Song at Blackheath Halls

4 March 2013

A very pleasant lunchtime concert, well designed for the venue and its audience, with the two young singers suitably dressed for an informal lunchtime occasion.

The original texts were supplied, which was most helpful for the Debussy and Delibes items. Marianne Wright in green had a voice on the small side, but her articulation was excellent and her gestures appropriate - she might have needing to husband her voice because of a cold, as she had to repeatedly pick up her glass of water from underneath the piano.

Phillipa Thomas in red had a stronger presence and put over the Falla popular songs with flair. The two of them enjoyed duetting in Saint-Saens and joined in a tour of force for the melodious Lakmé favourite; timely, as the whole opera was on Sky Arts 2 that week, and turned out to be better than I'd anticipated.

The two sympathetic pianists swapped places and page-turned for each other which helped the atmosphere.

Peter Grahame Woolf

Badkes at Blackheath

Recital Room

18 February 2013

In 2011 Tom Butler's 75th birthday was marked by a specially commissioned celebratory piano quintet at St Olave's in the City, and the following year the Badke Quartet appeared there and included the Britten No. 3 to mark Butler's retirement as curator of the successful series of lunchtime concerts he'd curated there. He handed them over as a thriving concern to Michael Gammie [R], who was at Blackheath today, if you follow me...

This year he brought to Blackheath the renowned Badke Quartet for another extraordinarily moving account of the third and last of Britten's string quartets, its composition completed at Venice and evoking the opera Death in Venice.

This performance was especially remarkable given that the violinists Lana Trotovšek and Emma Parker were replaced for this occasion by Charlotte Scott (of the Piattis) and Helena Nicholls - photographed above L with violist Jon Thorne receiving Tom Butler's appreciation; their cohesion was so perfect that you'd never have guessed. Cellist Jonathan Byers, who announced the Britten quartet helpfully, is with them in the other image (photography allowed upstairs !) which gives a glimpse of the newly restored Recital Room's improved look.

The Recital Room was packed and afterwards Tom Butler's generosity extended to a magnificent snacks and drinks buffet for everyone. An occasion to remember.

Peter GrahameWoolf