2021 Online Showcase Recital Series
We are excited to announce the launch of our 2021 Showcase Recital Series. Over the next year, the Premiere Recitals artists will each be giving an online concert-talk, either livestreamed or over Zoom, with the opportunity to chat with the artists and ask questions at the end.
Tickets are priced at £11 and are limited to 70 per event in keeping with our ethos of creating intimate, exclusive events (and to ensure the sound quality is as high as possible), so book your spot now! Concerts last an hour, with approximately 25 minutes of structured discussion/audience Q&As afterwards.
Upcoming Recitals
10th Oct 2021, 6 pm
ARTIST
Timothée Botbol (cello)
John Paul Ekins (piano)
RECITAL
“Sturm und Drang”
Turbulent emotions, mercurial moods and rhapsodic fantasy are the order of the day in this thoroughly Mitteleuropean programme, presented by cellist Timothée Botbol and pianist John Paul Ekins. Here, the quicksands of Schumann’s Fantasiestücke and the wild virtuosity of Popper’s Hungarian Rhapsody provide the perfect foil to the deeply passionate lyricism and weighty formal structures of Brahms’ First Cello Sonata. Throughout, dreamy tranquility and inflamed ardour vie for prominence.
PROGRAMME
Timothée Botbol
cello
John Paul Ekins
piano
- Schumann – Fantasiestücke op.73
- Brahms – Cello and Piano Sonata no.1 in E minor op.38
- Popper – Hungarian Rhapsody op.68
Past Recitals
23rd Jan 2021, 7.30 pm
ARTIST
Petr Limonov (piano)
RECITAL
The Inner Worlds of Robert Schumann
The second section of Schumann’s Humoreske features an intriguing addition: an inner voice, or “innere Stimme” written out on a third stave between the traditional right hand and left hand staves, but not meant to be actually played by the pianist. In this recital-talk, pianist Petr Limonov explores the role of the unspoken, the “yet-to-be-imagined” (by the listener) in both Schumann’s Kinderszenen and the Humoreske, demonstrating how the composer makes us undertake a journey into our own inner worlds by making us imagine sounds which are not written and narratives which are hinted at, but never explicitly described by, the titles of his works.
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PROGRAMME
Petr Limonov
piano
- Schumann – Kinderszenen op.15
- Schumann – Humoreske op.20
06th Feb 2021, 7.30 pm
ARTIST
Litsa Tunnah (violin)
RECITAL
Synaesthesia in String-Playing
Violinist Litsa Tunnah gives a recital-talk on the phenomenon of synaesthesia, whereby musical sounds are simultaneously perceived as colours, focussing in particular on its connection to string-playing. Drawing on her personal experiences as a synaesthete, she describes how string colours affect sound-colour association and how works that have been arranged for solo violin from other instruments alter the synesthetic experience.
She also reveals her experiences in the creative process of working with composers, specifically how they respond to colour in her interpretation of their works. A wonderful opportunity to gain first-hand insight into this fascinating topic.
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PROGRAMME
Litsa Tunnah
violin
- Bach – Toccata and Fugue
- David Matthews – “Four Australian Birds”
- Biber – Passacaglia
20th Feb 2021, 7.30 pm
ARTIST
Peter Facer (oboe)
RECITAL
The Fall and Rise of the Romantic Oboe
The lone, lyrical sound of the oboe has always been at the very centre of the orchestra’s expressive palette. But away from its symphonic success, the oboe as a solo instrument has enjoyed less consistent popularity, experiencing various reversals of fortune over the centuries. In “The Fall and Rise of the Romantic Oboe”, oboist Peter Facer charts the trajectory of the solo oboe alongside its orchestral counterpart, starting with J.S. Bach and moving towards the present day.
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PROGRAMME
- Vivaldi – Concerto in A Minor, 1st mvt
- Bach – Sinfonia from Easter Oratorio
- Mozart – Oboe Quartet, 1st mvt
- Brahms – Violin Concerto, 2nd mvt (opening)
- Schumann- Romanze no. 2
- Poulenc – Sonata for oboe and piano, 1st mvt
- Pasculli – Ricordo di Napoli
6th March 2021 , 7.30 pm
ARTIST
Tristan Hambleton (bass-baritone)
Sholto Kynoch (piano)
RECITAL
Art and the Aria
ln this lecture-recital, bass-baritone and Cambridge art-history graduate Tristan Hambleton performs and discusses the artistic context of famous arias, exploring the idea of an artistic Zeitgeist and the way in which sculpture, painting and architecture from Caravaggio and Vermeer to the Panthéon and l’Arc de Triomphe in Paris to Manet and Rodin have influenced and shaped musical styles and sensibilities through time.
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PROGRAMME
Tristan Hambleton
bass-baritone
- Monteverdi – “Caronte”- L’Orfeo (1607)
- Bach – “Betrachte meine Seele”- St John Passion (1724)
- Mozart – “Se vuoi ballare” Le Nozze di Figaro (1786)
- Beethoven – “Hat man nicht auch Gold beineben” Fidelio (1805)
- Wagner – “Tatest du’s wirklich” Tristan und Isolde (1864)
20th March 2021 , 7.30 pm
ARTIST
Alex Lomeiko (violin)
RECITAL
The Virtuoso Violin
Violinist Alex Lomeiko takes us on a thrilling voyage through the history of virtuosity on the violin, starting from its humble beginnings with the music of Telemann through to the polyphony of Bach which would in turn inspire Ysayë several centuries later. A recital with this theme would of course not be complete without the music of the definitive violinist virtuoso, Paganini, who pushed the limits of what was deemed possible on the instrument during the 1800s, and we see how this prompted performer-composers such as Nathan Milstein to introduce even more pyrotechnics of their own in the 1900s.
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PROGRAMME
Alexandra Lomeiko
violin
- Telemann – Fantasie no.5 in A major, TWV. 40:18
- Bach – Sarabande & Tempo di Borea from Solo Partita no.1 in B minor, BWV. 1002
- Ysayë – Allegretto con scherzando & Finale; Con brio from Solo Sonata no.1 in G minor
- Paganini – Caprice no.24
- Nathan Milstein – Paganiniana
10th April 2021 , 7.30 pm
ARTIST
Riyad Nicolas (piano)
RECITAL
Schubert; Solace in Lockdown
Pianist Riyad Nicolas performs a programme dedicated to Schubert whose compositions have brought him joy and peace during lockdown, presenting the Sonata D 664 in A major and the Sonata D 894 in G major, singled out by Schumann as a “perfect sonata”.
This programme fascinates with its contrasts; the Sonata in A major on the one hand is filled with melodic charm, its lyrical and poignant nature reflecting the image of the young Schubert in love surrounded by the Austrian countryside with its beautiful mountains. The sonata in G major on the other hand is one of the composer’s most important late sonatas and combines many different types of emotion, shade and colour, oscillating between delicacy and vigour, pianissimo lightness and bold chordal passages, and luminous serenity and intense pain.
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PROGRAMME
Riyad Nicolas
piano
- Schubert – Sonata D 664 in A major
- Schubert – Sonata D 894 in G major
24th April 2021 , 6.00 pm
ARTIST
Dimitris Dekavallas (guitar)
RECITAL
The Spanish Guitar Through the Centuries
It has been said that you can see Buenos Aires whilst listening to Astor Piazzolla’s music. In this recital, guitarist Dimitris Dekavallas takes us on a journey through time and around the globe with a selection of some of the most celebrated guitar works in the classical repertoire. Conjuring up images of locations such as the Alhambra palace, Argentina and the islands of Mallorca and Malaga and encompassing styles including flamenco, tango, samba and jazz, this highly evocative programme of music by the great Spanish and Latin American composers of the 19th and 20th centuries promises to delight.
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PROGRAMME
Dimitris Dekavallas
guitar
- Isaac Albéniz – Asturias (Leyenda), Mallorca Op. 20, Sevilla (Sevillanas)
- Francisco Tarrega – Recuerdos de la Alhambra
- Astor Piazzolla – Verano Porteno, Milonga del Angel
- Jorge Morel – Danza Brasilera, Misionera
- Ernesto Lecuona – Malaguena
8th May 2021 , 7.30 pm
ARTIST
Daniel Palmizio (viola)
RECITAL
Chromaticism, Fantasy and the Solo Viola
Violist Daniel Palmizio presents this intriguing and highly virtuosic selection of solo works characterised by harmonic complexity and invention. At the musical core of the programme is J.S. Bach’s famous Chromatic Fantasy, unique to the composer’s output in its unconventional structure and bold tonal exploration, and transcribed here for the viola by Bruno Giuranna. The 20th-century composer Max Reger would himself transcribe the Fantasy for piano; in this recital we hear his Suite no.1 in G major, filled with allusions to Bach’s solo string works.
Interposed between these works is the monumental Sonata op.25 no.1 by one of the great composers for viola, Paul Hindemith, himself a great virtuoso on the instrument. The opening Praeludium is in homage to Bach, while its idiosyncratic harmonic structure would come to define the composer’s very own musical take on the “Neue Sachlichkeit” artistic movement of the 1920s.
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PROGRAMME
Daniel Palmizio
viola
- Max Reger – Suite op.131B for solo Viola
- Paul Hindemith – Sonata op.25 n. 1 for solo Viola
- J. S. Bach – Chromatic Fantasy for solo Viola (transcription by B. Giuranna)