle’s On-Line Event, 21 April 2021

…who told me at that time that he would like to host us for dinner at Boodle’s. As with so many things in this time of Covid, it took quite a while to find a suitable and allowable date.

It was worth the wait – we had a delightful evening with Oliver, Sarah, Julian Dent (another fellow realist and distant cousin to Oliver) and Julian’s wife Kelly. Great grub too.

A fine end to a really lovely day off, with live concert music again, at last!

Kyrie Eleison, The King’s Consort, Wigmore Hall, 23 February 2000

A delicious concert of baroque, mostly sacred, music at The Wig. We had thrown ourselves into the baroque season that year, venturing even on a Wednesday evening, which was usually off limits in our busy lives back then. I recall that the effort was well worth it.

We heard:

  • Johann Heinrich Schmelzer – Sonata no 8 in G
  • Sebastian Knüpfer – Wenn Mein Stundlein Vorhanden Ist
  • Johann Sebastian Bach – Mass in G Minor, BWV 235
  • Johann Sebastian Bach – Mass in G Major, BWV 236
  • Georg Muffat – Sonata ‘a cinque’ in D
  • Johann Kuhnau – Tristis Est Anima Mea

Back then, The King’s Consort was a bit of an “all stars” affair in the early music world, with Carolyn Sampson, Rebecca Outram, Charles Daniels and Andrew Carwood, to name but four, all appearing under Robert King’s banner.

Some unusual pieces in there too. Let’s see if I can dig out some tasty samples. Here’s a sweet performance of the Schmelzer by Ensemble Masques

The Knüpfer was part of The King’s Consort’s recording projects around that time. Here is their recording:

The first of the Bach Masses at the centre of this concert, BWV 235, has been beautifully recorded live by the Netherlands Bach Society.

Here is Herreweghe’s version of the Kyrie from the Bach Mass BWV 236. You can load and click through for the whole of this mass if you wish:

The King’s Consort had also recently recorded the Kuhnau a couple of years before this concert. Here is their beautiful recording.