This post is one in a sequence which lists (mostly) live music I have heard, as best as memory allows. I write to have a record of my musical experiences and these entries are intended as postcards from me to my future self. All opinions are personal, although music historians from the 25th Century may find some of them of interest.

Other posts in this collection can be found here. The most recent prior post in this sequence is here.

• Kasparas Mikužis in his debut recital at Wigmore Hall, London, on Wednesday 4 December 2024. The program:
  • Rameau: Suite in G
  • Rachmaninoff: Sonata No 1 in D minor, Op. 28

  This was an outstanding mid-day recital on the Wigmore’s Steinway piano, to a hall about two-thirds full. Mr Mikužis played one encore, a short prelude by his fellow Lithuanian Mikalojus Čiurlionis. It is charming that Mr Mikužis so often plays the music of Čiurlionis, drawing our attention to this fine composer.

  I only heard the Rachmaninoff first Sonata for the first time a few weeks ago (played by Professor Dmitri Alexeev), and I was delighted to hear it again so soon. The work is intellectually and emotionally very challenging, with a great symphony’s worth of ideas, lines of development, moods, techniques, and effects. Mr Mikužis rose superbly to its many challenges and presented a powerful and coherent reading of this masterpiece.

  How immensely different this performance was to that other Opus 28 I have Mr Mikužis play several times this past year, Chopin’s collection of 24 Preludes. Chopin’s theme in that set was death and its presentiment, and Rachmaninoff’s here (at least initially) was the legend of Faust, a story which is also about death and how one should live one’s life in face of it. I wonder where this deep thread will take Mr Mikužis next!

• Krius String Quartet to an audience of about 50 people in St Bride’s Church, Fleet Street, London on Friday 22 November 2024. The quartet comprises Alfie Weinberg (v), Louis Solon (v), Theo Hayward (va), and Frederick Carter (c), all students at the Royal Academy. The programme was:
  • Haydn: String Quartet, Op. 54 No. 2
  • Puccini: Crisantemi

  This was another very fine performance by this young quartet, sounding more confident and assured than they did just a few weeks ago at St Marylebone Church. For the audience, and perhaps also the performers, the acoustic of St Bride’s is far better than at St Marylebone (where the sound seemed to disappear upwards). As in the previous concert, the descant melody over the sombre chords of the second movement of the Haydn quartet was profoundly moving.

  This concert was a wonderful experience, and I look forward eagerly to hearing Krius play again. Their lightness of touch and tight co-ordination would make them ideal performers for the quartets of Cherubini and Arriaga.

• Harp Chamber Music, by students from the Royal Academy of Music, at Regent Hall, London, Friday 15 November 2024. The programme was:
  • 1. Debussy (arranged Henk de Vlieger): Prelude a l’apres-midi d’un faune
  • 2. Christopher Gunning (1944-2023): Lament
  • 3. Britten: Folk Songs for High Voice
  • 4. Andre Jolivet (1905-1974): Chant de Linos

  Continue reading ‘Concert Concat 2024’