Category: Awards Scheme Concerts 2020

Day 2 – ‘Mambo!’

We weren’t off to the best of starts yesterday, as just one hour into our journey the car broke down… An hour and a half after pulling into a conveniently placed lay-by, Rob from the RAC arrived – he loaded the car onto the truck, we hopped in the front with him and he brought us back to Aberdeen where there was a branch of our hire car company. Thank you for rescuing us, Rob!

Finally on the road for good, in a different car, we arrived in Inverness just in time for half an hour to get used to the hall and the piano and for a bowl of soup (thanks to our lovely host, James). We caught our first glimpse of Inverness Town House looking in through the window from the outside – seeing the chandeliers shimmering we could tell it was going to be grand!

We performed a different programme last night, having offered all of the music clubs two contrasting options. Music Inverness chose the concert including works by Debussy, Schumann, Bernstein, Yoshimatsu, Piazzolla and Gershwin. We particularly enjoyed the humour of the programme notes written by Ian Sharpe, ‘[in the arrangement of West Side Story we will hear the] Mambo – with or without the words?’ – of course we can’t tell you whether we did shout Mambo or not, as we have two more performances of that programme coming up!

After black pudding and haggis for breakfast this morning, we are ready to travel south to our next stop: Penicuik!

Palisander’s Snowy Highland Adventure!

Yesterday we enjoyed a spectacular drive from Crieff to Fort William, through Loch Lomond National Park & Glenn Coe. For many of us, it was the first time seeing so much snow, so we simply couldn’t resist pulling over to create a recorder playing snowman!!



Lochaber Music for All hosted us in Fort William last night, and we were thrilled to see so many in the audience. Like last night, there were a number of recorder enthusiasts we chatted with about temperament & instrumentation; as well as many people experiencing our instrument for the first time.
Our favourite question from an audience member: ‘is the bass recorder design inspired by a drain pipe, or a drain pipe by the bass recorder?’

Today we head to the Isle of Eigg, where as well as performing a concert this evening, we will also be visiting the local school.
First, a strong coffee!

 

Day 1 – ‘Across the Pyrenees’

Our first day took us 395 miles, as the crow flies, as we travelled from London to Banchory – taking the train to Edinburgh and then driving north through the stunning landscape of Scotland, over spectacular bridges and through mountain snow. This seemed very apt ahead of performing our programme last night which we had titled ‘Across the Pyrenees!’

Members of Woodend Music Committee welcomed us at The Barn – a multi-arts centre which, over the last 25 years, has grown to become the largest arts venue in Aberdeenshire. We were immediately taken by the warm, generous acoustic and settled into the afternoon’s rehearsal. Then it was time for a short break and for making the most of tucking into local Scottish food before starting the concert. Thank you so much to Woodend Music Society for our Scottish duo debut!

Today we travel to Inverness. We’ve been warned that a road closure will prevent us from taking the most picturesque route, but even so we are sure we aren’t going to be disappointed by the scenery – everywhere we look on our journeys could be a painting!

Bags packed, Sat Nav set, here we go!

Palisander have arrived in Scotland!


Four recorder players & 25+ recorders arrived in Scotland  ✅ 

First concert given ✅ 

Following a rather dramatic start, with a member of the quartet pulling out of the tour for medical reasons with 24 hours to go, we are thrilled to have made it to Scotland to start our Tunnell Trust adventure!!

We need to say a huge thank you to Rebecca Vucetic, who stepped in as our fourth member. She had possibly the most productive 4 hour train ride ever, learning the parts on the ride from London – Edinburgh!

 

We received an exceptionally warm welcome from Strathearn music society.

Chatting with the audience in the interval and following the concert, it was lovely to discover that for many of them it was their first time hearing our instrument, the recorder, in all it’s different shapes and sizes, with music spanning 1000 years!

We were also thrilled there we a couple of fellow recorder enthusiasts in attendance, who had some in depth questions about breathing and articulation, to relay to their own recorder ensembles. Go team recorder!

After rehearsing this morning we are heading to Fort William, presenting our Double Double Toil and Trouble programme, all about the links between music and magic with Lochaber Music for All tonight.

Can’t wait!