Tag: Wigmore Hall

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.

Camerata RCO, Bruckner Symphony No 6, Wigmore Hall, 1 July 2024

This Wigmore Hall lunchtime concert was a bit unusual.

Camerata RCO is the scaled-down chamber orchestra bit of the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra. They are making a bit of a reputation for themselves playing scaled-down versions of enormous symphonies, such as this sixth one by Anton Bruckner.

It’s all explained on the Wigmore Hall stub for this concert – click here.

Does this idea work? It was a BBC Lunchtime concert, so if you get here within 30 days of the concert you can listen here.

Or you might listen to the album version, e.g. on your favourite streaming platform – YouTube link here.

We rather liked it, although I don’t think we’ll be elbowing people out of the way to grab tickets for another such concert in a hurry.

A lovely way to spend a lunchtime, though – at The Wig.

The Renaissance Princes Of Heartbreak: The Gesualdo Six, Wigmore Hall, 23 June 2024

This was a wonderful concert and a lovely way for me and Janie to chill at the end of the weekend.

When I first saw The Gesualdo Six, coincidentally six years ago, I described them as the hottest boy band in the early music vocal consort world

Fading: The Hour Is At Hand, The Gesualdo Six, St John’s Smith Square, 28 March 2018

But now, having heard them and seen them some more, I realise that The Gesualdo Six are now beyond boy band. They are to 15th/16th century Chansons de Regretz what Taylor Swift is to the 21st century heartbreak song.

Further, the Ges-Ges Boys, much like Tay-Tay, are mastering the art of social media management. When Owain Park announced from the stage that “you can find us on TikTok”, I wondered:

  • whether he was joking,
  • how many members of the Wigmore hall audience understood what he meant by TikTok,
  • was I the only person in the Hall (other than the Ges-Ges Crew) who had a TikTok account.

I can’t be sure about the answer to the second and third question, but I can confirm that Owain Park wasn’t joking.

@thegesualdosix

Listen to this famous motet by Thomas Tallis. ‘If ye love me’ was composed in the 16th-century and is a perfect example of the enduring power of Renaissance polyphony. #singing #classicalmusic #music #choir #musician #church #song #cinematic #g6 #choral #classical #oldisgold #ancientmusic #polyphony #earlymusic #renaissance #fyp #foryoupage #fypシ #tallis

♬ original sound – The Gesualdo Six

They are also very good at merchandising. On my 2018 visit Owain tempted me to buy a pre-release version of their first album – English Motets (which includes the track embedded above from TikTok, as it happens). This time he persuaded me to be among the first to buy Queen Of Hearts, the latest album.

To be honest, I don’t really need much persuading and I can confirm that the Gesualdo Six recordings are excellent.

The Gesualdo team themselves staffed the merchandise and payment gadgets during the interval, chatting kindly (and at some cases at length) with the patrons who queued up to buy the recordings. I believe they did that all again at the end of the gig.

I wondered to myself whether Taylor Swift was doing this at her Wembley Stadium concerts – I have heard that she engages with her audience like no other. Possibly Tay-Tay is still there at Wembley, selling, signing and chatting.

So what did we hear at The Gesualdo Six gig, I hear you cry. Here is the stub from the Wigmore Hall website posting for this concert.

Almost all the stuff we heard was from this new Queen of Hearts album. Did I mention that it is available from The Gesualdo Six website – click here. We are loving listening to the albums. I also bought Josquin’s Legacy to add to my collection.

Before the interval we heard:

  • Antoine Brumel (c.1450-1512) Sub tuum praesidium (pub. 1520)
  • Josquin des Prez (c.1450-1521) O virgo prudentissima
  • Loyset Compère (c.1445-1518) Plaine d’ennuy/Anima mea
  • Antoine Brumel Sicut Lilium
  • Jean Mouton (c.1459-1522) Ave Maria … virgo serena (pub. c.1520)
  • Johannes Prioris (fl. c.1485-1512) Dulcis amica Dei (pub. 1508)
  • Owain Park (b.1993) Prière pour Marie (2023)
  • Jean Lhéritier (c.1480-1551) Sub tuum presidium a6

After the interval:

  • Josquin des Prez Petite camusette (pub. 1545)
  • Antoine de Févin (c.1470-1511) Fors seulement (pub. c.1515)
  • Jean Mouton De tous regretz
  • Anon Se je souspire/Ecce iterum attributed to Margaret of
  • Austria
  • Costanzo Festa (c.1485-1545) Quis dabit oculis (1514)
  • Ninfea Cruttwell-Reade (b.1989) Plaisir n’ai plus Commissioned by The Gesualdo Six (2023)
  • Johannes Prioris Consommo la vita mia
  • Nicolas Gombert (c.1495-1560) Tous les regretz (pub. 1544)

Below is a video of them singing Josquin’s O Virgo Prudentissima – one of the pieces we heard.

This group is the real deal. Janie and I floated home after the concert.

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.

Joe Lovano Trio Tapestry At The Wigmore Hall, 12 April 2024

To the Wigmore Hall on a Friday evening to see some jazz. Joe Lovano Trio Tapestry, to be precise. Here is the Wigmore hall stub for the event.

I always have a sense of trepidation when I book jazz, ever since my ill-considered choice of “Free Jazz” in 2007: Cecil Taylor & Anthony Braxton on that occasion convincing me that free jazz should be so-called because no-one in their right mind would pay to hear it – click here to read all about that ill-fated evening.

I’m not entirely sure what motivated me to book Joe Lovano, as I was aware that he had some connections with that school but also with many other schools of jazz. I played a few snippets on YouTube and reckoned that Janie’s love of the saxophone would conquer all.

The first two or three minutes did not go well. In particular, Marilyn Crispell’s first few bars on the piano sounded really free, really free, really-really-really free, to me.

Were I a praying person, I would have been praying for the gig to warm up.

It did warm up.

I was more impressed by Carmen Castaldi on the drums than Janie was. He was assisted at times by Joe Lovano himself, who not only played the saxophone but also the gongs and a shaky-stick thing which defies description other than the term “shaky stick thing”. It might have been a cacho seedpod stick. I think that both of them also used some loose seedpods a few times. It all felt a bit experimental and “do what you like” at that end of the percussion section.

But heck, this trio is old enough and experienced enough to do what they like. I have said many times that Wigmore Hall is one of the few places left where stewards refer to us, without irony, as young man and young woman. But these days we rarely feel, as we did that evening, that we are youngsters next to all of the performers. No matter.

Here’s a little documentary released by ECM in 2019 when this trio started working together:

Here’s a recording of a whole live gig from 2022 in Luxembourg, some of which will sound much like the music we heard:

At the end of the evening we ran into John Thirlwell, one of my real tennis pals from Lord’s. Come to think of it, Lord’s is the only other place left, apart from Wigmore Hall, where we are still addressed by stewards as young man and young woman without irony.

“Nobody calls me alto and gets away with it”

Koras Of Approval: Tunde Jegede & Friends At The Wigmore Hall, 17 February 2024

Kora up front, with percussion instruments behind

Janie and I loved this unusual concert at the Wigmore Hall, especially the first half during which Tunde Jegede played the 21-string kora.

Here is a link to the Wigmore Hall stub for this concert, which includes the programme. If by any chance something dreadful ever happens to that website, you can find the programme here.

Everything else I want to say about our experience of this concert is contained in my ThreadMash (or should I say in this instance NashMash) piece, entitled The Phone Call, which you can find here or through the link below:

The Phone Call by Nashmash, Royal National Theatre, 27 February 2024
If you want to know why the tale of our visit to this concert is embedded in a story named The Phone Call, you’ll need to click!

ECM Jazz Series At The Wigmore Hall, 4 January 2024

Everything you might want to know about the concert from a Wigmore Hall perspective can be seen on this link.

In the first half, Michele Rabbia, Gianluca Petrella and Eivind Aarset played their unusual style of electronically-enhanced ambient music, mostly pieces from the album Lost River.

Here’s an example piece – Nimbus

One lady in our row, clearly not keen on electronically enhanced jazz, decided not to stick around for the second half. That’s a shame, because it was very different and not electronically enhanced at all.

Avishai Cohen and Yonathan Avishai have been friends since they were kids and the camaraderie really showed. Their set mostly came form the album “Playing The Room”.

Here’s a sample from that:

Here is a live video of them playing a lullaby, which i think they used as their encore:

Not a concert to set your pulse racing, but two very interesting acts and a good way to start concert-going in 2024.

Rappresentatione di Anima, et di Corpo by Emilio de’ Cavalieri, Vox Luminis, Wigmore Hall, 1 October 2023

“Just one cornetto“ in our concert – our cornetto looked like the middle one.

We also heard and saw a beautiful cetterone, an instrument about which I needed to do research afterwards. Likewise the lirone, (see below).

Lira de gamba (which I think is the same thing as a lirone), GeorgWildermann, CC BY-SA 4.0

But the thing that made this concert so very special was the extraordinary piece we heard. Emilio de’ Cavalieri’s Rappresentatione di Anima, et di Corpo.

Here is a link to the Wigmore Hall information-rich (if you look at the programme notes) stub for this concert.

Those programme notes describe the piece as an:

uncategorisable piece of music-theatre [which was] premièred in Rome in February 1600…

Coincidentally, I had only recently put on, at Hampton Court Palace, my own uncategorisable piece of music-theatre from around that period

Hampton Court, Tennis, Gresham, Music & Drama

…but I digress.

Vox Luminis are a wonderful outfit who don’t tend to disappoint. This evening was no exception. They perform with smiles on their faces and clearly celebrate each other’s and their joint success.

Here is a trailer of Vox Luminis performing this very piece in 2021 in Utrecht. Different soloists, but you can’t have everything:

Janie and I are not easily wowed these days – we’ve seen a lot of excellent concerts in our time, but this one blew our metaphorical socks off. Delicious music, sounding a little different from anything we’ve heard before from that period. Sweeter than Monteverdi oratorios, but loads going on in the soundscape.

A real treat.

Celebrating Women Baroque Composers, Roberta Invernizzi & Friends, Wigmore Hall, 11 September 2023

Barbara Strozzi (1619-1677), painted by Bernardo Strozzi

We spent a very pleasant evening at “The Wig” enjoying some early Baroque music, all composed by women.

Roberta Invernizzi and her gang performed the work of four composers:

Janie and I had enjoyed a lunchtime concert of the latter composer’s work only a year or so ago, at the hands of Nevermind – click here or below:

Lunchtime Baroque At Wigmore Hall, Nevermind, 13 June 2022

Strozzi and Caccini provided the songs – I suppose I should call them madrigals from that era. They were all operatic in style, which suits Roberta Invernizzi’s theatrical delivery and powerful soprano voice.

Invernizzi was ably supported by period instrumentalists, all extremely capable on their instruments. Two theorboes and a harp seems almost an embarrassment of plucked-string-riches, but the sound was lovely so we wallowed in the excess.

In truth, to our taste, the trio sonatas and passacaille of Leonarda and Jacquet De La Guerre respectively were more to our taste than the madrigals, but we enjoyed the whole concert.

Here is an example of a Leonarda sonata – coincidentally from an album primarily containing Roberta Invernizzi but not on this instrumental piece:

Below, from a separate recording, is Roberta Invernizzi singing Strozzi’s Sino Alla Morte, one of the madrigals we heard:

Here is a link to the Wigmore Hall stub for this concert. It includes a link to the programme which you can also find here.

It was a relatively short concert, 70 minutes, but short can also be sweet. This concert certainly was that.

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.