Sinfonia Student review - At Lunch Three

Sinfonia Student Helen shares her experience of our At Lunch Three performance that took place in West Road Concert Hall, Cambridge on Tuesday 23 February...


Having never heard the combination of flute, viola and harp before – as well as being an enthusiastic Debussy fan – I was particularly looking forward to yesterday’s At Lunch concert with Britten Sinfonia. Unsurprisingly, it didn’t disappoint: the programme provided a fascinating and varied exploration of instrumental texture and colour, masterfully performed by Emer McDonough (flute), Clare Finnimore (viola), and Lucy Wakeford (harp). The blending of these three instruments created an extraordinary atmosphere in West Road Concert Hall – the perfect form of escapism in the middle of a busy day.

The concert opened and closed with works by Debussy, which gave an attractive symmetry to the programme. McDonough’s performance of Syrinx immediately drew us into the sound of the flute. Syrinx is a pivotal piece in the flute’s repertoire and one I have heard performed several times, but never quite like this: McDonough combined hauntingly lyrical melodic lines with delicate, acrobatic phrases in an almost hypnotic fashion, featuring moments of extremely soft dynamic which filled the vast space of the concert hall with remarkable ease. It was a breath-taking – if slightly eerie – insight into the range of colours the flute has to offer.

Icelandic composer Daníel Bjarnason 

(c) Samantha West

The flute was joined by the viola and harp for the next two items. As well as introducing me to a new combination of instruments, this section of the programme also exposed me to the music of Takemitsu and Daníel Bjarnason, two composers I had barely encountered before. In fact, I have discovered something new at each of the Britten Sinfonia’s At Lunch concerts this year, which is one of my favourite aspects of the series. Both pieces draw upon mosaic-like processes, resulting in fluid and fragmented textures in which short melodic ideas pass between the three instruments. In the Takemitsu, I particularly enjoyed the occasional moments where these fragmented parts converged onto a more unified triad or melodic line. What really stood out here was the blending of the viola and flute: I was not expecting two such different instruments to combine into such a homogenous timbre. These two instruments often seemed to work as a pair against the harp; Bjarnason particularly exploits this texture in the second section of Parallel, in which the flute and viola, playing sustained chords beneath a prominent moving part in the harp, gradually shift from the background of the texture to the foreground, capturing the listener’s attention as the harp slips away. Such subtle changes in texture always occurred seamlessly and organically, due to the carefully balanced and sensitive playing of the performers.

Next, the programme focused exclusively on the sound of the harp, with a performance of Donatoni’s Marches by Lucy Wakeford. This piece brought yet another new discovery: I had not previously appreciated the versatility of the harp as a solo instrument. Marches was a true showcase of harp technique, displaying a virtuosic range of sounds, colours and dynamic extremes; like Syrinx, the quietest moments of Marches were particularly captivating. I enjoyed the occasional jazzy harmonies emerging from the texture, which was again built from very fragmentary material – a clear preoccupation of this programme.

Debussy’s Sonata for flute, viola and harp provided a return to the Syrinx sound-world for the end of the concert. The piece generally featured more homogenous textures than the other works, exploring yet more textural possibilities of this combination of instruments. Indeed, what most struck me about this piece was the fact that there was never a sense of one ‘solo’ instrument being accompanied by the others, as might be expected from a sonata model. The three performers participated equally and, despite their differences, no instrument seemed out of place. The remarkable cohesion of the performance has encouraged me to consider other instrumental combinations that might provide unexpected unity. Like so many Britten Sinfonia concerts, At Lunch Three demonstrated the benefits of thinking outside of the musical box.

Helen McKeown (Sinfonia Student 2015-16)

Don't miss At Lunch Four - featuring Schumann's Piano Quartet and a new work by Bryce Dessner - Norwich 8 April, Cambridge 12 April, London 13 April. More details.

Rising Sun, Falling Rain: Our Concerts Director's introduction to Toru Takemitsu

 Ahead of our At Lunch Three tour, James our Concerts Director, shares an introduction into the work of Toru Takemitsu, whose music is featured in the programme...

The timing of our Britten Sinfonia At Lunch Three tour this week is particularly poignant, as our musicians Emer McDonough, Lucy Wakeford and Clare Finnimore perform Toru Takemitsu’s trio for flute, harp and viola Then I Knew t’was Wind, marking the 20th anniversary of the composer’s death, 20th February 1996. Takemitsu is a composer I admire greatly, his music much like that of Messiaen’s: inspired by nature, the environment, Japanese cultural aesthetics but also his bold confrontation of social and racial boundaries of his era (he was commissioned by Leonard Bernstein and the New York Philharmonic back in the 60s, at the time hailed as one of the world’s leading composers).

His sizeable output is stylistically difficult to define, his concert scores layered with traditional Japanese, jazz, pastiche and eclectic musical idioms not to mention his 90 or so film scores, both mainstream and arthouse, including one to a film starring Sean Connery and Will Snipes. His first feature-length film score was for the controversially erotic 1956 Crazed Fruit, written for guitar, banjo, trumpet, piano, flute harmonica, tenor sax, vibraphone and an array of percussion, unusual to say the least for the time, littered with seductive portamento and detuned effects, Hawaiian-esque guitar slides and a sleazy jazz waltz.

Although he later confessed that as a young man he had little or no knowledge of traditional Japanese music, Takemitsu’s incorporation of traditional Japanese instruments (particularly the biwa and shakuhachi) and non-Western themes, notably in his earlier works Eclipse and November Steps, led where others feared to tread at a time when the Darmstadt School were by far the loudest voice in the classical music scene.

(c) Kazumi Kurigami

Takemitsu is in good company for our hour-long programme featuring some of the relatively limited catalogue of repertoire scored for this configuration of flute, harp and viola, particularly Debussy’s trio written for the same ensemble. Sixty years earlier, Debussy was experimenting with incorporating aspects of the unfamiliar into the familiar, a process of ‘borrowing’ from different musical styles and traditions, a process and a work with which Takemitsu was evidently familiar.

Personally, Takemitsu’s musical logic speaks to me, not purely through a string of evocative titles (it really is much more than that), but in how this music ‘breathes’ so-to-speak; the fact that he was largely self-taught and unafraid of pastiche, but also how this endearing somewhat patchwork approach to composing provides a glimpse into his philosophical, ethereal approach to The Cosmos.

For more on Takemitsu, I’d recommend his autobiographical treatise Confronting Silence, published a year before his death, and also Tom Service’s 2013 Guardian article, which is available here.

James, Concerts Director

At Lunch Three takes place in Norwich on Fri 19 Feb, Cambridge on Tue 23 Feb and London on Wed 24 Feb. More info here

An extended version of this programme will also be performed at Southampton's Turner Sims Concert Hall on Thu 25 Feb. More info here

Meet Emer McDonough

In another of regular Q&A blogs we asked Britten Sinfonia Principal Flute, Emer McDonough a few questions ahead of her performances of Debussy's Syrinx and his Sonata for Flute, Viola and Harp this February in Norwich, Cambridge, London and Southampton.

What has been the highlight of your career so far?

Being on the same stage as Martha Argerich when she played Ravel Piano Concerto in G Major. I cannot begin to describe the colours she created. I'd never heard such exquisite, evocative and sultry sounds from a piano.

When are you happiest?
When we are all on holiday and all is harmonious between my three boys ...


What is your earliest musical memory?
Watching my big sister play the piano and feeling so desperate to learn too.

Which living person do you most admire, and why?
My mother. She is everything I admire in a person. Kind, gentle, thoughtful, tactful, unbelievably intelligent, the most attentive listener.... I really could go on and on.

What has been your most embarrassing moment?
Misunderstanding a conductor's beat in the second movement of Liszt's Piano Concerto No.2 and going off piste for what seemed like an age. It was just horrible. I still don't know what I played or if he was in 2 or 4. I still blush and feel queasy when I think of it.

What is your most treasured possession?
Apart from my wedding ring and poems, pictures and stories by my kids, my holy communion cross is my most treasured possession. I've had it since I was 6 years old and I wear with it in times of need. I'd be devastated if I lost it.

What would your super power be?
Obviously to be in two places, no make that 3 or 4 places at once!! What's the technical term for that?

If you were an animal what would you be?
I love dogs and horses but I wouldn't want to be one. I caught sight of a hawk the other day riding the wind over an under 10 rugby match I was watching and I remember thinking it would have been pretty spectacular to be soaring up there.

What is your most unappealing habit?
Being absolutely useless with any technology. Speed reading and thus gleaning all the wrong or no information. Forgetting people's names the instant I hear them. Being uncomfortable with silence......

What is your favourite book?
Anything by Colm Toibin or Sebastian Barry.  Irish literature is especially dear to me, both prose and poetry, but I still love the Shakespeare sonnets and plays I learned at school and I always return to Wuthering Heights by Emily Brontë.

What is your guiltiest pleasure?
I don't really know. I must find one quickly though. I was about to say finishing a cup of tea when it's still hot but I realise that's more of a basic human right than a guilty pleasure. Perhaps watching a panel show called "A league of their own " with my husband. It's just so silly and daft.

Who would you invite to your dream dinner party?
Marcel Moyse, Roy Keane, Roger Federer, Ronaldo, Messi, Jessica Ennis, Judy Dench, Fireman Sam, Johnny Wilkinson, my husband, my closest friends and my three boys who all are football mad hence mainly sport themed dinner party.

If you could go back in time, where would you go?
To when my 2 year old slept.

How do you relax away from the concert platform?
I run, a lot.

What do you consider your greatest achievement?
Passing my driving test first time with a stupendous parallel parking manoeuvre & my children, oh and the principal flute stuff. I'm really very proud of that too.

What is the most important lesson life has taught you?
To be calm and take each moment as it comes. I forget to abide by this but the intention is often there.

In a nutshell, what is your philosophy?
 "Go to bed early" seems like a good one but not very eloquent. I say it a lot to the little people and to myself but rarely does anyone, including myself, listen! So I think to treat others as you would like them to treat you is my philosophy in a slightly cracked nutshell.

Emer performs Debussy's Syrinx, a new work by Daniel Bjarnason and Debussy's Sonata for flute, viola and harp with fellow principal players, Clare Finnimore (viola) and Lucy Wakeford (harp) in Britten Sinfonia's At Lunch Three tour. Performances take place in Norwich on Fri 19 Feb, Cambridge on Tue 23 Feb and London on Wed 24 Feb. More info here

An extended version of this programme will also be performed at Southampton's Turner Sims Concert Hall on Thu 25 Feb. More info here

You can read Emer's full biography here.