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Tuesday 24 June at 1.15pm St Bride’s Church, Fleet Street, London EC4Y 8AU

World premiere performance of ‘Metropolis’, six songs by British composer Bernard Hughes and lyricist Chinwe D John that capture the pulse of a modern metropolis. These songs, which explore aspects of urban life, romantic love, and resilience, bring the emotional essence of our shared experience into stark and beautiful view. Soprano Isabelle Haile and pianist Asako Ogawa infuse their sublime artistry through the songs, creating an unforgettable musical experience.

This free lunchtime concert also includes music by Francis Poulenc, chosen to complement the songs. Find out more here

Metropolis appears on the album ‘Songs for Our Times’, released to critical acclaim in 2023 on the Divine Art label. ‘Songs for Our Times’ features composers Bernard Hughes and Staurt MacRae, lyricist Chinwe D John, pianist Christopher Glynn, soprano Isabelle Haile and tenor Nick Pritchard. The project, from its conception by Chinwe D John to the enthusiastic participation of the artists, exemplified by the premiere organised by soprano Isabelle Haile and pianist Asako Ogawa, speaks to the spirit of collaboration and shared interest in engaging current and future listeners.

Composer Bernard Hughes says, ‘I hadn’t written any solo songs when the opportunity to work with Chinwe came up. It was really interesting to work with lyrics by someone from such a different background to me. She pointed me towards some music styles I wouldn’t have otherwise encountered, and these formed the inspiration for the piano parts of several of the songs. It was a very collaborative process…I liked working on the songs as a cycle: there is a definite thread running through them. It was a delight working with Isabelle Haile on the recording. She is an exceptional talent and I’m so pleased she is giving the live UK premiere of Metropolis.’

Praise for Songs for Our Times – Metropolis

‘As a poet writing texts for songs, John has a very clear, direct voice, with the ability to craft memorable, evocative phrases and use short bursts of lyricism. Rarely do her texts feel too wordy or too over-written, there is space for the music….. Haile sings with a lovely bright, focused soprano tone’ – Robert Hugill

‘Here is music to enjoy but to make you think as well!’ – British Music Society

‘This is a capable and sensitive player who is intelligently inside the music, and quite capable of drawing us into it.’ – Early Music Review on Asako Ogawa

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The penultimate weekend in March saw me in London for two exceptional concerts in particularly lovely settings. The experience was enhanced by the company of friends and a delicious meal with a wonderful view across Smithfield (former meat market, now the new site for the Museum of London) to St Paul’s cathedral.

A Season to Sing is a reimagining of Vivaldi’s evergreen The Four Seasons for mixed voices by British composer, vocalist and music director Joanna Forbes L’Estrange. A co-commissioning project between the composer, The Royal School of Church Music (RSCM) and over 50 choirs around the world, A Season to Sing was written to mark the 300th anniversary this year of Vivaldi’s The Four Seasons.

The London ‘launch concert’ took place on Saturday 22nd March at historic St Bartholomew-the-Great, a beautiful ancient church in the City of London. Luminosa Music, an exceptional amateur choir (who impressed with their pitch-perfect timing and exquisite, colourful sound) performed the music, the first half comprising choral pieces by Joanna, her husband Alexander L’Estrange, and works by Monteverdi and Thomas Morley, all with a seasonal theme. This set the scene nicely for the second half and A Season to Sing.

The Four Seasons is a perenially popular work, and this is is not the first time it has been ‘reimagined, Max Richter’s Recomposed, being the most famous example. But A Season to Sing is the first time this music has been reimagined for voices. As Joanna says in the concert programme notes, ‘...re-imagining in no way diminishes our respect for the original compositions. On the contrary it offers a new perspective….’ – this latter point being the most striking and magical thing about A Season to Sing.

Think you know The Four Seasons? Think again! Here, the orchestral version is transformed into a colourful extravaganza of sound which makes full use of the human voice (and other parts of the body) to bring Vivaldi’s seasons vividly to life – from whistled birdsong in Spring to “body percussion” to evoke the storm, a bagpipe’s drone and even some Swingle-style wordless ‘scat’ (Joanna was music director of The Swingle Singers for seven years, and the middle movement is dedicated to the group’s founder, Ward Swingle). New details from the original orchestration are revealed by the choir, such as interior lines and textures, and the entire piece feels as fresh as a spring shower. It’s full of affection too, and wit and warmth. It’s a wonderful tribute to this much-loved music.

The Four Seasons is the first piece of classical music I remember listening to as a child. I have very vivid memories of dancing around the room to the 3rd movement of Autumn

Joanna Forbes L’Estrange, composer

A Season to Sing is being performed around the world by the choirs who took part in the commissioning project (find details of all performances here). The score will be published by the Royal School of Church Music on 1st June (pre-order here).

Sunday afternoon and another concert at a lovely venue, this time the 1901 Arts Club, London’s most stylish and convivial small venue. This was a special concert to celebrate the 340th birthday of J S Bach and to launch American pianist Eleonor Bindman’s new album ABSOLUTE – her own transcriptions for piano of Bach’s Lute Suites BWV 996-998.

A lifelong love of J S Bach has led Eleonor Bindman to produce a number of important transcriptions for solo piano and piano duo of his music for other instruments, including the evergreen Cello Suites and the Brandenberg Concertos. In this latest addition to her catalogue, Eleonor has turned her attention to works originally composed for the lautenwerk or lautenwerck (lute-harpsichord), one of Bach’s favourite instruments, similar to the harpsichord, but with gut (or nylon today) rather than metal strings.

The small size of the music salon at the 1901 Arts Club lends itself to “haus konzert” style performances (such as Bach might have known) and the ambiance at this concert was warm and friendly.

Like Joanna’s reimagining of The Four Seasons, Eleonor sees transcriptions as a vehicle to “revive interest in original compositions”, shine a new light on the original work and “increase their popularity”. And just as in A Season to Sing, new details of dynamics, texture, counterpoint and more are revealed in this transcription for solo piano.

But for me the most satisfying aspect of Eleonor’s concert was her ability to bring so much colour and nuance to the music. Her range of sound was impressive, but never too much nor too little. Perfectly balanced to suit the small size of the venue, she brought both intimacy and grandeur (we can thank Bach for that!) to the music. I don’t think I have ever heard the Steinway at the 1901 played better!

The following day I met Eleonor for a most enjoyable, leisurely lunch, replete with much ‘piano chat’ and conversations about food.

ABSOLUTE is out now on the Orchid Classics label and on all major streaming platforms.

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Last week I went up to Hertford, the attractive county town of Hertfordshire, to attend an inaugural concert and reception, ahead of this year’s Hertfordshire Festival of Music (HFoM) which runs from 7 to 14 June.

I have been involved in the Festival since its founding by conductor Tom Hammond (who tragically died in 2021) and composer James Francis Brown, initially in an ad hoc way by sharing details of the festival here and on my social networks, and since 2020 as the Festival’s publicist.

Now in its ninth year, the festival has grown from a weekend to a full week of concerts and related events/activities. The ethos and aims of the festival have remained largely the same – presenting world class classical music and musicians in the heart of Hertfordshire alongside education and outreach projects within the local community – and each year sees a different Principal Artist (Emma Johnson, Ben Goldscheider, Steven Isserlis and Stephen Hough to name a few) and Featured Living Composer (e.g. Judith Weir, CBE, David Matthews), as well as musicians who live and/or come from Hertfordshire (flautist Emma Halnan, pianist Florian Mitrea). The concert programmes are varied and imaginative, and the range of artists is impressive. Previous performers/ensembles have included ZRI, the Rosetti Ensemble, pianists Katya Apekisheva and Charles Owen, violinists Litsa Tunnah, Mathilde Milwidsky and Chloe Hanslip, cellist Guy Johnson, and guitarist Jack Hancher.

Potential audiences (and reviewers) who live in London are often reluctant to journey too far out of the metropolis to experience live music (it was via an online discussion about this issue that I first met Tom Hammond, back in 2015), yet the ease with which one can travel to Hertfordshire was quite evident when, after having lunch with my father near Kings Cross, I took the Circle Line a few stops to Moorgate and thence a train to Hertford North station (Hertford has 2 railway stations; trains from Hertford East go to Liverpool Street). The journey was less than an hour, comfortable and pleasant, and my hotel was an easy 10-minute stroll from the station to the attractive historic centre of town. Hertford is also easily accessible by road, again less than an hour’s drive from London.

HFoM concerts take place in the town’s two main churches, St Andrew’s and All Saints, both of which are within walking distance of the town centre. Other events take place at the Hertford Quaker Meeting House (the oldest meeting house built by Friends that has remained in unbroken use since 1670), and other local venues.

If you were to make a mini break or weekend visit to Hertford, or even just a day trip, you’ll find the town has a good range of independent shops, cafes, restaurants and pubs. Ahead of the evening event, I enjoyed a stroll around the town in unexpectedly mild sunshine.

This year’s festival runs from 7 to 14 June. I can’t reveal the full programme yet but I can tell you that this year’s Festival theme, ‘Shadows to Light: Musical Journeys in Conflicts and Peace’, which celebrates the universal language of music through times of adversity and peace, and touches on the 80th anniversary of VE Day alongside contemporary global conflicts. From young musicians to established international artists, jazz music, the Hertford Community Concert Band, and even a special Festival Church Service, this year’s Festival offers something for everyone and features over 30 events across music and outreach activities, of which 50% are free, with concessions applied to ticketed events.

You can enjoy early access to Festival news by signing up to the HFoM newsletter or by following the festival on social media.

Hertfordshire Festival of Music website

Hertfordshire Festival of Music is built on the involvement, support and encouragement of Hertford and the county’s communities who help build a thriving and rich Festival for the communities HFoM wishes to serve.

The Hertford hart
Artistic Director/pianist James Francis Brown & volist Sarah-Jane Bradley

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‘The World of Yesterday’ – written & performed by Sir Stephen Hough with the Bournemouth Syphony Orchestra, conducted by Mark Wigglesworth. Wednesday 26th February, Lighthouse, Poole

British pianist Sir Stephen Hough hadn’t intended to write a piano concerto. But during the dark days of the COVID pandemic, he was approached to write a score for a film about a concert pianist writing a piano concerto… With little to do but take Zoom calls, “it seemed like a wonderful way to keep me busy”, and, intrigued by the film’s plot, he began jotting down ideas.

As the world emerged from the pandemic, the film project stalled and Stephen’s concert diary began to fill up again, but he still had the sketches for the film score and, with the support of four orchestras (the Utah, Singapore and Adelaide symphonies, and the Hallé) he wrote his piano concerto ‘The World of Yesterday’. It received its world premiere with the Utah Symphony Orchestra in January 2024 and a recording made with the Hallé and Sir Mark Elder is available on the Hyperion label.

I had the pleasure of hearing Hough perform his concerto with the Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra in a well-conceived programme called Notes of Nostalgia. Given its theme, the concerto sat perfectly between Brahms’ Third Symphony and Elgar’s Enigma Variations – all three works infused with a certain wistfulness interposed with personal reflection, warmth and wit.

Hough’s concerto takes its inspiration, in part, from Austrian author Stefan Zweig’s atmospheric memoir of the same name, which depicts Vienna and Viennese culture in the last golden days of the Habsburg Empire before Europe was torn apart by war. You can almost smell the aroma of Viennese coffee and taste the Sacher-Torte in the quieter passages of the piece.

The music is rich in nostalgia, but without the heart-tugging poignancy of Chopin, for instance: it’s a more reflective yet positive reminiscence of another time. Scored in a single movement but with distinct sections, ‘The World of Yesterday’ has a filmic quality (“something from the 1940s”, my husband commented as we left the concert hall) – you certainly hear nods to Korngold’s film scores, and it shares Korngold’s romantic sweep, but there are also references to Rachmaninov (particularly in the very glittery virtuosic solo sections), Copland, the Warsaw Concerto…but at no point do these references feel like pastiche. And if you’re familiar with Hough’s wonderful transcriptions of Rodgers and Hammerstein, you’ll find similar idioms here (I half-expected Hough to segue into the Carousel Waltz at one point). And yes, there is a waltz too – not so much a Viennese waltz but something more sultry, redolent of Bill Evans and a smoky, late-night jazz club.

Hearing the composer play his own work was like a bridge across time to another world of yesterday, a time when composers wrote piano concertos which they performed themselves: Mozart, Beethoven, Mendelssohn, Chopin, Liszt, Rachmaninov and Prokofiev all performed their own concertos. Showcasing their prowess and personality as both performer and composer, these works becoming their “calling cards” as they toured to give concerts.

The music has an almost “vintage” quality: surprisingly traditional in its direct communication with orchestra and audience, and its idioms, motifs and references to other composers (there’s not a hint of that “squeaky gate” atonality one often associates with contemporary classical music). The piano enjoys Brahmsian interactions with the orchestra and Rachmaninov-esque cadenzas, but Hough’s does break with tradition in a few significant ways. First, the concerto has a narrative title, rather than just an opus number or key, which undoubtedly guides the audience, even without a programme note. Additionally, the cadenza, traditionally heard at the end of a movement, comes very early, after an orchestral ‘prelude’. Here the piano is solo, notes and motifs sparkling in the upper register (later mirrored by the piccolo).

Above all, The World of Yesterday is a richly textured, virtuosic and joyful celebration of past influences, rather than a poignant glance back to a better time. It’s full of warmth and wit, affection and humour: it made me smile, it thoroughly uplifted.

After all, isn’t that what music should do?

‘The World of Yesterday’ is released on 28 February on the Hyperion label

Stephen Hough
Sketch of what would be Hough’s Piano Concerto (credit: Stephen Hough)