On the Tuesday evening I was back in the Assembly rooms with our youngest for the Trio Wanderer, a French ensemble who played Mozart’s K502, Ravel’s piano trio and Schubert’s D898 in poised yet expressive performances. This was my son’s first proper adult concert (he stayed for just the first half) and he listened intently. The Ravel was new to me and is a curious mix: everything from Basque dances to Malay pantoum to a passacaglia.
This concert deserved to have been better attended. I particularly appreciated the instinctive understanding the three players had of each other’s timing, born of long association with one another.
Earlier my husband went to hear Elizabeth Watts and Roger Vignoles in a recital of songs to texts by Goethe and da Ponte. Composers ranged from the well-known to the obscure (though Stephen Storace has featured here before); they were all served well and the various heroines appropriately characterised. Her encore was a wordless version of Mozart’s Rondo alla turca, for which you really ‘had to be there’ to appreciate the acting she put into it.