News – July 2016

Over the next few months the English Piano Trio will be concentrating on the Russian masters. We continue to perform single composer recitals at The Lantern in Colston Hall, Bristol, and these evenings are presented with well known music journalist Stephen Johnson. Stephen has worked extensively with the BBC and is a familiar voice on Radio 3.  The Russian composers in this next season at Colston Hall are Tchaikovsky, Rimsky Korsakov, Shostakovich and Rachmaninov.  At concerts around the UK these works will be juxtaposed with masterpieces from the Viennese era.  It is challenging to perform the big romantic pieces, and yet wonderful to put them alongside the earlier Viennese composers.

At the beginning of a new season I like to look back and decide what concert/ or particular piece gave me remains most in my memory from the previous twelve months.  Surprisingly the concert was a charity event at St Alfeges in Greenwich, early in 2016.  Maybe it was because there had been so work put into it by the administrators for the local homeless charity the ‘999 club’, and also the amazing people who run this enterprise.  However, the atmosphere was unlike that of a more conventional concert.  The audience had a commitment to the cause, and perhaps many were not regular concert goers. It was a thoroughly inspiring event with a feeling of community.  It is a privilege to be able to fund raise by performing. Sadly it is not always possible with financial implications, but if the organisers can find a sponsor for the performers, it makes a great evening.

And the favourite piece for last season – surprisingly it was with the addition of a viola! Mahler’s piano quartet movement in A minor. If you do not know it, do listen and think of adding it to a concert programme!

We look forward to this 2016/17 season.

WORDS and MUSIC

WORDS and MUSIC

with narrators:

evans-ravenscroft

CHRISTOPHER RAVENSCROFT
D.I. Mike Burdenin ‘Ruth Rendell Mysteries’

SERENA EVANS
Sergeant Patricia Dawkins in the sitcom ‘Thin Blue Line’

In these two programmes, readings are woven around music by the composers and their contemporaries.

MOZART
MAN & MUSIC

THE SCHUMANNS
TURBULENCE & FRIENDSHIPS

 mozschu

The English Piano Trio presents two new contrasting ‘Words and Music’ programmes for their next season.

MOZART – MAN & MUSIC

Mozart composed six magnificent piano trios. He also wrote letters to family, friends and colleagues. Thses letters are not only accounts of his work and travels, but also a revelation of an inner world of his joys, worries and emotions. They portray his humour and wit, and make compulsive reading and listening. These readings are woven around movements from the trios.

This script is narrated by Christopher Ravenscroft

THE SCHUMANNS – TURBULENCE & FRIENDSHIPS

Robert Schumann’s emotionally turbulent life is unusually well-documented, not least because both he and his wife Clara kept diaries. The revealing and entertaining entries provide an insight into his music, his psychology, his friendships with Mendelssohn, Wagner, Liszt and Brahms, and of course his marriage to Clara, mother of their many children, as well as one of the greatest pianists of her age. The muisc is from works by both Robert and Clara Schumann, Brahms and Mendelssohn.

This script is narrated by Christopher Ravenscroft and Serena Evans

Christopher Ravenscroft first became a household name co starring in Ruth Rendell’s ‘Inspector Wexford’ series. He worked regularly with the RSC playing parts as diverse as Buckingham in Richard III, Antonio in the Merchant of Venice, Banquo in Macbeth and Cassius in Julius Caesar. His film appearances include Montjoy in Kenneth Branagh’s Henry V.

Serena Evans concluded a hugely successful West End run in 2014 with Angela Lansbury. Familiar to TV audiences, she is best known for her starring role with Rowan Atkinson in the series ‘Thin Blue Line’.

Contact details: Elizabeth James (manager), Victoria House, The Green, Sarratt. Hertfordshire, UK WD3 6AY Tel: +44 (0) 1923 265066

E-mail:info@englishpianotrio.co.uk