I hadn't realised Janacek could be funny!
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Face to face February includes live music. Short blog break while I go to the Opera..  My book group (thanks to Aidible I can still be part of it) has just finished Thunderclap by Laura Cummings which has made us all want to go to Amsterdam, which we may well do.... Next read is Hilary Mantel's A Memoir of my Former Self. Suggestions welcome! ..which lightened my heart. Enjoy. Maybe dance? I was very moved by this story by Luciano Pavarotti. He experienced war as a child and at one point he decided not to look at what was right and what was wrong in the world. He said - It is the world. I am alive. It is plenty enough. He fundraised all his life for child victims of war. Sometimes when the world gets too much I think 'I am alive. It is plenty enough.' I love that at the beginning of this concert everyone in the audience waves a white handkerchief. I wonder who thught of that.
What is you ideal day out? Mine was on Thursday. Perfect. The concert at the University of Glasgow (icy cold draughty mock Gothic building) was called How To Raise The Wind with a fiddle, a guitar, two violins, a viola, a cellot and a double bass, a cintemporary take oon traditional Scottish with more than a hint of jazz - a short programme and I felt they were just really warming up when it ended. They were very good, especially the Finnish double bass player Rickard Toften Holst. Lunch at Kember and Jones in nearby Byers Road. Kale soup with meatballs. A quick bus ride into the city centre and we popped into a Cocktail Bar because I wanted to see the interior (the one with all the candles). We rather boringly had coffee which wasn't on the menu but they kindly made us one anyway!  More wandering round gazing at elegant buildings - the floodlighting shows up the details beautifully. This one is in Renfiled St and I can honestly say I have never noticed it beofre. Then on to the City Halls and Mozart and Elgar. Stunningly good, and you can hear the concert on BBC Sounds. We also got to see inside the Bank of Scotland building I photographed recently...more tomorrow.. Have you got your great day out planned yet?  If you have access to BBC Sounds there was a lovely interview with pianist Krystian Zimmerman on Music Matters of 14 October.
The sunset coming home from the city was glorious.   As I sat here this morning I thought how well we are served by the arts here in uk. I listened to BBC Radio Three (sanity in a mad world!) and heard Sran Getz, followed by a beautiful reading of W H Auden's poem Musee des Beaux-Arts by Paul Scofield, and then a very moving piece by Ysaye played by Maria Duenas a violinist on the excellent New Generation Artists scheme. This was just before 8 this morning should you want to hear it and have access. At a window on a quiet morning in a small rural village in Scotland I can have such a rich start to my day at the click of a a button. It's wonderful. I am off somewhere even quieter for a few days - can probably still get Radio 3 ... I love the work of Norman Ackroyd. He was the guest today on one of my favourite programmes, Private Passions on BBC Radio Three, in which he was interviewed about his favourite music by Michael Barclay, who always seems to really like his gursts and who genuinely listens to them. I love what Norman Ackroyd says about his art and his music and what they mean to him. Art is everything, really.  I am the happy owner of a very small Ackroyd Rain, Skellig. I had wanted one of his prints for many years but many of the ones I loved were too big and too bold and dramatic for my small space. He shows at the Royal Academy every year and at the Zillah Bell gallery in Thirsk, North Yorkshire. It was there I saw this one. Irish islands in the rain like a Chinese ink painting, and a bold border like a Howard Hodgson (which I know I will never afford). A very fine artist. I first heard this when working for the National Trust at Beningbrough Hall near York. I was teaching a watercolour class on a perfec smmer day in the walled flower garden and this song came floating out of the shop! Idyllic! Utterly romantic. I felt I was in heaven. This beautiful image is from Anna Potter's book Flower Philosophy.  Even the sound of the rain is romantic in this.. Ah, the food of love.. I will be listening to Oscar Peterson, Tord Gustavsson, Charles Aznavour, Steven Isserlis, Quator Ebene, Arvo Part and Jan Garbbarek, Nina Simone, Sinatra, Mozart, Pucccini, Satie and Debussy, Elaine Page perhaps, or Judy Dench, Katie Melua.. And I plan to listen again to some music posted under Simply Listen (I began my Desert Island Disc selection some years ago and didn't finish it - overwhelmed by the inppossibility of choosing eight!) Please share your favourites! I heard Steven Isserlis play Richard Strauss's Romance in F Major on Radio 3 the other morning and thought I should look out my favouritte romantic music this month. I spent a whole evening listening to and watching programmes about this composer - who wrote this when he was just 19 years od! He composed his fist piece aged 6.    Still enjoying keeping it simple Did anyone else hear the first episode today of a programme called Living With The News (BBC Sounds Radio 4 at 13.45 every day this week). Fascinating on a subject which I think about a lot. The Attention Economy - I knew it existed but didn't know it had a name... Thank you to Susan in Dorset who recommended this programme on BBC Radio 3. I particularly love Music For Growing Flowers in 10 October episode, and Hana Rani's Safe Haven from 31 October - the sound of rain on the roof of the attic in her home in Poland. (The programmes are available for a limited time.) Each episode features a different theme and has a different guest who shares their safe haven. Delightful! I love that the blog is a two way process and that over the years you have told me about wonderful books, music, films and videos, events and places. You enrich my life and I thank you. A fascinating live concert by the Sequoia Duo. You can learn more about them and hear some of their music here. But as you know there's nothing like the real thing..   The painting is Dreams of Flying and is a much deeper and intense sky blue than it looks here... Pianist Vikingur Olafsson says of Bach Bach is always a good idea. Whether you are feeling happy, sad, whatever it is, he makes things better. I would add especially when played by Olafsson, and when played loud! I simply have no words to express the horror and dismay about what is happening in Ukraine. I won't be mentioning it here in the blog, although like everyone, including my nephew's Ukrainian wife, I will be thinking about it. Words may fail me, but music doesn't. The first in person concert in over two years was a resunding success. Webern, Schoenberg and the Bruckner Fourth, it was being recorded for BBC Radio 3 and is being broadcast tonight (Mar 1). It was thrilling to be in the elegant City Halls in Glasgow. My favourite was The Song Of The Wood Dove by Schoenberg, sung by a wonderful mezzo soprano Karen Cargill whose voice just took your breath away, and conducted by balletic Alpesh Chauhan who almost danced off the podium in the Bruckner! The Scottish Symphony Orchestra were at their dazzling best.     Paul McCartney;s Blackbird by Hiromi. Fabulous. The musician in yesterday's post made such a difference to the atmosphere on the Glasgow street on the wet cold day, with his cheerful fiddle. It lifted my spirits and I was glad to have some coins in my pocket. He wished me a Happy New Year when I dropped them into his box. (It was the day before Hogmanay.) York is a great city for street music. I remember a harpist and cellist in Stonegate, a soprano with a voice like an angel in St Helen's Square, a pianist who trundled round a piano on wheels to various locations, a man with a very fine voice singing sea shanties in the Shambles (we also saw hm in Whitby and Lincoln), and Ed Alleyne who drew a crowd in Parliament Stree with his electric violin. There was also, long ago, a little frail man with a shock of white hair who merely leaned against a wasll and breathed in and out of his mouth organ.. In Oxford there was a man with a zither-like instrument who played twinkly music with canddles in jars around his feet and a beatific smile on his face. Are there street musicians where you live? I am finding both music and the talk about music and creativity inspiring. You can hear this pianist on BBC Sounds in In Tune of 12th August, and in a video on YouTube -Vikingur Olafsson Debussy Rameau EPK/Trailer. I would love to know what you think.. The days are flying by and I am feeling quite tired, not having worked this hard for years! This is the start of Ice And Lemon.  I am enjoying The Proms on Radio Three and the wonderful Icelandic pianist Vikingur Olafsson. I love listening to him talk about his art. When someone commented that he made it look easy, he replied that it is easy. You have to love it, he said. If you love it enough to spend the time required on it, then it becomes easy. What an excellent point. I am looking forward to his concert this Saturday.   Thank you Grace for leading me to this! Oops! If this will not play a notice will say Watch on YouTube - if you click on tht it should play....sorry about that. ..and a bit tearful, so sending you this lovely little piece of music. I have been searching for this for years and found it yesterday... ..on my make it rhrough list is make music. Time for an update on my Desert Island Disc choices. (See under Simply Listen in sidebar.) So far I have Beethoven, Mozart, Oscar Peterson and Pablo Casalsand I have been enjoying some of your choices too. I could not miss out this one which lifts my spirits every time and makes me long for Italy. Joyous. Pure escapism. I suggest full screen and full volume! What do you think?
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