March 2008

Dear music lover,

Our March concert, given by piano quartet Ensemble na Mara mirrored, in musical terms, my Wednesday. I had set off early to Cairngorm for a day's skiing - only to be met with news that it was all off, because of high winds and had to face a long drive home. I consoled myself with a run over the Craig Dunain area, where I discovered a new, exciting route and the day got better.

The concert began with a long - no, a very long - early string trio by Beethoven. The players sounded a little tentative but they relaxed with the following exciting Martinu trio. A couple of unscripted moments made me smile: in her introduction to the piece from the platform, Eilidh Martin told us that the composer had been born in a clock tower and that his father had been the local bell-ringer. Precisely in the gap between the first and second movements, the clock bell outside started chiming. And Tom Hankey's (violin) playing of a wavy slide on the top string was echoed by the sound of an emergency vehicle's siren in the High Street.

And then it got better. In the second half, the trio were joined by pianist Alasdair Beatson for Faure's piano quartet no. 1 and the whole performance moved up to a different level. Alasdair's sympathetic playing sustained and then drove on the quartet to produce what was, for me and for the many smiling faces in the audience, a memorable climax to the concert.

A final note; the turnout, on a wild night, for an unknown quartet, was fantastic. A few had taken advantage of our "Bring a friend" vouchers; a few were friends of Eilidh who were determined to have a ceilidh in the "green room" after the concert; but the vast majority were people like you - who love chamber music, played live, in pleasant surroundings, with fine company.


Paul