Ten years of At Lunch - from the stage

In celebration of the tenth anniversary of our At Lunch concert series, we asked some of our players to share their favourite memories from the last decade of lunchtime concerts...

Joy Farrall (Principal Clarinet):

"There is real excitement in opening a brand new piece of music once a year (if not twice on occasion), knowing it is a piece written especially for your orchestra and your colleagues by an amazing establishment figure or up-and-coming young genius, and for that privilege to have been on-going for ten years is a total delight."

Clare Finnimore (Principal Viola):

"In Norwich there's always a fabulous keen and supportive audience. We can really feel that they're with us every step of the way- they're especially open and receptive to the new music. 

With the BBC broadcasts often being taken from Cambridge's West Road Concert Hall there is always an 'edge' to these lunchtime performances in more ways that one. I'll always remember the bitter cold at the beginning of the rehearsal and the howling gale coming in through the back door with the BBC wires! It's always lovely chatting to audience members here afterwards, then going to Burwash Manor Barns for tea and cake.

Wigmore Hall is such a special place holding many memories for each one of us. With the pressure of the live broadcast behind us it's great to wallow in this perfect acoustic!" 

Huw Watkins (Principal Piano):

"It's been a huge privilege to launch so many new pieces in the last 10 years of At Lunch. I'm particularly proud to have written one of the very first of these commissions in 2006, Dream, for violin, clarinet and piano. Not only was this a remarkable experience musically (working with Joy Farrall and Alina Ibragimova, who joined us for this tour) - we also took the programme to Kraków, where the food was unforgettable!"

Alina Ibragimova, Joy Farrall, Michael Zev Gordon (whose music also featured in this programme),
and David Butcher (Chief Executive) on tour in Kraków.

Miranda Dale (Principal Second Violin):

"Perhaps most of our interesting experiences have been played out before Norwich concerts, including the time when we turned up in a taxi to play at the Assembly Rooms and Jackie realised that she had left her violin on the train! On hair-tailing back in said taxi and feverishly searching the train, which luckily had not started it's return journey, she even more luckily spotted a cleaner walking down the platform with her violin on the trolley! Not much rehearsal was had before that concert, just tea and scones required!

The other famed Norwich incident was when it started snowing just after our train started out from Liverpool Street station in London - it snowed so hard and fast that our train could not cope and we limped towards Norwich having to disembark at Ipswich in order to wait on the freezing platform for another train. Phone calls were feverishly made to and fro to our colleagues and concert manager who had driven there from nearer by and as the time ticked quickly by and the concert should have started we were still on the train! Joy and David valiantly saved the day (Norwich audience as ever game) by having a pre-concert talk (only during concert time!) whilst we scrambled to the Assembly House. I seem to remember Caroline running onto the stage from the taxi and joining Huw in her stocking feet to play a sonata with him followed by our commission before jumping back in a taxi to catch our return train!"

Thomas Gould (Associate Leader):

“At Britten Sinfonia we often say that a chamber music mentality is at the core of everything we do, and the At Lunch series provides us with the chance to put our money where our mouths are! As well as providing an opportunity to interpret chamber masterworks, each programme also features a world premiere composition. We've been privileged to work with composers such as Joey Roukens, Enrico Chapela, Dobrinka Tabakova, Charlie Piper, Nico Muhly and Jay Greenberg (to name but a few) over recent years, and it has been wonderful to see their careers flourish. A particular highlight for me was the At Lunch programme that featured Argentinian bandoneonist Marcelo Nisinman in music by his compatriot Astor Piazzolla. We had a lot of fun letting our hair down and undoing a few buttons for that one!"


Don't miss At Lunch Three, featuring music for the unusual combination of flute, viola and harp by Debussy, Takemitsu and a new work by Icelandic composer Daníel Bjarnason - Norwich Fri 19 Feb, Cambridge Tue 23 Feb & London Wed 24 Feb. More information and booking.

Find out more about Ten Years of At Lunch.

Meet Joy Farrall

Joy has been Britten Sinfonia's Principal Clarinet since the orchestra was founded. She is also a founding member of the Haffner Wind Ensemble, with whom she has broadcast and toured widely. As a recitalist and concerto soloist Joy has appeared in all the major London concert venues, playing with such orchestras as the Philharmonia, the English Chamber Orchestra, the Ulster Orchestra, the London Mozart Players, City of London Sinfonia and Britten Sinfonia.

In this blog post Joy discusses various highlights of her musical career so far (as well as the odd embarrassing moment), her favourite pastimes and superpower of choice.


What has been the highlight of your career so far?
Every concert really as I am delighted that Britten Sinfonia, which has become my musical home, has so many dates in the diary. I feel lucky to be employed to do what I do.

When are you happiest?
When I have time to reflect after a busy but exciting patch of work.
 
What is your greatest fear?
Roller-coasters!

What is your earliest musical memory?
Listening to ice skating music whilst my parents practised their ice dance. Torville and Dean they were not, but the music was great.

Which living person do you most admire, and why?
Numerous colleagues who find time to give their all to their families and students despite the demands of a rigorous performing career.

What was your most embarrassing moment?
Going on stage in Spain to perform a concerto and tripping on the lovely (but totally impractical, and warned against) pair of new purple shoes bought especially for the occasion.

What is your most treasured possession?
I am not really a collector of things!

What would your superpower be?
To appear and reappear through a Harry Potter style port key so as to cut out travelling to and from concerts.

If you were an animal what would you be?
A dog for the deaf and blind. A worthy job to do but plenty of lolling around with guaranteed friendship, food and affection.

What is your most unappealing habit?
Behaving like the world is about to end if I haven't got a reed to play.

What is your favourite book?
Any historical novels.

What is your guiltiest pleasure?
Blue cheese and biscuits and a glass of champagne.

Who would you invite to your dream dinner party?
A jolly good cook as I am hopeless at anything other than the basics.

If you could go back in time, where would you go?
Back to my college days with all the knowledge I have now.

How do you relax away from the concert platform?
Seeing family and friends, playing tennis and being outdoors walking or in the garden.

What do you consider your greatest achievement?
Getting this far!

What is the most important lesson life has taught you?
Forgiveness... I can try to play better in the next concert.

In a nutshell, what is your philosophy?
Concentration and focus is the key to understanding.

Listen to Joy...

Live: Joy is appearing in Britten Sinfonia's TAKE TWO: Oliver Knussen in Focus One performance on Sunday 25 October at London's Milton Court Concert Hall. The programme is centred on the orchestra's wind players and features Berg's Chamber Concerto for piano and violin and Oliver Knussen's Requiem - Songs for Sue. Click here for more info.

On Spotify: Listen to Britten Sinfonia's 'Discover: Knussen wind players' Spotify playlist of recordings from the wind players performing in Britten Sinfonia's TAKE TWO: Oliver Knussen in Focus One programme (including Joy), and the works featured in this concert.

On the radio: Britten Sinfonia's At Lunch 1 concert from the 2014-15 season - featuring music for wind quintet - will be broadcast by BBC Radio 3 at 1pm on Friday 16 October. Tune in live or listen again online here.

P-bones and Stravinsky

Britten Sinfonia and Norfolk Music Hub’s Wider Opportunities Celebration Day 

Wednesday 8 July 2015

“I didn’t like to ask in front of the children but, what on earth is a ‘P-bone’?”  

It is early on a bright, Norfolk Wednesday morning and St Andrew’s hall, rescued some 550 years ago from the destructive orders of Henry VIII, is decked out from stage to wall in a sea of stack-able chairs in the monarch’s favourite crimson. These are carefully and laboriously divided into sections each of which is identified with colourful laminated signs:

“Reserved for violins x 60”

“Cellos x 10 (plus some violas)”

“Clarinets x 68”

“P-bones x 60”

This is Britten Sinfonia’s Wider Opportunities Music Celebration Day fuelled by the unflagging good cheer and excellent organisation (and funding) of the Norfolk Music Hub. It is the lull before the storm as we are expecting 60 ukuleles, 15 flutes and 30 xylophones and miscellaneous brass in staggering numbers to join those already marked out to make up a total of just over 300 primary school children and their teachers. They will join 11 of Britten Sinfonia’s musicians for a celebration of instrumental learning. Today we’ll play, sing, compose and perform together under the creative guidance of workshop leader and composer Fraser Trainer.

Britten Sinfonia’s leader Jackie Shave is mustering her troops before the children arrive. In addition to playing alongside the young musicians, Britten Sinfonia have prepared a special performance, a little taster of where they might one day be if they continue the hard work they’ve been putting in at their instruments. “Remember”, she reminds fellow strings Miranda Dale, Kate Musker and Billy Cole, wind players David Cuthbert and Joy Farrall, brassers Alex Wide, Tom Rainer and Chris Smith, pianist Simon  Lane and percussionist Jeremy Cornes, “make everything big, do what you are doing but even more so. We’re playing for children remember and this should be the most exciting thing they’ve ever heard or seen.”

She might have been describing the whole day which is big and more so! The children arrive, colour co-ordinated armies, musical weaponry in hand, under arm, or casually slung across a shoulder. Positions are jostled for, a ukulele tumbles to the floor and a violin loses a string. Fraser wields a microphone over the cacophony of noodling and hissing “shushes” from vigilant teachers. He begins to sing, a call and then, a breathless moment of sudden quiet before the sweetness and power of 300 young voices raised in melodic response and the day has begun.

The end of project sharing is indeed celebratory, and one of the highlights for everyone is the chance to put down their instruments and perch at the edges of their seats for Britten Sinfonia’s performance. Anyone familiar with the orchestra’s concerts will know that one of the highlights is the compelling physicality of Jackie and her colleagues’ performances. Today is no different and three hundred young faces light up when the first notes of Stravinsky’s Ragtime ring jauntily out through the hall. The final drum beat is met with spontaneous whoops of appreciation and much bouncing in seats. Even the most seasoned of the professionals on stage cannot help but crack a smile at such genuine enthusiasm.

Afterwards the musicians - older and young - cluster in groups to exclaim over new instruments they’ve not seen before, ask questions “how do you make that sound?” or make suggestions “you should play loud all the time”. The relative merits of one instrument’s tone over another’s and Stravinsky’s compositional technique compared to the day’s other creative ventures are discussed in depth. The gaps in ages and experience melt away simply leaving 311 musicians sharing their art.

At the centre of one group, our question is answered: A ‘P-bone’, it is loudly explained, “… is like a trombone, only cooler, way cooler, ‘cos you see, get this right, you can get all different colours! Mine plays the best because it’s blue. The blue ones are the best and I can play really loud! Listen to this …” He waves his instrument enthusiastically, narrowly missing the opportunity to decapitate a classmate. “Nah don’t worry” he says soothingly when we gasp at his willful disregard of the fragility of a musical instrument handled with such enthusiasm, “its plastic, right, so we can’t smash it, see.” He thumps the bell as though greeting an old friend. P-bone – plastic trombone – but clearly here is the next generation of brass player through and through! 

Jen House

Creative Learning Director

Find out more about our Creative Learning team and their work here.

Sinfonia Students review - At Lunch 1

Sinfonia Students Carl and Simone share their perspectives on our At Lunch 1 programme (in rehearsal and in concert), performed in West Road Concert Hall, Cambridge, on Tuesday 2 December 2014.

Britten Sinfonia Wind Quintet At Lunch: A behind the scenes experience

I enjoy the concert experience - sitting down and watching one or more musicians perform with polish and flair. It is well known that performers spend enormous amounts of time in the practice room, yet the audience will never know any of that build up; a concept conveyed perfectly by this picture of an iceberg. As a performer myself, I have always been intrigued with knowing what went on before the concert. How do professional musicians prepare their performances?

I recently had a rare opportunity to listen in on a pre-concert rehearsal by the Britten Sinfonia wind quintet. Sitting very quietly in the top seats of the West Road Concert Hall, I listened for an hour.

The first thing to strike me was the different seating formation of the quintet. Compared to a string quartet, wind quintets allow more flexibility in regards to where the players sit. In my own experience, the following arrangement was common: (from left to right) flute, oboe, bassoon, horn, clarinet. The Britten Sinfonia players sat: bassoon, clarinet, flute, oboe, horn. Never experiencing such a formation, I was unsure how effective the overall sound would be. I was quickly won over. The bassoon and horn created a ‘surround sound’ bass line coming from left and right, of which the block of three treble instruments projected over the top. By the time the sound reached the audience, it was a perfect blend.

The quintet members did not rehearse every single piece from beginning to end - which I assume was simply not necessary, and they wanted to preserve energy for the concert. Their playing was interspersed with lively, humorous chatter and old stories of concert disasters. The group was clearly more than just five musicians performing a quintet recital; they seemed genuine friends. The issue of leadership in chamber music can often be a challenge, however the members all took turns at directing the flow of the rehearsal.

The four recurring focuses of their repertoire during the rehearsal were: communication (particularly who was showing the beat and leading in the other players), tuning chords, keeping a consistent tempo, and negotiating more effective places to breathe. As a student, it is reassuring to know that professional musicians also have to continue developing these challenging areas of chamber music.

My ‘behind the scenes’ experience ended as I quietly exited the rehearsal while the quintet had a break between pieces. I began to wonder how hearing the rehearsal would affect my experience of the concert. Though, as soon as the quintet sat down to perform, the events of the rehearsal moved to the back of my mind and I was overtaken by the wonderful blend of timbres. 

Simone Maurer (Sinfonia Student 2014-15)

Spectacular Jones, Graceful Nielsen

The wind quintet comprised from leading members of the Britten Sinfonia dazzled Cambridge with its virtuosity and musicianship, in bringing to life three contemporary works, and one more staple piece of repertoire.

Berkeley’s Re-Inventions and Seeger’s Suite for wind quintet were both lively, with the former offering a contemplative approach to the well known Bach repertoire, and Seeger’s exciting work showing the full breadth of wind quintet capabilities.

However, the lunchtime concert really came to life with the OPUS2014 winner, Patrick John Jones’s Uncanny Vale, a new work for wind quintet, which explored harmonic and timbral possibilities in a pioneering way. Creating a strange, eerie atmosphere, the work was altogether more expressive than Berkeley or Seeger, and really captured the audience’s imagination, exploring ideas of fantasy and the mind.

Nielsen’s famed wind quintet is a more familiar work in this size of ensemble, and offered the composer’s unique sonority and handling of tonality. The players from Britten Sinfonia worked well to produce a clean sound, resulting in a poised, elegant but nonetheless vivacious account of the Danish composer’s great work.

Carl Wikeley (Sinfonia Student 2014-15)

2014-15 Britten Sinfonia Academy so far...

Our 2014-15 Britten Sinfonia Academy members have been meeting since September for workshops, courses and performances. Clarinetist, Morgan tells us what he's been up to during his first three months as a Britten Sinfonia Academy member;

I was very excited (but admittedly a little nervous) to be accepted as a member of the Britten Sinfonia Academy as I had never been in a regional orchestra before and I really had no idea what to expect. However, from the moment I first met Natalie, Mateja and (later) Emily, I knew I would have no problems at all!

I really enjoyed our induction day in September, when  I got the chance to meet the other members of the Academy, as well as some of the members of Britten Sinfonia itself. As I play clarinet, I particularly got to know Joy, one of the clarinettists in the main orchestra, who offered me help and encouragement which has improved my playing.  I especially enjoyed the improvisational exercises, including a Japanese compositional technique called shōgi. We sat in a circle and each of us came up with a musical idea and then began playing it. Up to five musicians were playing at a time - as one came in, one dropped out, and as the music continued round the circle, a very interesting and very strange piece of music builds up! Versions of The Rite of Spring and different technical exercises were interspersed with London Bridge and my quickly-made-up attempt at a prepared piano. People also used a variety of small percussion and their own bodies to create some interesting patterns - it was imaginative, to say the least. A particular highlight was Joy and her more-than-persistent spoken contribution ("Hey, you guys...") in a variety of styles.

Our first weekend course comprised a heady mix of new and old - Now, that we all knew each other - we concentrated on learning to play together as an ensemble. We covered Mozart's Idomeneo, Debussy's Prélude à l'après-midi d'un faune, Kabalevsky's The Comedians and Finnissey's Plain Harmony, with the afternoons dedicated to chamber music including Ravel's Mother Goose suite. All of these pieces allowed each of the sections of the ensemble their own moments to shine and presented each of us with a few meatier bits to sweat over a bit! But that is a good thing!

As the courses progressed, we in the Academy continued to get to know one another more through the lunchtime football  and some particularly fascinating conversation during the breaks - made more enjoyable by the seemingly endless supply of mini brownies and rocky road bites courtesy of the very important snack rota!

In November, the course weekend focused on preparing for two pre-concert events where the Academy was playing as a "warm-up" act to Britten Sinfonia.  We were all very excited - a gig! These two concerts were retrospectives of John Woolrich (a good friend of Britten Sinfonia) and some of his influences. The Academy as a whole played Woolrich's Stealing a March (dedicated to Frank Zappa) and a quintet played In the Mirrors of Asleep. Woolrich's style is wildly eclectic and very interesting (that much we all agreed) - what we couldn't agree on was whose part was the most difficult (I still think I win).

The next time we met as an orchestra was on November 20th at Milton Court Concert Hall (next door to the Barbican) for the first of the two pre-concert events - the following day, we were back in Cambridge for the second. Nerves were high and we were brimming with excitement. The quintet went first and was received brilliantly. Then the full Academy (with one or two loan instrumentalists from various sources) took to the stage. We triumphantly stormed through Stealing a March, and the applause was rapturous. It was in all honesty, one of the best experiences of my life!

I am sure, if the first 3 months are anything to go by, more fantastic experiences await! I am so grateful for the chance to be a part of the Academy. I hope I can continue for many years!

Morgan
Clarinet, Britten Sinfonia Academy

For more information about Britten Sinfonia Academy click here