Kleio Quartet head north!

After a day of serene travel from London up to Lanark (serene in all but a rather alarming moment when Jenny accidentally locked the rental car keys in the boot.. rectified by a panicked but ultimately successful dive into the boot via the back seat) we find ourselves an hour before the first concert of our greatly anticipated Tunnell Tour. Tonight’s venue is a beautiful little church, Christ Church on Hope Street, and we will play Haydn’s scintillating ‘Rider’ quartet, Mendelssohn’s brooding E minor quartet Op.44 No.2 and Mozart’s sparkling G major ‘Spring’ quartet. This last work is a piece we especially love – a new addition to our repertoire – but one that speaks to us all for it’s cheekiness, charm and the absolute stunner of a slow movement. We look forward to keeping you abreast of our movements as our tour goes on! After this concert we will be driving over to Kelso to stay with Jenny’s godmother – our wonderful host providing us with a gorgeous base for the duration of our tour. We can’t wait!

 

 

 

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Concert in Penicuik

We stayed at Daniel’s family home in South Queensferry after the concert in Perth. Our final concert of the tour was in Penicuik and it was only a half an hour drive from Daniel’s home. This felt like a real luxury after long train and bus journeys to venues over the last few days. We arrived at the Penicuik Community Arts Association for 13:00. The venue was very cosy and intimate, and the acoustic was really great!

It was really lovely to end our tour in a smaller venue as it felt really personal and we were able to directly feel the energy of the audience. The audience was so warm and they all really appreciated the recital.


We had the most amazing time performing all over Scotland over the last few days! We would like to say a huge thank you to the Tunnell Trust again for giving us this amazing opportunity, for the Music clubs around Scotland for having us, and to our wonderful hosts in Skye and Nairn. This experience was life-changing and we are extremely grateful for this brilliant opportunity.

Daniel & Hanzhi

 

Concert in Perth

We caught the 13:00 train to Perth from Inverness on Saturday. The journey down was so beautiful as we passed the Cairngorms. The journey went smoothly and we arrived into Perth at around 15:30 and headed to St. John’s Kirk. 

The church is so beautiful and it was a joy to play there – even though it was absolutely freezing inside!
It was another great turn out for the audience and Daniel’s family really enjoyed the recital! We had a lot of fun!

We then made our way to Edinburgh, where we will finish the tour on Sunday.

Thank you to everyone who came out to watch us – we are very grateful!

 

 

Concert in Nairn

Concert day in Nairn:

We had such an amazing concert day in Nairn! We arrived into Inverness at around 12:30 and our lovely host, Joan, gave us a lift to their beautiful home in Nairn. Joan and her husband made us feel extremely welcome and made us a very delicious soup and spread for lunch. We then relaxed and had a walk in their stunning garden. After quite a bumpy 3.5hr bus journey, it was very much needed!

We then made our way to venue in Nairn at Community & Arts Centre to rehearse before the concert. It was such a lovely hall with a great acoustic! There was a great turn out at the concert and the audience were so receptive and listened very attentively.
Half way through the first piece of the recital (Kiss on Wood), as Daniel was playing on the G string, both his A and D strings completely unravelled… So we had to stop the recital and spend the next minute re-tuning the violin! Thankfully the audience were very understanding and we started the piece again.

We had such a great time in Nairn and it was made extra special by staying with Joan and her husband. They told us many great stories and were so hospitable with everything. They also have the cutest black Labrador called Brodie. We were very sad to leave, but were excited to get on the road to play in Perth tonight. Daniel’s family were coming to watch, so we were really looking forward to this concert!

Thank you again to everyone who came to watch us in Nairn, we really appreciate it a lot!


Our hosts beautiful garden.

The view from our warm up room at the venue.
The hall we played in.

The adorable Brodie with Hanzhi.

 

West Kilbride and Au Revoir!

Alas, our tour has to come to an end! We are truly grateful to all of the wonderful people we met on the way, and to have experienced some lovely corners of Scotland we had never encountered before. On top of that we had the rare chance to perform three nights in a row, which is quite a special thing in itself, and the group has really taken a lot from it.

The morning after our concert in the Old Well Theatre of Moffat – we went straight back to Cafe Ariete for brunch! One long card game and many pots of tea later and we were back on the road, this time to West Kilbride. It made for a perfect wrapping up of our tour, with friends and family managing to make it from Glasgow.

It is fair to say that we are now absolutely shattered and very much sad that it’s all over. We’d like to give a huge thank you again to The Tunnell Trust for the support and work that has gone into making this incredible opportunity a possibility for us. Thank you!