Savva Zverev: Russian-born violinist and graduate of Royal Northern Collge of Music. Picture: York Late Music
LATE Music has been changing gradually over the years. It now encompasses two concerts on the first Saturday of every month between October and June, one at lunchtime and one in the evening.
Amabile, a clarinet trio, drew the lunchtime slot this month, with Farrenc and Brahms sandwiching a premiere by Steve Crowther.
In the welcome wave of rediscovery of female composers through the ages, the name of Louise Farrenc (1804-1875) regularly recurs. She mainly wrote for her own instrument, the piano, but chamber music – always with piano – engaged her frequently.
Her Trio in E flat, Op 44 (1861), partners clarinet (or violin) with cello and piano. It shows craftsmanship rather than inspiration, and is a throwback to Mendelssohn with a touch of Mozartian finesse.
Amabile, with the seasoned clarinet of Lesley Schatzberger to the fore, treated it with considerable respect. Balance was awry at first, with prominent piano and self-effacing cello, but Farrenc’s imitative tendencies soon emerged politely enough.
A slithery little figure in the minuet heralded a finale that showed flashes of imagination; it was taken at an exciting pace. There is probably more to the composer than this but it was good to hear.
Crowther’s Transcriptions from Morris Dances are nothing to do with the well-known dances but five cameos inspired by the composer’s friendship with Philip Morris, presumably originally for piano.
They are delightful vignettes, spiced with wit and insight, ranging from the light and airy in the opening homage to friendship to the thoughtfully elegiac in the final Love Song, with its quizzical ending. They were lovingly played.
Brahms’s Clarinet Trio, Op 114 in A minor (1891), has all the autumnal warmth we associate with the composer’s twilight years. The opening Allegro had a lovely flow here and a delicate ending.
In the heat haze conjured by the Adagio, the cello of Nicola Tait Baxter came into its own, entwined closely with Schatzberger’s idiomatic clarinet. Paul Nicholson’s piano neatly underpinned the lilting Viennese waltz that preceded a finale of crisp rhythms tinged with a touch of aggression. It was good to see Nicholson back in musical harness after his retirement from the Anglican ministry. He has lost none of his previous finesse on all types of keyboard.
The evening brought a surprise. There have been countless expert exponents of contemporary music in this series over the years, but never, I would guess, a virtuoso of quite the calibre of violinist Savva Zverev.
His nonchalant dispatch of a variety of works from Bach to Bartók and beyond was breathtaking. Sid Ramchander was his nimble-fingered piano partner.
Zverev opened his first half with Bach’s first solo violin sonata, BWV 1001 in G minor. He made it sound, as Bach undoubtedly intended, as if there were several instruments involved, not just counterpoint in three or even four parts but, with double and treble-stopping, remarkable harmony as well. This was cutting-edge stuff in Bach’s day. It still is – and very much belonged here.
By way of balance, Zverev’s second half began with Bartók’s unaccompanied Violin Sonata of 1944, the year before he died. It takes several leaves out of Bach’s book and is equally challenging.
Not that it held any terrors for Zverev. His top-string brilliance was not balanced by much dynamic shading in the opening chaconne, but his handling of the four-voice fugue, with its alternate plucking and bowing, was masterly. So too was the zig-zagging Melodia and bravura reached a new peak in the headlong finale.
After that, there was bound to be anti-climax. Pärt’s slow, minimalist Spiegel im Spiegel could not hold attention in this company. Franz Waxman’s Carmen Fantasy, taken from his soundtrack to the 1946 film Humoresque, inevitably came across as relatively empty display, virtuosity for its own sake. Perhaps we had simply had enough by then.
Earlier, Zverev had shown a different side to his musical personality in the delicate traceries of Webern’s Four Pieces, Op 7 and discovered genuine drama in Lutoslawski’s rondo Subito, especially in the episode on the G-string. Ramchander was with him every step of the way here, no mean feat in itself.
In five extracts from Debussy’s Préludes for piano his melody lines were not always evenly voiced, but his minimal use of pedal contributed to admirable clarity. This is certainly a duo to watch.
The four doormen of the apocalypse: John Godber Company in Bouncers, on tour at York Theatre Royal
THE northern 1980s and Bath society in 1798, French park life and a canny tortoise stir Charles Hutchinson into heading out of the front door.
York play of the week: John Godber Company in Bouncers, York Theatre Royal, April 5, 7.30pm; April 6, 2.30pm and 7.30pm
MEET Lucky Eric, Judd, Les and Ralph, the original men in black, as they tell the torrid tale of one Eighties’ night in a Yorkshire disco in John Godber’s northern parody of Saturday Night Fever. All the gang are out on the town, the lads, the lasses, the cheesy DJ, the late-night kebab man, and the taxi home, under the watchful eyes of the Bouncers (Nick Figgis, George Reid, Frazer Hammill and newcomer Tom Whittaker).
“We’re delighted to be taking Bouncers back to the heyday of disco and the 1980s,” says Goober. “Looking back, there was so much wrong with the decade but also so much to celebrate; this new production dances a balance between what was great and what is cringe-worthy now!” Box office: 01904 623568 or yorktheatreroyal.co.uk.
Rebecca Banatvala, back, AK Golding, middle, and Sam Newton, front, in Northanger Abbey at the SJT, Scarborough. Picture: Pamela Raith
Play of the week outside York: Northanger Abbey, Stephen Joseph Theatre, Scarborough, until April 13
ZOE Cooper adapts Jane Austen’s coming-of-age satire of Gothic novels in a co-production by the SJT, Orange Tree Theatre, Richmond, Octagon Theatre, Bolton, and Theatre by the Lake, Keswick, starring Rebecca Banatvala (Cath), AK Golding (Iz) and Sam Newton (Hen) under Tessa Walker’s direction.
In a play fizzing with imagination, humour and love, Cath Morland knows little of the world, but who needs real-life experience when you have books to guide you? Cath seizes her chance to escape her claustrophobic family life and join the smart set in Bath. Between balls and parties, she meets worldly, sophisticated Iz, and so Cath’s very own adventure begins. Box office: 01723 370541 or sjt.uk.com.
Yu Wakizuka’s Hare in Northern Ballet’s Tortoise & The Hare, racing around York Theatre Royal. Picture: Sophie Beth Jones
Children’s show of the week: Northern Ballet in Tortoise & The Hare, York Theatre Royal, Tuesday, 2pm, 4pm; Wednesday, 11am (Relaxed Performance), 2pm, 4pm
CHOREOGRAPHED by former Northern Ballet dancers Dreda Blow and Sebastian Loe, Tortoise & The Hare is an introduction to live ballet, theatre and music for “little ones”. When cheeky Hare can’t stop boasting about his speed, thoughtful Tortoise, so tired of being teased for his slowness, decides to challenge him in a race. No-one thinks Tortoise can win, but once Hare is distracted by games and treats, Tortoise might surprise everyone.
Leeds company Northern Ballet’s 40-minute adaptation of Aesop’s fable features an original score by Bruno Merz, set designs by Ali Allen and live music performed by Northern Ballet Sinfonia members. Box office: 01904 623568 or yorktheatreroyal.co.uk.
Benjamin Francis Leftwich: Opening his spring tour at Leeds Brudenell Social Club
Gig of the week: Benjamin Francis Leftwich, Leeds Brudenell Social Club, Thursday, 7.30pm
YORK singer-songwriter Benjamin Francis Leftwich follows up Dirty Hit Records’ February 9 release of his fifth album, Some Things Break, with a nine-date spring tour that opens in Leeds.
He will perform alongside The 1975’s guitarist and keyboard player Jamie Squire on a tour managed by Bradley Blackwell, former bassist and keyboards player in The York band The Howl & The Hum.
Benjamin has released a 15-minute film of Some Things Break, directed by Harvey Pearson, that combines documentary footage of the recording process with interviews and four live videos of album tracks featuring Squire on keyboards and backing vocals. You can watch the film at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VqAUE3jrp6w
Now based in Tottenham, London, Benjamin will be returning to York on July 18 to open the bill for Jack Savoretti’s open-air concert in York Museum Gardens on July 18. Box office: Leeds, brudenellsocialclub.seetickets.com; York, jacksavoretti.com/events.
Jessica Fostekew: On her mettle at Pocklington Arts Centre
Comedy gag of the week: Jessica Fostekew, Mettle, Pocklington Arts Centre, Thursday, 8pm
IN her new stand-up show of passion, pace and purpose, Jessica Fostekew’s son has joined a cult and her cat has learnt to talk. Nevertheless, she feels fine. In fact she is hurtling faster and hustling harder than ever for the things that she wants and needs.
Fostekew appeared in the sitcom Motherland and Sundance Festival Grand Jury prize-winning film Scrapper and is a regular co-host of The Guilty Feminist podcast, host and creator of her own podcast about eating, Hoovering, and the star and writer of BBC Radio 4’s Sturdy Girl Club. Box office: 01759 301547 or pocklingtonartscentre.co.uk.
Savva Zverev: Russian-born violinist, playing York Late Music concert on April 6. Picture: Mixei & TunaPutting themselves in the picture: Pick Me Up Theatre cast members James Willstrop (as Jules), left, Neil Foster (as Soldier), Natalie Walker (as Dot) amd Sanna Jeppsson (as Yvonne), front, set the scene for Sunday In The Park With George
York musical of the week: Pick Me Up Theatre in Sunday In The Park With George, Theatre@41, Monkgate, York, April 5 to 13, 7.30pm except April 8; 2.30pm, April 6, 7 and 13
STEPHEN Sondheim and James Lapine’s musical follows painter Georges Seurat (played by Adam Price) in the months leading up to the completion of his most famous painting, A Sunday Afternoon On The Island Of La Grande Jatte.
Consumed by his need to “finish the hat”, Seurat alienates the French bourgeoisie, spurns his fellow artists and neglects his lover Dot (Natalie Walker), not realising that his actions will reverberate through the next 100 years. Box office: tickets.41monkgate.co.uk.
Fairground Attraction: Mark Nevin, left, Roy Dodds, Eddi Reader and Simon Edwards reunite after 35 years for a York-bound tour and new album
Gig announcement of the week: Fairground Attraction, York Barbican, October 1
AFTER an absence of nigh on 35 years, all four original members of short-lived late-Eighties’ band Fairground Attraction are reuniting for a 14-date British tour and an as-yet-untitled new studio album, preceded by first single What’s Wrong With The World?, out now.
Best known for their chart-topping debut, Perfect, winner of the Best Single prize at the 1988 Brit Awards, Fairground Attraction return with their country-pop line-up of singer Eddi Reader, guitarist Mark Nevin, guitarrón bassist Simon Edwards and drummer Roy Dodds. Box office: axs.com/York.
In Focus: A triple bill of York Late Music concerts, Unitarian Chapel, St Saviourgate, York, April 5 and 6
Violinist Savva Zverev. Picture: York Late Music
THREE York Late Music concerts promise compositions by Bach, Bartok, Brahms, Bryars, Webern, Pärt, Farrenc and Debussy, new works and old works, York composers and even a York Suite, Richard Stoker’s Eboracum.
First up, on April 5 at 1pm, pianist David Hammond plays William Baines’s Pictures Of Light, Drift-light, Bursting Flames and Pool-lights, Steve Crowther’s Michael Dances, Ruth Karn’s The Loneliness Of Now and Gavin Bryars’ Ramble On Cortona.
Richard Stoker’s aforemtioned work A York Suite, Eboracum comprises Vale Of York, chorale prelude; Micklegate, interlude 1; Minster and the Five Sisters, lullaby; River Ouse, scherzo; Bootham Bar, interlude 2; Station and Railway Museum Castleand Clifford’s Tower, nocturne.
Hammond’s programme is completed by Matt Dibble’s Prelude in B minor, Hammond’s own work Variations On A Scottish Jig and William Baines’s Tides, The Lone Wreck and Goodnight To Flamboro’.
At 1pm on April 6, Amabile’s trio of Lesley Schatzberger, Nicola Tait Baxter and Paul Nicholson bring the distinctive blend of clarinet, cello and piano to life with a combination of trios by Brahms and performer, composer and equality campaigner Louise Farrenc, complemented by a new Steve Crowther work.
In the evening, at 7.30pm, Russian-born violinst Savva Zverev and pianist Sid Ramachander combine Bach’s Violin Concerto No 1 in G minor and Preludes by Debussy with works by Webern, Lutoslawski, Bartok, Pärt and Franz Waxmann. Tickets: latemusic.org or on the door.
Late Music York, Robert Rice and William Vann, Unitarian Chapel, St Saviourgate, York, February 3
WALTER de la Mare’s Peacock Pie (1922) is a charming collection of rhymes that have an appeal for all ages, not least through their evocation of childhood.
This recital, featuring baritone Robert Rice and pianist William Vann, mainly paired settings from the anthology by Armstrong Gibbs and Howells with first performances of the same poems by living composers, many of whom were in the audience.
Before that, Rice announced himself with Finzi’s song-cycle in tribute to Vaughan Williams, Let Us Garlands Bring, celebrating the latter’s 70th birthday in 1942. He at once established his sense of line and a keen awareness of text, while Vann added some tasty colour, not least in the postlude to ‘Who Is Sylvia?’. The duo was notably effervescent in ‘It Was A Lover And His Lass’.
Thereafter we had no fewer than ten premieres by nine different composers. As a whole, they were encouragingly well crafted, and a handful also revealed real inspiration.
Robert Walker found an ingenious way to conjure scissors at work in The Barber’s, which Armstrong Gibbs had not done. Also in the Gibbs corner was Charlotte Marlow’s Old Shellover, nicely shaped with its opening repeated.
Liz Dilnot Johnson exploited piano extremes in Hide And Seek and David Lancaster used effective syncopation in With Lantern Bright, a setting of the original ‘Then’. William Rhys Meek daringly selected Miss T, already wittily set by both Gibbs and Howells, and still managed to add tonal variety.
Amongst the Howells settings, Hayley Jenkins neatly milked the absurdity of Alas, Alack! in both parts, but her piano was hyperactive in The Dunce. Phillip Cooke conjured an appealing vocal line in Full Moon.
At this point we had heard no fewer than 26 songs. But there were still six to come that had nothing to do with the rest of the evening.
Having successfully curated the programme, David Power rewarded himself with his own (translated) settings of René Char, three written as a student nearly 40 years ago and the same three poems re-cast in 2016. The early ones had little to offer, the later ones were much bolder and more confident. But their relevance here was tenuous and looked like self-indulgence.
Nonetheless Rice and Vann treated them with the same tireless respect as elsewhere, despite not enjoying any biographies of their own in the otherwise truly admirable printed programme.
Neil Vincent, left, Clare Halliday, Chris Pomfrett, Victoria Delaney and Mick Liversidge in rehearsal for York Actors Collective’s Beyond Caring
A GLUT of York theatre companies, a nocturnal sky festival, a Yorkshire musical and a colourful installation light up the dark nights of February for culture guide Charles Hutchinson.
Social drama of the week: York Actors Collective in Beyond Caring, Theatre@41, Monkgate, York, Tuesday to Friday, 7.30pm; Saturday, 2.30pm and 5.30pm
DEVISED by Alexander Zeldin and the original Yard Theatre cast in London, this 90-minute play highlighting the social damage inflicted by zero-hours contracts forms York Actors Collective’s second production, directed by founder Angie Millard.
Performed by Victoria Delaney, Clare Halliday, Mick Liversidge, Chris Pomfrett and Neil Vincent, Beyond Caring follows meat-packing factory cleaners Becky, Grace and Sam on the night shift as they confront the reality of low wage employment, never sure whether their ‘job’ will continue. Box office: tickets.41monkgate.co.uk.
Robert Rice: Recital at Unitarian Chapel, St Saviourgate tonight
Late Music at the double: Steve Bingham, violin and electronics, 1pm today; Robert Rice, baritone, and William Vann, piano, 7.30pm tonight, Unitarian Chapel, St Saviourgate, York
PET Shop Boys’ It’s A Sin chills with Bach’s Allemande in D minor, while a tango from Piazzolla is thrown in for good measure, as Steve Bingham explores four centuries of solo violin music this afternoon. World premieres of David Power’s Miniatures, Wayne Siegel’s Salamander (violin and electronics) and Rowan Alfred’s Cuckoo Phase will be performed too.
York composer David Power has curated Robert Rice and William Vann’s evening recital, featuring the first complete performance of Power’s Three Char Songs (1985 and 2016). Works by Gerald Finzi, Cecil Armstrong Gibbs, Herbert Howells, Robert Walker, William Rhys Meek, Charlotte Marlow, Liz Dilnot Johnson, David Lancaster, Hannah Garton, Ruth Lee, Hayley Jenkins and Phillip Cooke. Power gives a pre-concert talk at 6.45pm with a complimentary glass of wine or juice. Tickets: latemusic.org or on the door.
Jonny Holbek as Sebastian in York Light Opera Company’s production of Disney’s The Little Mermaid. Picture: Matthew Kitchen
Nautical adventure of the week: York Light Opera Company in Disney’s The Little Mermaid, York Theatre Royal, February 7 to 17, except February 12
BASED on the classic 1989 Disney animated film, The Little Mermaid tells the enchanting story of Ariel, a mermaid who dreams of trading her tail for legs and exploring the human world. Aided by her mischievous sidekick, Flounder, and the cunning Ursula, Ariel strikes a bargain that will change her life forever.
Martyn Knight’s production for York Light features stunning projection, dazzling costumes, unforgettable musical numbers, such as Under The Sea and Kiss The Girl, and choreography by Rachael Whitehead. Box office: 01904 623568 or yorktheatreroyal.co.uk.
The poster for Colour & Light, soon to illuminate the facade of York Art Gallery
Installation launch of the week: Colour & Light, York Art Gallery, February 7 to 25
YORK BID is linking up with York Museums Trust for the return of Colour & Light: an innovative project that will transform the facade of York Art Gallery to counter the cold winter with a vibrant light installation.
This “high impact and large-scale visual arts project” uses 3D projection mapping to bring York’s iconic buildings to life, first York Minster last year, now York Art Gallery, where the projection will play every ten minutes from 6pm to 9pm daily in a non-ticketed free event.
Watching the detective: Steven Jobson’s Lieutenant Frank Cioffi in Joseph Rowntree Theatre Company’s Curtains. Picture: Jennifer Jones
It’s Curtains for…Joseph Rowntree Theatre Company, Joseph Rowntree Theatre, York, Wednesday to Saturday, 7.30pm and 2.30pm Saturday matinee
WHEN the leading lady of a new musical mysteriously dies on stage, a plucky local detective must solve this 1959 case at Boston’s Colonial Theatre, where the entire cast and crew are suspects in Kander & Ebb’s musical with a book by Rupert Holmes.
Cue delightful characters, a witty and charming script and glorious tunes in the Joseph Rowntree Theatre Company’s staging of Curtains. Box office: 01904 501935 or josephrowntreetheatre.co.uk.
Sunflower power: The Calendar Girls cast on tour at the Grand Opera House, York, from Tuesday to Saturday
Touring musical of the week: Calendar Girls The Musical, Grand Opera House, York, Tuesday to Saturday, 7.30pm plus 2.30pm Wednesday, Thursday and Saturday matinees
YOU know the story, the one where a husband’s death to leukaemia prompts a group of ordinary women in a small Yorkshire Women’s Institute to do an extraordinary thing, whereupon they set about creating a nude calendarto raise money for charity.
Premiered at Leeds Grand Theatre in 2015, Gary Barlow and Tim Firth’s musical is now touring with a cast of music, stage and television stars. Baring all will be Laurie Brettas Annie;Liz Carneyas Marie; Helen Pearson as Celia; Samantha Seager as Chris; Maureen Nolan as Ruth; Lyn Paul as Jessie and Honeysuckle Weeks as Cora. Once more the tour supports Blood Cancer UK. Box office: atgtickets.com/york.
Nicola Holliday (as Jean Tanner) and James Lee (as Charles Stratton) in rehearsal for Settlement Players’ Separate Tables. Picture: John Saunders
English manners of the week: York Settlement Community Players in Separate Tables, York Theatre Royal Studio, February 8 to 17, 7.45pm except Sunday and Monday, plus 2pm Saturday matinees
AFTER directing four Russian plays by Chekhov, Helen Wilson turns her attention to Separate Tables, two very English Terence Rattigan tales of love and loss, set in a shabby Bournemouth hotel in the 1950s.
Guests, both permanent and transient, sit on separate tables, a formality that underlines the loneliness of these characters in a play about class, secrets and repressed emotions. Chris Meadley, Paul French, Molly Kay, Jess Murray, Marie-Louise Feeley, Caroline Greenwood and Linda Fletcher are among the Settlement cast. Box office: 01904 623568 or yorktheatreroyal.co.uk.
Festival of the month: North York Moors and Yorkshire Dales Dark Skies Festival, February 9 to 25
TEAMING up for the ninth time since 2016, the North York Moors and Yorkshire Dales National Park authorities celebrate the jewels of God’s Own Country’s night sky this month.
Discover nocturnal activities to heighten the senses such as the Dark Skies Experience (February 9 to 25) night navigation (February 16); trail run and yoga (February 17, sold out); canoeing; planet trail and constellation trail at Aysgarth Falls (February 9 to 25); astrophotography workshops at Castle Howard (February 22), stargazing safaris, children’s daytime trails, art workshops and mindful experiences. More details: darkskiesnationalparks.org.uk; yorkshiredales.org.uk/things-to-do/whats-on/shows/dark-skies-festival/.
Richard Ashcroft: Heading to the woods for Forest Live at Dalby Forest in June. Picture: Dean Chalkley
Outdoor gig announcement of the week: Richard Ashcroft, Forest Live, Dalby Forest, near Pickering, June 23
FORESTRY England completes its Forest Live return to Dalby Forest for the first time since 2019 with Richard Ashcroft, the two-time Ivor Novello Award-winning Wigan singer, songwriter and frontman of The Verve.
Canadian rocker Bryan Adams and disco icons Nile Rodgers & CHIC were confirmed already for June 21 and 22 respectively. New addition Ashcroft’s set list will draw on his five solo albums, along with The Verve’s anthems Bittersweet Symphony, The Drugs Don’t Work, Lucky Man and Sonnet. Leeds band Apollo Junction will be supporting. Box office: forestlive.com.
In Focus: York Ice Trail, City of Dreams, York city centre, today and tomorrow, from 10am
York Ice Trail: City of Dreams this weekend
THE theme for York Ice Trail 2024 transforms York into the City of Dreams, inviting visitors to dream big.
The last York Ice Trail, in February 2023, drew 40,000 visitors to York to view 36 sculptures. Organised by Make It York, the 2024 event again sees the “coolest” sculptures line the streets of York, each conceived and sponsored by businesses and designed and created by ice specialist Icebox.
Sarah Loftus, Make It York managing director, says: “York Ice Trail is one of the most-loved events in the city for residents and visitors alike, and we’re excited to be bringing it back for another year in 2024.
“It’s a huge celebration of our city and businesses, and the concept will inspire everyone’s inner child, encouraging people to let their imagination run wild.”
Icebox managing director Greg Pittard says: “Returning to York for the 2024 Ice Trail is a true honour for us. The York Ice Trail holds a special place in our hearts, and we are thrilled to bring this year’s theme to life.
“Our talented team of ice carvers pour their passion into crafting magnificent ice sculptures that will transport visitors to a world of wonder and delight.”
The 2024 ice sculptures:
Our City Of Dreams, provided by Make It York, Parliament Street.
A Field Of Dreams, Murton Park, Parliament Street.
A Journey In ice, Grand Central, Parliament Street.
City Of Trees, Dalby Forest, Parliament Street.
Chasing Rainbows, in celebration of York band Shed Seven topping the UK official album chart in January, York Mix Radio, Parliament Street.
I’m Late, I’m Late! For A Very Important Date!, Ate O’Clock, High Ousegate.
Sewing Like A Dream, Gillies Fabrics, Peter Lane.
Mythical Beasts: The Yeti, York BID, Walmgate.
Hop On Your Bike, Spark:York, Piccadilly (Spark:York will be open from 12 noon).
Belle Of The Ball, York Castle Museum, Eye of York.
The best things in life are free…or on offer: York Residents’ Festival 2024
TWO days of York celebrating all things York lead off Charles Hutchinson’s tips for cultural fulfilment, from Eighties’ nostalgia to a monster musical, a ghost story’s return to a singing French iconoclast.
York Residents’ Festival 2024, today and tomorrow
YORK Residents’ Festival returns this weekend with free entry or offers on more than 50 York attractions, restaurants, bars and retailers.
For the weekend organised by Make It York, historical attractions such as York Minster, Jorvik Viking Centre, Clifford’s Tower, Fairfax House, Barley Hall, Merchant Adventurers’ Hall and Treasurer’s House will be opening their doors for free to residents across the weekend.
Residents can also take advantage of a free river cruise with City Cruises, free wizard golf at The Hole In Wand, in Coppergate Walk, and the first 100 visitors can visit for free at York’s Chocolate Story, King’s Square.
Offers at York eateries and restaurants include The Grand, Rio Brazilian Steakhouse York, Ambiente Tapas and Pearly Cow. Retail offers exclusive to residents are available at Avorium, York Gin, Love Cheese, Potions Cauldron and more besides.
For those preferring to explore by foot, offers and discounts apply to walking tours and outdoor activities. Mountain Goat will be taking residents off the beaten path to explore the beautiful Yorkshire countryside, while the family-friendly Wizard Walk of York promises to be spellbinding. Or why not learn to abseil and climb Brimham Rocks, at Brimham Moor Road, Summerbridge, Harrogate?
Step this way for The Wizard Walk of York
To take advantage of York Residents’ Festival offers, you must present a valid York Card, student card or identity card (e.g. driving licence or bus pass) that proves York residency by clearly stating ‘York’.
Make It York managing director Sarah Loftus says: ‘We’re delighted that we have so many York businesses providing fantastic offers for Residents’ Festival weekend. This is a great opportunity for residents to rediscover some of the brilliant attractions, retail and food offers on their doorstop.
“A huge thank-you to our Visit York members for coming together to provide so many brilliant offers; there’s something for everyone during this fun-packed weekend.”
Meanwhile, Ann Petherick is reopening Kentmere House Gallery, in Scarcroft Hill, York, for a new year of exhibitions in time to coincide with the second day of York Residents’ Festival: tomorrow, from 11am to 5pm.
On show are original works of York and Yorkshire by more than 50 professional artists, plus prints, books and cards exclusive to the gallery. The first full weekend opening in 2024 will be on February 3 and 4, 11am to 5pm. Admission is free.
For the full list of offers, and for booking information for York Residents’ Festival, visit visityork.org. Please note, some venues and activities require pre-booking.
Celia Crwys Finnigan and Laura Sillett: On song for The 80’s Movie Mixtape at the Joseph Rowntree Theatre, York
Nostalgic gig of the week: The 80’s Movie Mixtape, Joseph Rowntree Theatre, York, tonight, 7.30pm
THE 80’s Movie Mixtape is a truly independent theatre show showcasing West End singers and musicians from around London and Surrey in a new tribute to Eighties’ blockbuster movies and their electrifying soundtracks.
A band of six actor-musicians – Jamie Ross, lead vocals, keyboard; Celia Crwys Finnigan, lead vocals, keyboard, alto saxophone; Laura Sillett, lead vocals, keyboard, baritone saxophone; Dom Gee-Burch, lead guitar; Ed Hole, bass, and Luke Thornton, drums – combine songs from Footloose, Top Gun, The Breakfast Club, Ferris Bueller’s Day Off, Dirty Dancing, Back To The Future, American Gigolo, Ghostbusters, Flashdance, Against All Odds and Electric Dreams with Eighties’ party anthems. Box office: 01904 501935 or josephrowntreetheatre.co.uk.
Percy: Performing at Navigators Art & Performance’s Basement Sessions 3 night of music, comedy, spoken word and poetry
On the move: Navigators Art & Performance, The Basement Sessions 3, The Basement, City Screen Picturehouse, York, February 23, 7.30pm
YORK creative collective Navigators Art & Performance is moving this weekend’s Basement Sessions 3 bill to next month. “Unfortunately, the Basement is ankle deep in flood water and we’re going to have to postpone the gig this Saturday,” says co-founder Richard Kitchen.
Taking part will be poet and actor Danae, from Mexico via York; “punk/jazz riot” Neo Borgia Trio, from the University of York Big Band; writer, poet, performer and multi-instrumentalist JT Welsch; comedian Will Glitch, from Norwich via Hull; left-field post-punk favourites Percy; acoustic duo The Jammingtons Experience and transatlantic guitar band Fat Spatula. Box office: https://bit.ly/nav-events-all.
English Teacher: Leeds band heading for York tomorrow
Independent Venue Week gig of the week: English Teacher, The Crescent, York, tomorrow, 7.30pm
“LEEDS’ music scene is the best in the world,” proclaims Lily Fontaine, English Teacher’s vocalist, guitarist and synthesiser player, without a blink of hesitation. This weekend she heads to near-neighbour York with bassist Nicholas Eden, drummer Doug Frost and lead guitarist Lewis Whitling, who she first met at house parties while they all studied at Leeds College of Music (now Leeds Conservatoire).
After tinkering with projects of their own, they settled on playing together, developing their fusion of dream pop and post-punk noise. Coming next? Writing new songs “somewhere between Adele, Jockstrap and Fontaines D.C.”. Box office: for returns only, thecrescentyork.seetickets.com.
Mark Hawkins as The Actor, left, and Malcolm James as Arthur Kipps in The Woman In Black, on tour at the Grand Opera House, York. Picture: Mark Douet
Haunting return of the week: The Woman In Black, Grand Opera House, York, Tuesday to Saturday, 7.30pm; 2.30pm Wednesday and Saturday matinees
STEPHEN Mallatratt’s stage adaptation of Scarborough author Susan Hill’s spine-chiller returns to York for the umpteenth time, directed as ever by Robin Herford. As he did at York Theatre Royal in November 2014, Malcolm James plays lawyer Arthur Kipps, who engages a sceptical young actor (Mark Hawkins) to help him tell his terrifying story and exorcise the fear that grips his soul. Box office: atgtickets.com/york.
Following the science: James Willstrop’s Dr Frederick Frankenstein in Pick Me Up Theatre’s Young Frankenstein. Picture: Jennifer Jones
Musical of the week: Pick Me Up Theatre in Young Frankenstein The Musical, Joseph Rowntree Theatre, York, Wednesday to Saturday, 7.30pm plus 2.30pm Saturday matinee
WHEN the infamous Victor Frankenstein’s grandson, Dr Frederick Frankenstein (James Willstrop), inherits the family castle in Transylvania, will he be doomed to repeat the same mistakes in Mel Brooks’s musical adaptation of his 1974 monster horror-movie spoof?
Andrew Isherwood directs York company Pick Me Up Theatre as Frankenstein’s experiment yields both madcap success and monstrous consequences with the help and hindrance of hunchback henchman Igor (Jack Hooper), Scandinavian assistant Inga (Sanna Jeppsson), mysterious housekeeper Frau Blucher (Helen Spencer) and needy fiancee Elizabeth (Jennie Wogan-Wells). Box office: 01904 501395 or josephrowntreetheatre.co.uk.
Guz Khan: York and Leeds gigs this winter
Comedy gig of the week: Guz Khan Live!, York Theatre Royal, Wednesday, 7.30pm
COVENTRY comedian, impressionist and actor Guz Khan is on his way to selling out York Theatre Royal after his February 25 gig at Leeds City Varieties already did so. Raised on a housing estate in Hillfields, he graduated from Coventry University and taught Humanities at Grace Academy in his home city before focusing on stand-up.
Khan, 38, is best known as the creator and star of the BBC Three comedy drama Man Like Mobeen, wherein he played a former Small Heath drug dealer now trying to live a good life as a Muslim. Box office: “Last tickets” on 01904 623568 or yorktheatreroyal.co.uk.
Cantona Sings Eric: Maverick footballer-turned-musician returns to Leeds for April concert. Poster picture: supplied by Academy Music Group
Most unexpected Yorkshire gig announcement of the week: Eric Cantona, Cantona Sings Eric, Leeds O2 Academy, April 16, doors, 7pm
ERIC Cantona once told Leeds United fans from the balcony of Leeds Town Hall, “why I love you, I don’t know why, but I love you” as the 1992 league champions paraded the Division One trophy. Only 207 days later, he was gone…to bitterest rivals Manchester United. Never to be forgiven.
Now 57, the avant-garde French footballer, sardine philosopher, actor, English advert regular and painter “to the rhythm of jazz” is to return to the city. Not in one of those “An Evening With” shows full of nostalgic football chat but as Eric Cantona, singer and musician, performing solo, with piano and cello for company. Box office: academymusicgroup.com/o2academyleeds/events or ticketmaster.co.uk/eric-cantona-tickets.
David Hammond: Performing works by work by Erik Satie, Brian Eno, Federico Mompou, Howard Skempton, David Power and Derek O’Connell
Piano recital of the week: Late Music presents David Hammond, St Saviourgate Unitarian Chapel, York, Friday, 1pm
DAVID Hammond performs a crossover of ambient and classical solo piano music centred on work by Erik Satie, Brian Eno, Federico Mompou and Howard Skempton, with new works by David Power and Derek O’Connell in the first Late Music recital of 2024.
The full programme will be: Erik Satie, Gnossiennes 1-3; Harold Budd/Brian Eno, The Plateaux Of Mirror; Derek O’Connell, Je mesure le son (first performance); John White, Sonata 95; David Power, Seven Paces Of Stillness (first performance); Erik Satie, Pièces Froides: No.2 Danses de travers; Federico Mompou, Cants Mágics; Howard Skempton, Well, Well Cornelius; Howard Skempton, Rumba; Howard Skempton, Quavers; Budd/Eno/Power mash-up, Remembered, and Erik Satie, Gnossiennes 4-5. Tickets: £5, latemusic.org/david-hammond-piano-2/ or on the door.
In focus: Exhibition launch of the week: Pyramid Gallery, York, from 11am today
One of Linda Combi’s 52 Postcards, painted in 2023
FOUR exhibitions are opening simultaneously today at Pyramid Gallery: Gomery & Braganza, ceramics and painting; Linda Combi’s 52 Postcards; glassmaker Jo Kenny’s What Lies Beneath and Ringleaders’ contemporary handmade rings.
Di Gomery, Loretta Braganza, Linda Combi and Jo Kenny all will be attending the 11am to 2.30pm launch. “Come along to the opening and enjoy a glass of wine or soft drink with the artists,” says gallery owner and curator Terry Brett.
Di’s studio is at South Bank Studios, Southlands Methodist Church, in Bishopthorpe Road, York. Her paintings are lyrical responses to landscape, still life and the human form, painted primarily in oil on canvas or board, often large in scale. Her approach is one of playful energy with an underlying structure and solidity.
Di, who worked in the design industry for Courtaulds (England) and Jakob Schlaepfer couture fabric design (Switzerland), has exhibited previously at Pyramid Gallery, Partisan café, in Micklegate, York, HartLaw Solicitors, in Wetherby, Dean Clough Gallery, Halifax, and the Fronteer Gallery, Sheffield.
Paintings created specifically for this Pyramid exhibition explore edges and volume, make reference to other artists, and generally play with surface and colour combinations. Her artistic influences include the work of British and American women abstract expressionists.
Loretta was born in Mumbai, India, came to Great Britain in 1965 and lives and works in York. She began her practice as a ceramicist in 1990 via a career in dance, graphic arts, textile design and sculpture, as well as teaching drawing and painting at York College.
Loretta Braganza and Di Gomery
Her distinctive style comprising taut edges, clean lines and complex mark making swiftly earned her exhibitions and commissions, as well as awards from the Crafts Council and the Arts Council.
Artist and illustrator Linda Combi, raised in a California desert, now settled in York, returns to Pyramid Gallery, this time with 52 Postcards, a series of original collage paintings, print cards and booklets that reflect on migration.
“I was inspired to create 52 postcards around the theme of displacement,” she says. “I decided to create postcards as you’d typically send them when you’re on holiday to family and friends back home, but for refugees, they can have very different connotations. It’s grounded in the concept of refugees being in another place, writing a letter to home or to their former self.
“In many of my postcards I use birds as a symbol for people forced to flee. They’re innocent, and they’re on the move.”
Linda’s postcards are mixed media, primarily hand painted and printed papers, but also incorporating coloured pencil, pen, stickers and crayon.
“Refugees and other displaced people have to endure so much,” she says. “Everyone should support refugees – not only do they enrich society, but more than anything, it’s just basic kindness and human empathy to understand how frightening it must be to be to have to flee.”
Glassmaker Jo Kenny at work in her studio
Fifty per cent of Linda’s sale proceeds will go to UNHRC, the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees agency mandated to aid and protect refugees, and the Lemon Tree Trust, an organisation that works alongside displaced people to transform refugee camps through gardening.
Glassmaker Jo Kenny creates pieces at the furnace inspired by exploring the beaches at Whitby, where she now lives. Such a simple childhood pleasure revisited, she finds a contemplative quality in the act of poking around in rock pools. “I feel the joy and excitement of discovery under each pebble,” she says.
Her What Lies Beneath series encourages the viewer to “look a little deeper and maybe feel a little of that childlike excitement making their own discoveries”.
Awarded an Arts Council England grant, Jo was able to develop the series further in collaboration with Scottish master craftsman Gordon Taylor, who completed pieces with his cutting and polishing skills.
Jo splits her time between making and teaching. Her key themes are the effect of the passage of time, erosion, entropy, persistence of image and all things pertaining to the ocean.
Di Gomery and Loretta Braganza’s exhibition runs until March 11; Linda Combi’s 52 Postcards until March 9; Jo Kenny’s glass until March 7, at Pyramid Gallery, Stonegate, York. Gallery opening hours are:Monday to Friday, 10am to 5pm; Saturdays, 10am to 5.30pm. The project can be viewed at Linda’s website, lindacombi.biz, from where purchases can be made too.
The late York composer Janet Owen Thomas, remembered in Anthony Gilbert’s work Monsoon Toccata
ANTHONY Gilbert’s Monsoon Toccata: In Memoriam Janet Owen Thomas (1961-2002) will be performed by pianist Kate Ledger at Saturday night’s Late Music concert in York.
“This concert will be a celebration of composer Anthony Gilbert who died in July this year, aged 89,” says Late Music administrator Steve Crowther. “The programme includes his memorial piece written for Janet Owen Thomas, the York composer, who died tragically young.”
Performed by violinist Nina Kumin, clarinet player Jonathan Sage and pianist Ledger at the Unitarian Chapel, St Saviourgate, the 7.30pm programme features three more Gilbert works, plus music by Nicola LeFanu and David Lumsdaine, who both knew him well.
Here Steve Crowther pays tribute to Jane Owen Thomas and her contribution to York Late Music.
“I never met Janet, even though she lived near me in Holgate, York. I did speak with her on the phone however, inviting Janet to compose a short piece for a small ensemble,” he recalls.
“It was the early days of Late Music and I worked with director David Power. It was then called the Late Music Festival with a strapline: The Cutting Edge, and the following year, The Cutting Edge Gets Sharper.
“The concerts were a niche market, and quite often the niche didn’t bother turning up. Low audiences with marginal box office revenue did not appeal to grant-funding bodies and so there was, as Kwasi Kwarteng discovered many years later, little in the way of inward investment.
“So we decided to change our marketing strategy, or rather, develop one. Living Composers, performed Live. This really sounded unique and, apart from the Go West Festival in Wales, it was.
Nina Kumin, left, Jonathan Sage and Kate Ledger: Playing Anthony Gilbert works at Saturday night’s Late Music concert at the Unitarian Chapel, St Saviourgate, York
“The main issue here was that quite a few of the living composers we programmed were no longer with us after we had gone to print. We then went nuts and threw the kitchen sink at the programming.
“The concerts now included jazz, Indian music, gamelan, crossover, loads of fusions; we even dug up Beethoven. Anyway, this long and winding road led us to where we are today. So back to Janet.
“OK, so this next bit isn’t going to sound professional or cool; not that I have ever been professional or cool. Janet said she would be interested and then caught me off guard with: ‘What will the commission fee be?’ I started laughing and said: ‘you’re kidding?’. She wasn’t.
“I have often thought Late Music should host a memorial concert of Janet’s music. And we will. I thought this programme note written by Anthony Gilbert – for a short piano piece called Monsoon Toccata, was very touching, very moving. It feels so right and so fitting to include this in Anthony’s own Late Music memorial concert.”
Anthony Gilbert wrote: “In 1988, Janet Owen Thomas met up with me in Sydney at the end of a short organ recital tour – possibly her last before devoting herself entirely to composing.
“We returned to England together, doing a rapid circular tour of Northern India on the way. Alighting from the plane at Delhi, we were hit by the whirling wind and torrential rain of the seasonal monsoon, and early the following morning there was also a minor earthquake.
“This experience determined the spirit of the music, and Northern Indian Raga determines the purely technical approach, with the quasi-improvisatory toccata-like textures acting as decoration to a slow-moving, widely spaced modal top line, which almost loses control of the overall shape at the mid-point – a reflection of the impact of those natural phenomena.”
Janet Owen Thomas, composer, writer, teacher and organist: the back story, from British Music Collection
Born: Merseyside, to Welsh and German parents.
Education: Merchant Taylors’ Girls’ School, Liverpool; read music at St Hugh’s College, Oxford, taught by Jane Glover and Robert Saxton (composition).
Further studies: After premiere of her choral work New And Better Days, commissioned to mark the opening of Liverpool’s Tate Gallery, read for degree in Music Technology at University of York, then took advanced composition studies with Anthony Gilbert at Royal Northern College of Music, Manchester.
Works included: UK premiere of Rosaces at 1991 BBC Proms (youngest composer featured that year). Concerto Grosso Cantus for Bang-on-a-Can, 1992, performed in Goldberg Ensemble’s Contemporary series at RNCM, broadcast on BBC Radio 3. Under The Skin, BBC commission for 1999 Huddersfield Festival of Contemporary Music. Preludes for Piano, premiered in London in 2000.
Commissioned or performed by: BBC; Goldberg Ensemble; Park Lane Group; Allegri and Bingham Quartets; Gemini; Boccherini String Trio; Stephen De Pledge; Mary Wiegold; Lontano; Kevin Bowyer; the Option Band and others.
Lived and worked in: York, dividing her time between teaching, writing and composition.
York composer Nicola LeFanu
IN her obituary for Janet Owen Thomas, fellow York composer Nicola LeFanu wrote of her musical style: “The hallmark of her style is linear counterpoint; the music is carefully constructed to allow for self-similarity in its proportions, both in the large and in the detail.
“In speaking of her work, Thomas acknowledged the influence of the 17th and 18th-century music which she played so much in her days as an organist. Her contrapuntal textures are transformed, though, by the ‘shimmer and glitter’ which she loved.”
THE Late Music concert series, aka Living Music, Live, has made a habit of inviting pianist Ian Pace over the years. It is easy to see why. He is a monarch of the keyboard, not least in repertory of the last two centuries.
He brought his full powers to bear on a programme that began and ended with Liszt transcriptions of Beethoven, with Gershwin and Kern transcriptions by Michael Finnissy and Steve Crowther’s Fourth Piano Sonata in between.
This was the opening concert in what is planned to be an annual series, The Beethoven Project, curated by Crowther and focused around all of Liszt’s transcriptions of Beethoven’s symphonies.
Liszt was an indefatigable transcriber of works by others, especially where they could be incorporated into his own virtuoso recitals. They also provided him with a more or less regular income.
His version of Beethoven’s Fifth is masterly, seemingly leaving nothing out and taxing the pianist to the very limit. But Pace was equal to his every demand. No-one could claim that this was a note-perfect account – how could it be? – but it was dazzling nonetheless.
He started with the three opening quavers so rapid that they were almost indistinguishable. The whole first movement, complete with repeat of the exposition, was adrenalin-fuelled, with the left hand in constant motion.
The Andante was richly voiced, with strong accents. All the statements of its rondo theme were insistent, although some of the diversions were taken more gently. Some of the humour of the third movement – effectively a scherzo and trio – was lost to heavy treatment, so that Beethoven’s subtle instrumentation in the fugato became too distant a memory.
But one could only gasp in admiration at the orchestral tone that Pace generated in the finale, with his left hand again moving at frightening speed. The work as a whole inevitably emerged more percussively than the original. But Liszt’s achievement was never in doubt.
Pace had opened with Liszt’s version of the first song-cycle in history, Beethoven’s An die Ferne Geliebte (To The Distant Beloved), six songs given without a break. Pace took great pains to highlight the vocal melodies, while opting for measured tempos larded with considerable rubato, probably more than a singer would countenance.
As the cycle progressed Pace made his upper register twinkle several times, not least with the trilling of birds in the unheard text.
Michael Finnissy’s ‘transcriptions’ from songs by Gershwin and Kern were much less literal than the Liszt and much more like arrangements, preferring to conjure atmosphere and doodle over harmonies.
In Love Is Here To Stay (from the 1938 film The Goldwyn Follies), the tune was held back until near the end, although in Embraceable You (from Girl Crazy) it was the jazz element that took control. Best of all was his version of Kern’s Can’t Help Lovin’ That Man (from Show Boat) where the melody was disguised but always detectable. Pace had them well organised.
So also in Steve Crowther’s Fourth Sonata, which sounded not unconnected with the Gershwin that preceded it, although sparer harmonically. Pace sustained excellent momentum and a staccato touch through the rapid opening movement, which was awash with syncopation and sounded like a rondo.
The slow movement was more ruminative, although tastily decorated with roulades. Decorations during the finale tended to occur in the right hand while the left carried the main theme. But both hands flitted lightly around the keyboard – and I swear I could hear traces of Kern here; perhaps they were just left over in my aural memory. But the work was never less than intriguing and often much more.
Pace had once again proved a mighty champion of the new and the little-known.
Ian Pace: Launching The Beethoven Project for Late Music York on Saturday
VIRTUOSO pianist Ian Pace will perform Late Music York’s first recital of The Beethoven Project at the Unitarian Chapel, St Saviourgate, York, on Saturday night.
Devised by Pace and Late Music administrator Steve Crowther, the project involves programming the whole cycle of Beethoven’s symphonies transcribed for piano by Franz Liszt in an annual series of piano recitals.
“Playing all nine transcribd Beethoven symphonies, the project should take Ian seven to eight years!” says Steve. “It’s incredibly demanding and it’ll be a real event.”
The opening 7.30pm concert features the heroic Symphony No. 5 and Liszt’s sublime transcription of the radical An die Ferne Geliebte, Beethoven’s only song cycle.
“But why did Liszt undertake such an enormous artistic challenge?” asks Steve. “To be sure, he loved the music deeply; he loved the challenge; he also loved the idea of the intimacy of performing these orchestral works on the piano, experiencing the symphonies afresh.
“But the main reason was financial. The music publisher Breitkopf & Härtel commissioned Liszt to transcribe the work, paying him eight francs per page. Liszt completed this (and the 6th Symphony) in 1837, ten years after Beethoven’s death.”
In an interview in 1988, the great pianist Vladimir Horowitz said: “I deeply regret never having played Liszt’s arrangements of the Beethoven symphonies in public. These are the greatest works for the piano – tremendous works – every note of the symphonies is in the Liszt works.”
Steve says: “Horowitz’s comments are embedded in the score itself to help the performer realise the original work through the lens of the piano transcription. Liszt would note down the names of the orchestral instruments for the pianist to imitate and add pedal marks and fingerings for pianistic clarity.”
Late Music York’s poster for the Beethoven Project
Saturday’s full concert programme is:
Beethoven: An die Ferne Geliebte (transcribed by Franz Liszt) ;
Gershwin: Love Is Here To Stay (transcribed by Michael Finnissy);
Gershwin: Embraceable You (transcribed by Michael Finnissy);
Gershwin (maybe): Please Pay Some Attention To Me (transcribed by Michael Finnissy)
Jerome Kern: Can’t Help Lovin’ That Man (transcribed by Michael Finnissy)
Steve Crowther: Piano Sonata No.4;
Beethoven: Symphony No.5 (transcribed by Franz Liszt).
“Now if we park the rogue Piano Sonata, the rest of the programme also reimagines original works, songs by Gershwin and Kern, for piano. This time transcribed by the wonderful composer, Michael Finnissy,” says Steve.
“I know Michael, having studied with him at the University of Sussex and continued contact with him through programming, and commissioning his highly original music. Indeed, it was Michael that introduced me and Late Music to Ian Pace. The rest, as they say, is history.”
Crowther sent Finnissy the programme blueprint, “not surprisingly receiving a corrective response with a lovely insight into Gershwin’s Please Pay Some Attention To Me”.
Finnissy wrote: “I have slightly corrected your programme attributions. Richard Rodney Bennett gave me the melody of Please Pay Some Attention To Me; he had been given it by a Swedish cabaret singer. It is (RRB told me) only attributed to George Gershwin – and does not appear in his work list.
“Jerome Kern wrote (rather than transcribed!) Can’t Help Lovin’ That Man(the original version of Show Boat had ‘dat’ instead of ’that’, but more recent editions have replaced this imitation-black-slang with ‘plain English’).”
In a pre-concert talk at 6.45pm, with a complimentary glass of wine or juice, Ian Pace will be in conversation with fellow pianist Kate Harrison-Ledger.
“We would like to discuss the Liszt and Gershwin transcriptions, and what they bring to the original compositions,” says Kate. “We will hopefully include a few anecdotes from Michael Finnissy, and, if time allows, invite questions from the audience.”
Tim Lowe and Katya Apekisheva, Unitarian Chapel, St Saviourgate, York, September 15
YORK Chamber Music Festival’s tenth anniversary season bounced into life with this lunchtime recital centred round Brahms’s First Cello Sonata. The remainder of the programme involved some Beethoven variations, a couple of Tchaikovsky bonbons and two Schumann movements originally intended for horn. But it was a pleasing taster nonetheless.
The first of Brahms’s two sonatas for cello and piano, in E minor, is a surprisingly mature work, given that it mostly dates from his late twenties and is his first chamber piece for two instruments.
Compared to most of his contemporaries he was a late developer. The first movement, in which the major key makes futile attempts to take over from the minor, relies heavily on the cello’s lower range. Here the balance between the players was, rarely in this recital, not quite right and a little more heft in the cello might have solved the problem. But there was no faulting Tim Lowe’s upper register, which sang with heartfelt joy.
There was a jaunty opening to the minuet and an engaging return to its resumption after the halting trio. Bach’s influence on the finale was plain to hear and the ebb and flow between the duo after the central unison was riveting, before a decidedly edgy coda.
Beethoven’s variations on Handel’s aria See, The Conquering Hero Comes – nowadays often sung as an Easter hymn – shows a remarkable affinity for the cello’s spectrum of colours, which Lowe amply demonstrated. As so often as an accompanist, Katya Apekisheva was quick to adapt her tone to the work’s chameleon moods.
Two Tchaikovsky pieces originally intended for piano solo revealed the composer’s talent for a long-breathed melody, particularly one in a minor key. He loved his C sharp minor Nocturne, Op 19 No 4 so much that he orchestrated it. Lowe was richly touching in the little cadenza at its heart. Even more soulful was the Valse Sentimentale (Op 51 No 6 in F minor) with its passionate undercurrents.
Schumann wrote his Adagio and Allegro, Op 70 for horn and piano but allowed a cellist friend to transcribe it. In this guise it sounds remarkably different. Lowe delivered a beautifully calm line in the Adagio, and the duo captured the Allegro’s rapture superbly, with its second theme ideally balanced by the piano, before full-blown excitement at its close.
Festival Strings, National Centre for Early Music, Walmgate, York, September 15
STRING quartets by Haydn and Mendelssohn preceded Richard Strauss’s Metamorphosen in its original form in this evening recital, which was the first at which all of the festival’s seven resident string players were present. Looked at another way, this was late Haydn, early Mendelssohn and late Strauss, a potent combination.
Jonathan Stone led the ensemble for Haydn’s Emperor quartet, Op 76 No 3 in C, backed by John Mills as second violin, Simone van der Giessen as viola and Jonathan Aasgaard as cello. There is always an element of hazard – part of the fun, if you like – when four independent souls, mainly used to solo work, link talents, particularly in a work by Haydn that requires the utmost precision.
That hazard is increased when they opt to play with very little vibrato, as here. That decision was odd given that this is a work of the late 1790s, with several toes, if not a whole foot, in the Romantic era. That may be the reason why this combo never quite settled.
Intonation was slightly awry in the nervous first movement and even the Emperor adagio (variations on Haydn’s hymn for the Kaiser, now the German national anthem) lacked real character, virtually vibrato-less.
The minuet was much more relaxed, even chirpy, with nice shading in its trio, but the finale was a touch too fast for its semiquavers to enjoy real clarity. The overall effect was intimate where we needed to hear more of Haydn’s heart on his sleeve.
Mills took over from Stone to lead Mendelssohn’s Second Quartet, Op 13 in A minor, with Hélène Clément as the new viola. Although only 30 years separate this piece from the Haydn, the players’ difference in approach was tangible.
Right from the start, there was a new commitment. After a rich opening Adagio, inner voices shone through commendably in the turbulent Allegro. After the slow movement’s central fugato, Mills’s little recitative to return to the opening was exquisite.
The central scherzo in the Intermezzo was light and delicate, returning to the movement’s opening with a delicate rallentando, before almost no break into the restless finale. Among so much incident here, the viola’s recall of the fugato theme was a pivotal moment, briefly changing the mood, before another outbreak of violence, stilled in its turn by the violin’s pacifying cadenza, supremely executed.
Thereafter, the recall of the very opening Adagio brought comfort and calm. It had been a passionate narrative, probably inspired by the teenage Mendelssohn’s unrequited infatuation at the time.
For nearly half a century, Strauss’s Metamorphosen was known only as a piece for 23 solo strings. Then the original version, for string septet with double bass foundation, came to light in 1990. It is writing of great intensity, which grew from a lament on the bombing of Munich in 1943.
The ensemble, led again by John Mills, brought great clarity to the score’s complex tapestry. From the dark opening on lower strings, its eventual emergence into major key territory brought a gradual quickening of rhythmic life, with all the players becoming as fervent as the ‘engine-room’ of violas.
When this had subsided back into grief, the cry of pain from the top three voices was answered by a vivid tutti, after which resignation slowly took over, with Strauss’s dotted figure assuming the characteristics of a recurring sob. It had seemed to subsume remorse, regret and elegy – for all mankind.
Katya Apekisheva: All-Schubert recital
Katya Apekisheva, Unitarian Chapel, St Saviourgate, York, September 16
KATYA Apekisheva is one of a very rare breed of pianists, one who is equally accomplished as a soloist and as a supportive player (otherwise known as an accompanist). She changed her originally published lunchtime programme into an all-Schubert recital, combining works written in the last year of his life, 1828.
Schubert’s Drei Klavierstücke (Three Piano Pieces), D.946, of May 1828 together equal the breadth of a full-scale sonata, although their keys are not related. They are better considered as impromptus, which implies sudden inspiration, even if they are all essentially in three parts.
Apekisheva took time to adjust her tone down to the size of the venue and began quite stridently, blurring the first statement in No 1 in E flat minor with over-pedalling, an oversight that she handsomely corrected on its repeat. Still, the central melody was too loud to be much of a contrast with the opening.
No 2 in E flat major enjoyed a more tender start, although it quickly boiled into something like anger when Apekisheva produced a trombone in the left hand where a gentler bassoon would have done the trick. Then we began to sense a Viennese flavour emerging at the move to the minor key, before a beautifully smooth transition back to the calm of the opening. This was more like it.
No 3 in C major was a real crackerjack, crisp and crunchy. The central trio was trimly smooth, right down to its stormy ending, and the syncopation in the returning scherzo injected exactly the wit we had been waiting for. She was back in the groove.
September 1828, a mere two months before Schubert’s death, saw him produce no less than three full-scale piano sonatas, which together may be said to crystallise his musical philosophy. The last of these, D.960 in B flat major, has a serenity largely missing from its two predecessors, which are more volatile. Apekisheva underlined this with some of her finest playing, growing more luminous with each movement.
Her opening was very spacious, a touch slower than is traditional, but right in keeping with the composer’s marking ‘Molto moderato’. The second theme was quicker, but its melodic flow was several times impeded by a little too much rubato. There was real nobility in the slow movement’s second melody, where the trombone returned, quite justifiably this time, to her left hand. But its overall mood was deeply ruminative, even doleful.
The scherzo was flickering and fairy-light, just what the doctor ordered, with fierce accents in its trio. Apekisheva’s contrasting moods throughout the finale were testimony to her deft touch, which enabled her to convey her ideas in the subtlest ways, tiny inflexions that reflected her intelligence.
By the end she had the sunlight bursting through the detached notes in the left hand, with the movement’s magical octave opening reduced to a pianissimo before the final burst of enthusiasm. This was Apekisheva at her radiant best.
Festival Strings and Piano, Sir Jack Lyons Concert Hall, University of York, September 16
THREE works written by English composers in the first two decades of the 20th century made an extremely satisfying combination on the festival’s second evening. Vaughan Williams’s rarely heard Piano Quintet was the centrepiece, framed by Bridge’s Three Idylls and Elgar’s Piano Quintet after the interval.
Bridge’s Three Idylls of 1906 come right out of the Edwardian playbook, those balmy years before Europe turned to war. They speak of a more Arcadian time infused with innocence. Bridge opens and closes the first, which is in C sharp minor, with a viola solo, the instrument reflecting his own professional career as a player.
Simone van der Giessen brought to it the dark colouring it demands. But with Jonathan Stone as leader the ensemble dissolved neatly into its quicker, major key section, before muting back into something calmer.
The Allegretto, No 2 in E minor, was notable for its springy rhythms, before breaking off into greater restraint. No 3 in C major, an Allegro con moto, has a catchy tune, with more than a sniff of Morris dancing; its snippets were jovially exchanged between the voices. The unexpected chorale that follows did not deter a snappy ending.
Vaughan Williams did not encourage, nor expect, his Piano Quintet in C minor (1903-5) to be played, regarding it as backward-looking. But his widow Ursula succumbed to pressure and allowed its performance only as recently as 1990. It reveals much about the composer’s early influences, as well as his likely direction of travel; we can now see it as a pivotal work, in other words.
The work is unusual in using a double bass and dispensing with a second violin. This give its bass line a firmer foundation and, with pizzicato, a more percussive impact. Its broad Brahmsian sweep at the start shows Vaughan Williams’s Romantic inclinations, before folk-song notions had grabbed his imagination. Even here, however, the second theme, with strings alone, begins to sound English and the use of the coda to give each player, including the double bass, a brief solo is a distinctive touch.
The chorale-like start to the Andante, heard in the piano and commented upon by the strings, was handled eloquently here before becoming more animated. On its return, the piano accompaniment sounded as if cribbed from his song Silent Noon, which was written the same year as this work was begun: a hazy, calming effect.
Strings and piano faced off against each other in the final Fantasia, but after Katya Apekisheva’s piano had furiously escaped the fray, they all came together in a staccato reconciliation, led by John Mills’s violin.
A wistful reminiscence, with pianistic bells tolling across the landscape, was followed by a grand build-up broken only by the piano’s return to the chorale and a quiet close that the ensemble controlled beautifully. It was hard to imagine a more revealing account of this superb work.
Elgar’s Piano Quintet in A minor of 1918, by contrast, was written in the wake of a searing war. Its hesitant introduction breaks into anger in its second theme, from which the ensemble, with Jonathan Stone back in the leader’s chair, did not recoil. The little three-note rhythm, a drumbeat of war, permeated the whole first movement, and the ensemble made the most of it, even in the deeply rueful ending.
The immense climax at the centre of the slow movement subsided as quickly as it arrived, and the extended coda resumed the telling harmonic stasis with which the movement had opened. The ensemble was unflaggingly insistent throughout Elgar’s heavily accented finale, building to a coda that was thrillingly optimistic.
Delta Saxophone Quartet: Martland, Soft Machine and new works on Saturday
WHO better than the Delta Saxophone Quartet to give York Late Music’s 2023-2024 concert season early momentum on Saturday?
A double celebration this weekend will mark not only 40 years of Late Music, but also the ruby anniversary of the Delta musicians, regular participants in the York series.
Saturday’s 7.30pm programme at the Unitarian Chapel, St Saviourgate, York, will be “typically Delta-eclectic”, featuring the music of Steve Martland, The Soft Machine and some new works.
Stuart O’Hara: Season-opening concert of English songs
The new series will begin on Friday at 1.30pm when bass singer Stuart O’Hara and pianist Marianna Cortesi take a tour through some of the finest English songs from the past decade: works by La Monte Young, Richard Rodney Bennett and Jonathan Harvey, complemented by world premieres of York composers’ settings of words by local poets.
On Friday evening, Late Music will pose the intriguing question: would you attend a concert where all the music was played twice? Would it help you appreciate the music more? Late Music wants to discover the answers in Ruth Lee’s innovative concert of music for harp and electronics. This one is a free/pay-what-you-like event. You could even choose to pay twice!
If your knowledge of accordion is limited to scene-setting via Hollywood movie conceptions of Paris – as sent up by American filmmaker Woody Allen in Everyone Says I Love You – Saturday’s lunchtime concert will put you right.
Franko Bozac: Never underestimate the accordion
Virtuoso Franko Bozac will showcase the reasons why this instrument should not be underestimated in his 1pm programme, featuring a collaboration between composer James Williamson and visual artist Romey T Brough, presented in tandem with Blossom Street Gallery, York.
November 4’s lunchtime concert will be a tribute to Dylan Thomas to mark the 70th anniversary of his death. Tenor Christopher Gorman and pianist David Pipe will present new settings of the Welshman’s poetry by composers Philip Grange, Sadie Harrison, Hayley Jenkins, David Lancaster and Rhian Samuel at 1pm.
In the evening, Beethoven will feature via Franz Liszt piano transcriptions, played by another Late Music favourite, Ian Pace. His 7.30pm programme will include Michael Finnissy’s Gershwin song transcriptions and Late Music concert administrator Steve Crowther’s Piano Sonata No. 4. Box office: latemusic.org.
Ruth Lee: Innovative concert of music for harp and electronics
