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Owen Leech in Blackheath Blackheath Sundays have got underway late this autumn, because of ongoing major refurbishment at the Halls. They are scheduled fortnightly (see further programmes below). Owen Leech's third commission for the Schubert Ensemble had its London premiere, bookended less than ideally by Schumann's piano quartet and Schubert's ticket-selling Trout Quintet, presumably programmed by the requirements of the promoters for what looked, on paper, an inviting programme. Leech's nine-minute single movement Into the ring of dancing shadows (2005), in response to a Mandelstam poem, is described in his programme note (written before its composition, he told us!) as 'a free mosaic to celebrate the spring'. In a morning of confessional anecdotes we were told, further, that Owen Leech got his first of those commissions when he was an assigned turner-overer for the Ensemble's CD recordings (unsung heroes, indispensable for pianists) after he shyly mentioned that he writes music too! It is an interesting piece which will have made no enemies for modern music, its ideas born of improvisation at the piano, with 'turning' motifs and dancing rhythms. Peter Bucocke's double-bass was intrinsic to the rich textures, and other bassists should invite their colleagues to slip it in for variety when engaged to play their nth Trout. The Schumann Quartet is still hanging in the Canon; not my favourite by a favourite composer, and it failed to 'speak' to me today. The Trout played its perennial magic, not only on account of the Theatre of Wine's Colosia Oloroso in the interval sherry tasting which had given us a first opportunity to admire the Great Hall's shining new floor. Simon Blendis and William Howard duetted, sharing the brunt of the work's demands, supported by Jane Salmon, expressive but not self-indulgent in her variation, and Douglas Paterson on viola (the players were unnamed in the improved Blackheath Halls programme book). Two images of the morning worth mention: an appreciative and clearly very musical young man with Downs syndrome, who probably knew the Trout as well as any of us, provided a visual counterpoint to the music, conducting along enthusiastically and in perfect rhythm, with occasional vocal comment, probably to the irritation of those near him; but tolerance and incluiveness prevailed, to everyone's credit. And I enjoyed the restful experience of trying to see the players silhouetted against the morning sun breaking through the scaffolding outside the windows. Those are memories that endure....
http://www.blackheathhalls.com/events.php?SID=1653bed0836c86bca0d2469a4b6bab72&count=20
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