What was your last concert?

[Simon B]

Hi Ferret, see the corresponding thread on Performance. Big divergence of opinion between those who were there (me also) and listeners to the broadcast.

I also thought exactly the same thing about the very noticeable acoustic advantage of having the strings on the extension rather than subject to the muddy congestion of the "funnel" - see my first post there. If we both think it's true, it must be so .

On the evidence, it appears that the repositioning had the exact opposite effect on the broadcast!

[Zucchini]

Philharmonia/Grimaud/Nelsons @ Oxford (same Brahms as RFH) It was a great pleasure and relief to see Andris working his magic, obviously so much fitter than before Christmas. Helen G & the Philharmonia strings (particularly) did him proud.

[Simon B]

Not a concert, strictly, but Peter Grimes at ENO, this evening.

In short, the 5* reviews are entirely justified in my view.

For what it's worth, my advice to enthusiasts for this opera is see this production if you can. Stuart Skelton was again utterly convincing as Grimes. Elza van den Heever as Ellen Orford is unusually gifted as an actress as well as singer. Really, though, it's a company achievement. Never, has an opera chorus made quite such an impression on me. Literally overwhelming. Nor have I heard a nearly full house at the opera so utterly still and silenced.

Generally speaking ENO has its troubles, and could do with all the support it can get. With an achievement like this, it deserves it.

[clive heath]

Another concert this afternoon from Ji Liu in St.Mary's , Perivale. Apparently he's hot stuff on CFM where you can't not hear him however hard you try! and has a CD out. But you wouldn't want to miss him as he is pretty good. We had a varied concert, "Moonlight"; C# minor Waltz and ditto Fantasy-Impromptu, Chopin; "Dance Macabre" Saint-Saens filtered though Liszt and Horovitz and Liszt's "Totentanz". So that was maybe a double dose of Dies Irae.

By contrast we also had "Marlboro Cotton Mill Blues" by Rzweski which is a lot of onomatopoeia ( involving use of the elbow) with a central slow bluesy section for relief from the banging and squeaking as you can hear here:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SAWszdW2oWw

and a lovely Joplinesque rip-off of the Waltz among other related themes "composed"/arranged by Clement Doucet and you can hear that here.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y_JdgcUSJbY

Ji placed it immediately after the two Chopin pieces which gave us a break before the Lisztian braggadocio.

As you enter the Church he is at the piano rippling through scale passages and reluctantly will leave for the announcements to return for the concert, delivered with staggering technique but absolutely no flamboyance. A tad too much pedal for my taste in the Beethoven although he can be admirably crisp and dry... but he does love to showcase his brilliance and why shouldn't he?

[Flosshilde]

A concert at Celtic Connections - KM Hindustani Ensemble with Lewis Psalm Singers (http://www.celticconnections.com/Eve...v=862&ty=World, Gaelic). The Psalm Singers were on first, & although it was interesting I would have been happy to have only heard a couple of psalms - especially if it meant that we could have heard more of the Hindustani Ensemble, who were brilliant - not just for the music but for the enthusiasm of the performance. The singers were definitely fully involved, with hand gestures & movement. They had a very enthusiastic reception from the audience as well.
I don't know if they have any more performances elsewhere in the UK, but if they do it's definitely worth hearing & seeing them. I hope they do, as it's rather a long way to come just for 45 minutes in Glasgow!

[edashtav]

Jacquin Trio with Jessie Grimes on clarinet at BCMS, February 2nd, 2014

The Jacquin Trio Bournemouth Chamber Music Society concert on Sunday, 2nd February, 2014

This youthful trio won the St. Martin's Chamber Music Competition in 2012. Their Bournemouth programme started with Mozart's Kegelstatt Clarinet Trio. The group plays under the name of that work's dedicatee so it not surprising that it was performed with assurance, elegance and affection. We soon realised that flame-haired Jessie Grimes was the leader for she displayed effortless command of all registers of her clarinet coupled with a rare insight into phrasing and accent. Charis Hanning was her loyal Sancho Panza, ever accurate and supportive on piano. whilst Zoe Matthews was a typical viola player: happier to be the harmony filler in a sandwich than the tuneful cherry on top of a cake. As I’m not partial to Mozart, I soon had my fill and nodded until stirred by Jessie's succinct, playful but helpful introduction to Huw Watkins' recent Speak Seven Seas. The work plays continuously for around 15 minutes and is a clever mixture of long lyrical lines energised by a unifying rhythm of 5 even beats on a single note, the whole interrupted by occasional short squalls. It was marvellous to hear a modern work played con amore. I've heard most of the music that Huw Watkins has written in the past decade; sadly, my belief in his music's worth has declined but the Jacquin's interpretation of Speak Seven Seas has kept my dying faith alive.

By now, I had realised that Jessie Grimes, though young, was a fully-fledged artist - her ability to float beautiful, hushed, mellow lines at the extremes of the clarinet's compass was astonishing and mesmerising.

Glinka's Trio Pathetique is a triumph of talent over ignorance. Written before Glinka received music theory lessons, it's a farrago, a melange of assorted oddments that are unified only by Glinka's dogged determination to get the music off his chest. There are ideas aplenty from short motifs to luscious, haunting melodies. Once again, the Jacquin's characterisation was superb, sending their happy audience to the interval with a spring in its step.

Two of Max Bruch's late Eight Pieces for clarinet, viola and piano shared with Libby Larsen's Black Birds, Red Hills a blandness that stemmed from excessive use of consonance and conscious avoidance of dissonance. No doubt, they are a delight to play but are so enervating that some of Sunday 's audience remained in slumberland.


Jean Francaix's late clarinet trio soon proclaimed "Sleepers Awake!". It's easy too dismiss Francaix 's music as facile but that isn't fair or just. It's far from facile for performers and this performance was a tour de force from the testing sinuous, exposed melody at its start to the quicksilver runs and rhythms that cap its helter-skelter finale.

I came away full of admiration for the Jacquin Trio and possessed of a strong belief that Jessie Grimes is a young lady of immense promise who is already equipped to deliver outstanding performances of high technical merit that are suffused with interpretative insights. Now, there are some clarinet quintets that I’d like her to perform…

[Mahler's3rd]

The Elias String Quartet @ St Georges Bristol last Friday, Beethoven String Quartets

[amateur51]

The Elias String Quartet @ St Georges Bristol last Friday, Beethoven String Quartets

How did it go, Mahler's3rd? They're slowly working their way through the complete cycle at London's Wigmore Hall and they have a remarkable website full of experts having their say about these extraordinary pieces.

http://thebeethovenproject.com/exploring-the-beethoven-quartets-on-disc-many-paths-to-nirvana/

[Ferretfancy]

A slightly mixed bag in a poorly attended Festival Hall concert last night, with the venue surrounded by a sea of rain. Our tube journey was easy though.

The Philharmonia was conducted by a relative newcomer, Anthony Collon, and began with the Four Sea Interludes from Peter Grimes. This was not the most subtle performance, from our position high up in the hall the wind and brass overwhelmed the strings, and there was no real atmosphere. Collon also succumbed to the temptation to take the storm too fast, simply making it noisy and lacking in menace.

Next came the Violin Concerto by Thomas Ades, with Pekka Kuusisto as soloist. This was new to me, and quite impressive with the longest central movement the most impressive. Although the orchestra was reduced Ades manages to produce quite a massive and very busy sound. I would like to hear this again.

Finally came Vaughan Williams, his sixth symphony, and this was the best performance of the evening. Miraculously the resident sealions were silent during that wonderful last movement. I have a happy memory of Boult conducting the LPO in this at the Festival Hall back in the 1960s, with a very young sax player who seemed to have sneaked in from Ronnie Scott's. It's a piece that always works for me, I first heard it at school on the premiere Boult recording on 78s from 1948.

I do sometimes wonder, in the age of enthusiasm for Shostakovich and Mahler, not to mention the avant garde, can we still respond in the way we used to do to that special English sense of the past that we find in Vaughan Williams and Holst? I still see pictures in the fire when I hear the Pastoral or Egdon Heath, but I'm not sure whether younger listeners respond in the same way.

[agingjb]

Piotr Anderszewski at the Turner Sims, Southampton (splendid, the TS does give us many goodies). Another silent pianist (and why not), although it's strange how chatty clarinetists are in contrast.

Why mention it? Well we didn't know what his encore was. Bach?. We were very taken with it and its performance. Half the audience had no doubt been trying or succeeding in playing the piece since they were 8; the other half (including us) were too embarrassed to ask. I'll guess that someone here was there.

[amateur51]

Piotr Anderszewski at the Turner Sims, Southampton (splendid, the TS does give us many goodies). Another silent pianist (and why not), although it's strange how chatty clarinetists are in contrast.

Why mention it? Well we didn't know what his encore was. Bach?. We were very taken with it and its performance. Half the audience had no doubt been trying or succeeding in playing the piece since they were 8; the other half (including us) were too embarrassed to ask. I'll guess that someone here was there.

Aside from an unidentified encore, what did Anderszewski play agingjb? I've always enjoyed his live performances, full of intelligence.

[Sir Velo]

Well we didn't know what his encore was. Bach?. We were very taken with it and its performance. Half the audience had no doubt been trying or succeeding in playing the piece since they were 8; the other half (including us) were too embarrassed to ask. I'll guess that someone here was there.

I'll lay a wager it was the Sarabande from Bach’s French Suite No. 5.

[agingjb]

Bach Overture in the French Style, BWV 831
Beethoven Bagatelles op 126
Schumann Novelette No 8 in F sharp minor
Beethoven Sonata No 31 in A flat, Op 110

which wasn't his original program - and in fact he played both the Beethoven pieces in the second half.

[amateur51]

Bach Overture in the French Style, BWV 831
Beethoven Bagatelles op 126
Schumann Novelette No 8 in F sharp minor
Beethoven Sonata No 31 in A flat, Op 110

which wasn't his original program - and in fact he played both the Beethoven pieces in the second half.

Many thanks agingjb - this is the programme he's playing at Wigmore Hall soon, I think.

[EdgeleyRob]

Last night at the Bridgewater Hall.

Manchester Camerata.

Strauss,orchestral songs :

Das Bächlein, Op.88 No.1
Meinem Kinde, Op.37 No.3
Mein Auge, Op.37 No.4

Mozart: Piano Concerto No.25 in C, K.503

Beethoven: Symphony No.3 in E flat "Eroica"

Ruby Hughes (soprano),Paul Lewis (piano)Gábor Takács-Nagy (conductor).

A very pleasant way to spend a Saturday evening.Not much good at this review malarkey.

Strauss,lovely music,not normally stuff I would listen to.
Ruby Hughes seemed to struggle a little,not sure whether with the words or trying to make herself heard above the orchestra.
The Mozart was the best thing of the night,is this concerto a bit Beethovenian ? sounds very grand when heard live.
Paul Lewis is clearly at home in this repertoire,super piano playing and some fantastic woodwind sound too.
The Eroica was very good too,especially the scherzo,again superb woodwind and only one fluffed note by the horns.

Gábor Takács-Nagy (founder member of the Takács Quartet don't you know)is a joy to watch,almost breaking into a dance in the Scherzo and standing to attention during the military sounding bit in the finale of the Beethoven (thought he was going to salute at one point).

Couple of strange moments.
Someone snoring during the Mozart slow movement,I kid you not.
Acouple of half hearted attempts at happy clapping,after the slow movement of the Mozart (maybe trying to wake up the sleeper)and after the first movement of the Eroica,this one provoked a glare to the audience from the conductor.

A great,if not especially unforgettable,concert.