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So I’m in the lobby of the hotel waiting for the coach to the airport!
We’ve all had a fantastic trip here and really hope it all works out to return in 2009!!!!
The staff and volunteers of the Florida International Festival have been looking after us and everything has run so smoothly – so thanks to everyone!!!
The Pops concert last night was a great success – I think it was sold out to a capacity of around 7500 people!!!! I really enjoyed it and the audience were noisily appreciative! It was amazing to see Francois Xavier Roth conducting Star Wars with a huge red lightsaber having beaten Darth Vader in a baton fight!!!
Anyway this could be it for my blogging so hope you’ve enjoyed reading about the trip. I’m sure there will be more LSO blog action in future!!
Mozart!I thought that Robert and I did a great job of trying to persuade the audience that they would much rather hear Zemlinsky or Shostakovich-Alistair must have bribed them on the way in…To be honest I was quite happy to play any of the three quartets but the Zemlinsky quartet was my particular favourite.When Alistair introduced the Mozart quartet with the words “this is simply the finest piece of chamber music ever written” I felt that Robert and I should just concede defeat.Also Alistairs decision to speak last was obviously a tactical one!The Zemlinsky and Shostakovich quartets did get some support(thank you Sylvain!) but Mozart was the clear winner.I would love to do this sort of concert again-this was a bit of an experiment for us but I think it was a great success.
Last nights concert was our final concert at the Peabody auditorium.Tonight we move to the Ocean Centre down the road for an evening of fabulous film music.Thursday night saw the return of Yan Pascal Tortelier to the Florida International Festival.Maestro Tortelier has been coming to Daytona since 1999.It was a great programme with Barry Douglas making his Daytona debut performing Tchaikovsky Piano Concerto No 1.I hope that the audience enjoyed the Tchaikovsky as much as I did.The highlight of the evening(for me anyway) was Daphnis and Chloe Suite No 2.There is something very special about the way that Maestro Tortelier approaches French music.It always seems to me to be beautifully balanced.Gareth Davies exquisite flute playing left us all breathless.Surely this piece must have been written just for him.
Francois-Xavier Roth conducted last nights all Beethoven concert.Beethoven Symphony No 9 was the perfect end to our series of classical concerts at the Peabody auditorium.We have played a lot of Beethoven this year with Bernard Haitink and Sir Colin Davis but I really enjoyed Francois approach.This was the first time that we had performed Beethoven with Francois and his energy is infectious.He is such an exciting conductor and I am really looking forward to many more concerts with him.So its on to the Ocean Centre for something completely different but it promises to be just as enjoyable!
So a summary of the story goes something like this – The cows and chickens write letters to Farmer Brown requesting electric blankets (2-5-2 models of course!). He doesn’t comply with the request and the animals go on strike meaning Bryn (LSO Harpist) doesn’t get his milk, and I don’t get my eggs!!! I was very proud to have a very intellectual quote on the front page of the Daytona News journal -”Where’s my omlete” puffed LSO bassist Tom Goodman!
Then the musicians go on strike! Chuck the duck sorts everything out and eventually 2-5-2 model diving boards and electric blankets are given to the animals and they start laying eggs etc, I get my omlete and everyone is happy.
This is a sumary of an LSO concert for young children called Sound Explorers. The highly esteemed music animateur – Rachel Leach wrote some wonderful music and songs for a quintet of French Horn (Jonathan Lipton), Harp (Bryn Lewis), Violin (Sarah Quinn and Belinda Mcfarlane), Clarinet (Chi yu Mo) and Double Bass (Tom Goodman). We have all done over 45 performanes in London of this particular story during which we introduce our instruments to the children, play songs which they sing along too and tell them a story.
I have to say the kids absolutely love it and so do the parents!! Rachel has such a fantastic manner everyone gets totally involved in the songs and story. We did three performances of this particular story and another group of musicians are currently doing a different story so if you want to try and catch it – Fri 27th July 3 p.m. – Ormond Museum of Arts, Sat 28th July 11 a.m. Museum of Florida Arts.
There is a storm here almost every afternoon-I know that this is not particularly interesting but I just needed an excuse to mention lightning.Many thanks to all my friends who alerted me to my spelling mistakes!I cannot spell at the best of times but I was very tired and emotional…..well that is my excuse anyway.
It is hard to believe that the first three LSO concerts have already been and gone.I particularly enjoyed saturday nights concert, conducted by Marin Alsop.The first half was a world premiere of an arrangement of the Symphonic Dances from West Side Story.Evelyn Glennie was the soloist in the arrangement by Craig Leon for solo percussion and ensemble.I was not involved in the piece but I did get a chance to listen from backstage and I thought it sounded wonderful.The concert was an all American affair and Appalchian Spring by Copland was the perfect start to the second half.However the highlight of the evening for me was Gershwins Rhapsody in Blue.The soloist was Simon Trpceski and he thrilled the audience and the orchestra with his stunning playing.Chi Yu Mo dazzled us all with his superb clarinet solos.
Last nights concert was something completely different and Daniel Harding made his Florida International Festival debut.Carmine Lauri and Tim Hugh thrilled us with their performance of Brahms Double Concerto.Simply stunning!The programme also included Berlioz Symphonie Fantastique which we performed in Japan,China,Taiwan,Malaysia and Spain with Daniel Harding earlier this year.You can read all about it in the far east blog.
The orchestra has a day off today!There are lots of different things to do here and I imagine that many people will spend the day sky-diving,Harley riding or getting involved in other life threatening activities.Or you can just spend the day by the pool or on the golf course.Sadly I have to rehearse for a quartet concert tomorrow night.I may be turning into a workaholic….The other members of the Vuillaume Quartet are Tom Norris,Robert Turner and Alistair Blayden.Tom came up with the idea for this particular concert-the audience gets to decide which work is performed!We are each going to present a quartet,play some extracts from each one and then have a vote.The audience will not know in advance which quartets are being presented.I hope that this does not all go horribly wrong-I really want to play the quartet that I am presenting and I may sulk if it does not get selected!We are unsure about the voting process-this is Florida after all.I am sure that they will demand a recount.It is a shame that the concert only lasts an hour or we could have organised a eurovision style voting ceremony.Another time maybe?Watch this space to see which quartet wins!
Fork Lightening is slicing through the sky on the afternoon of our second day here at the Florida International Festival in Daytona Beach.I hope that we have not brought the great British summer with us!We arrived here on wednesday night after an eventful days travel.The words “Virgin Airlines welcomes the London Sympathy Orchestra” greeted us at our check in desk at Gatwick airport-I wondered if this was a good start to the day.However after a two hour delay we were bound for Orlando.It was all going terribly well until we were greeted upon landing by some spectacular thunder and lightening.This put the baggage ramp out of action so we sat around at baggage reclaim for what seemed like an eternity.Thank heavens Tom Norris had an emergency bag of minstrels in his hand luggage-things may have turned ugly!
The orchestra has been on tour so much this year that it is a real luxury to stay in the same place for twelve days.I packed in such a hurry-I was interested to see what on earth was going to come out of my suitcase.Probably the right shoe of one pair of shoes and the left shoe of another……….
The first LSO concert takes place tonight so we are all looking forward to that.Marin Alsop is conducting Stravinsky Firebird Suite and Rimsky-Korsakov Scheherazade.Carmine Lauris solos sound absolutely beautiful.Nicolaj Znaider is performing the Mendelssohn violin concerto so it promises to be a wonderful concert.He is one of my favourite violinists so I am particularly looking forward it.
However the first concert LSO mini concert took place last night involving none other than my good self!A great way to beat jet-lag is to organise a stressful concert on the day after you arrive.There is simply no time to think about feeling tired!Gareth Davies,Malcolm Johnston,Rebecca Gilliver,Neil Percy and John Alley were the other players involved and it was a concert featuring music from the Bitish Isles.Gareth also did all the arrangements and I thought that they sounded wonderful.Is there no end to his talents?The concert took place at the Elizabeth Hall at Stetson University which has the most beautiful acoustic.This was however a concert with a difference-we were also reading poems from England,Ireland Scotland and Wales!!Although we perform on stage nearly every day the thought of standing up in front of a hall full of people filled me with absolute horror and I was not the only one.Backstage before the concert began, we were all wandering around reciting poetry.It was all very strange.John Alley had us all in stitches as his impressions of famous actors became more and more ridicuolus.He does a great Lawrence Olivier by the way.
So we agreed that we all just had to go for it and after Malcolms brilliant rendition of “Coming thro’ the Rye” the standard was set.Gareth also read in Welsh and I read in Irish which is something that I have not done for such a long time.I have started to feel quite homesick!Neil Percy excelled on the bodhran-he would not be out of place in any Irish pub.I may be biased but I thought that it was a fantatstic concert and we were all thrilled with the immediate standing ovation at the end.Well deserved I thought!
So the first morning in Daytona started early. The jet lag to the U.S. always results in waking very early as it is five hours behind. I opened my curtains for the first look out of my room in daylight. There was a fantastic view of the pool 7 floors below, the beach and the sea trailing off over the horizon. The sun was still low in the sky and I opened the balcony door and felt a blast of heat and humidity- Now I remembered what it was like in Daytona!!! All I wanted to do at that moment was jump into the pool, but I had a busy day ahead of me so it would have to wait until later.
Sarah Quinn, Chi Mo and myself were picked up at the hotel at 9.15 by Sylvia – one of the helpful administrators of the Florida International Festival. We were taken to the Peabody Auditorium to pick up our instruments. Sarah and I were then taken to the venue of our “LSO On Call” visit – a retirement home about 20 mins drive away.
Dorothy Jane was the lady we were visiting. She had won a competition to have a visit from some LSO players as she was unable to come to a concert due to her age and arthritic condition. We arrived and were shown to the dining area and started setting up our stands and and unpacking our instruments. More residents started arriving and sitting down for our performance. We were only really expecting to play to Dorothy- Jane and a few of her friends, however in the end were had to entertain approximately 50 residents! It was a little more than we had bargained for but we really felt at home when we met Dorothy. She was a fantastic 81 year old lady who had an Masters in music education and she really let us know how much she appreciated us coming to play to them.
So we introduced ourselves and each played a short solo piece. The other pieces were a good variety of duos we had either arranged or tracked down that had been written for the Violin/Bass duo combination – There are not that many written so it took a lot of work to find enough material for an hour long concert. We introduced each piece and told a few anecdotes as we went along. Before we played Pizzicato Polka for instance, Sarah told a very funny story about a time she had played that piece in concert and her bow had fallen apart! Tee Hee!
We left time at the end to ask the residents if they had any questions for us. There was only one so we rounded things up with a favorite of ours – Bare Necessaties from the Jungle Book! Everyone seemed to really enjoy it, including the staff so we were pleased that all our hours of preparation was worth it!!!
They had made an amazing cake with an iced ViolBass and welome LSO on top so we had a big piece and a drink and headed back to the hotel for lunch.
Coming soon …
Look out for a new blog from the LSO’s residency at the Florida International Festival in Daytona Beach, USA. The Orchestra arrives in Daytona on 19 July 2007.
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