Scholfield-Clarke Duo – Inverurie Music, 9th February 2024

Hello! We’re the Scholfield-Clarke Duo, and we’ve just started our Tunnell Trust sponsored tour in the lovely Scottish town of Inverurie! We’ve got another two concerts this weekend in Ayr and Helensburgh, and we’re bringing along our ‘red, white and blue’ programme of original saxophone repertoire from France, Britain and America, taking audiences on a journey through the life of the classical saxophone over the last 100 years.

We started our day in Glasgow, jumping on a train up to Aberdeen – typical Scottish weather on the journey (although thankfully the snow held off at least!), with some amazing views of the very wild North Sea out of the window as we made our way up the coast.

Once we got to Inverurie we were met by the lovely Sylvia, who showed us around the local area before our rehearsal in the afternoon. Our venue for the evening was Inverurie Town Hall, a grand Victorian building at the centre of the town with a splendid Schimmel baby grand which Iain quickly got acquainted with!

After our rehearsal, we were treated to a delicious curry at a local restaurant, joined by music club members Margaret and Roy, along with composer John De Simone and his wife Emily.

After that it was time to get ready for the performance, and begin our exploration of the saxophone’s amazingly rich and varied original repertoire! We thoroughly enjoyed the concert, and were delighted with how receptive and invested the audience were in all of the new music we introduced them to.

A highlight of the programme was a brand new work written for us by composer John De Simone entitled ‘Another Life’. Working on this piece has been an amazing experience for us as it’s our first premier together as a duo, and it was very exciting to premier it last night – especially with the composer, who happens to be on the board of Inverurie Music, present at the performance! John also happens to be a former teacher of us both from our time at the Junior Royal Conservatoire of Scotland, so it was such a nice experience to reconnect and work together in a professional capacity on this new piece.

Now it’s back to Glasgow, and a quick turnaround to get down to Ayrshire for our concert this evening for Ayr Music Club!

6 January 2024

2023 Music Club Awards Scheme Winners

Please check out our fabulous 2023 winners who will be giving their Scottish Music Club concerts this year and next:

Click HERE to go to the Concerts page and click on each group to read all about next season’s wonderful performers!

29 June 2023

Asaka’s FUN FACT time

Coll welcomed us with fresh rains and winds exactly as the last year!

This is the reason we love Scotland: the nature of Scotland is a perfect model of making music, (quoting from Leopold Auer) anyway it’s so nice to be here again!

Exhausted Glasgow Eriol

This magical island inspired us since the first day: we’re four young people from different corners of the world, also we’re very capable of talking nonsense which are irrelevant to rehearsals– sometimes it can be very difficult to put on a brake of the adventure of Iona’s fluffy balls (two huge male cats) or Jonathan’s badminton legend (fine they will be whingeing if they read this) or Eriol’s tale of training a chicken how to fly, or Susie… well everyone knows Susie behaves herself…but a perfect solution was provided by a tiny property on the reception table in An Cridhe: a bell (originally) for beer.

B******t Bell in action

In order to create a more efficient environment for rehearsal, it was requisitioned by us. If anyone sense a hint of nonsense at any point, he or she would ring the bell immediately. The situation of the bell warning until now: Iona 6, Eriol 4, Jonathan 3, Susie 0.

happy John

happy Sue

happy Eri

stressful Iona!

I think we’ll purchase a same bell in London!

As we are on an island full of sheep, we would like to share some fun facts with you:

1.If you spot a jellyfish near shore, even it waves lively, it is either dead or dying…

poor jellyjelly

2.A mother sheep can only look after two lambs, if she give birth to three lambs, the third lamb would be taken and given to a mummy sheep which lost her lambs (very sweet isn’t it?)

3.If you sight read Große Fugue, after that you’ll be as dead as this crab ⇩

Hope you have a great weekend and looking forward to seeing some of you in concerts!

28 June 2023

Aquilae Quartet in Coll

Our journey to Coll was a very long one. We got here from Cornwall, after playing in a festival there – doesn’t get much further within the UK!

We left Penzance at 5 in the morning and after 15 hours and 5 trains we finally reached Oban! It greeted us with a rather wet weather, so we decided to get some good old frozen pizzas and go to bed early.

The next day started rather early for us, too! At 6:00, our ferry departed to Coll – Jake was awestruck by the views of the surrounding Scottish islands, the rest of us slept through everything!

Upon our arrival, we were met by Jonathan who introduced us to the island and guided us to the bunkhouse. We got settled in our rooms, and were ready to have a successful and productive time in Coll.

So far in this course, our schedule has included ample rehearsal time, coaching by some fantastic tutors, and time to individually practice.

When we have not been playing music, we have taken in as much of the beauty of the island as we can! As long as it has not rained…We have passed the free time by going on walks and to the Coll Hotel pub that even had a night where locals brought instruments and performed together

Lovely lovely time!!