Philharmonia

Last Sunday for one of our occasional visits to the Royal Festival Hall, for a spot of orchestral for a change. Don Juan, Op.20 from Strauss. Piano Concerto, K.482 from Mozart. Symphony, Op.60 from Beethoven. Under the baton of one Jakub Hrůša, a Czech who is to be found at reference 1. And with Martin Helmchen on the piano.

After some discussion about the relative merits of early lunch in Epsom and timely picnic in the Hall, we settled for the latter. White bread and kabanosi from Waitrose in my case. The kabanosi from Waitrose were Austrian rather than Polish and while they were made of pig not chicken and did not involve cheese, they were rather orange in colour and rather highly spiced in taste. Not like the much higher grade kabanosi that used to be sent out from Poland in the 1970's, when they needed the hard currency more than they do now. But they served well enough.

Free programme

Programme free, which was good. But no one page summary that I could find, giving both the timetable and the musicians.

Dollis Hill: location

Gladstone Park: roadside

Gladstone Park: interior

Gladstone Park: heritage

Our part of the Hall was pretty full. For the first half, I was sitting next to an Irish gentleman from Dollis Hill, possibly a Limerick man by birth. I managed to demonstrate my ignorance of Irish geography by thinking that Limerick was in the middle of Ireland, say about where I now know Athlone to be, and then thinking that I had muddled it up with Tipperary. But Limerick and Tipperary are both in the south west, while the other name that springs to the lips (on account of the fusiliers), Enniskillen, is in the north, across the border. I was slightly better on the location of Dollis Hill, although I would have been hard pressed to know exactly which tube line it was one. But I did learn that the main attraction of the area, Gladstone Park, did not contain a statue of the man for whom it was named.

For the second half, I was sitting next to a musical gentleman, who, at one point, was telling his companion about how a second violin had dropped a stitch, had lost the plot at one point, but managed to get back on message with commendable speed. A stitch dropping which I had completely missed. Possibly because it took me a while to get back into the orchestral point of view, with lots going on on a big stage, from our more usual diet of chamber.

I found the Strauss a bit loud and foreign - but not without interest and some compelling passages. A big orchestra, including a harp. Mozart as good as expected - although Helmchen was much smaller than expected. Beethoven better than expected: my first symphony for some time and I thoroughly enjoyed it. Checking, I find that the last symphony was back in March (reference 3), rather more recently than I had thought. Memory failing me again.

But I do remember that the conductor was an energetic chap, rather given to jumping up and down, with both feet leaving the ground. Not clear how much attention the orchestra were paying to him; perhaps the jumping was more for our benefit.

Fleabag

The real thing: I think the big star is on the right

Out to inspect a 'Fleabag' mock-up. I learned that this was an important television programme involving a guinea pig. Looked after by an energetic lady who was quite happy for us to touch, even to sit on, the exhibit. Unlike some more arty offerings that one comes across. It may have been to do with promoting a new book. See reference 4.

Out to eat at the Archduke, where we had taken the precaution of booking on the way out, which I think, as it turned out, was just as well. Music from piano and double bass. Very good service. I reprised my menu from what I think was the last occasion, noticed at reference 6. Not bad, but chicken not quite as good as on the last occasion, not being squashed quite flat enough and not being cooked quite enough for my taste. The waitress excelled herself by, there being no pink ice cream, turning up a small jug of raspberry sauce to go with yellow ice cream aka vanilla. The gentlemen excelled themselves by taking no fewer than two bottles of wine between them. No counting the odd beverage at the Hall. Was it their Wairau River Sauvignon Blanc from Marlborough, to show respect for our usual home brew from Villa Maria? So carried away that I forgot to take its picture to jog the memory.

A good meal. A place which has atmosphere and which is very convenient to Waterloo and the South Bank.

Festive Waterloo

BH thought that we had had enough and that a visit to 'Le Cabin' (hard by platform 1) was not called for. But see reference 5 for an occasion when we were allowed in. There were also a lot of armed police, British Transport variety, clearly on some kind of a mission as they had no time to chat.

Reference 1: http://www.jakubhrusa.com/.

Reference 2: http://psmv2.blogspot.com/2014/01/martin-helmchen.html. The first of what look likes the three times we have heard him.

Reference 3: https://psmv4.blogspot.com/2019/03/symphony.html. The last symphony. Search of the archive revealed plenty of occurrences of the word 'symphony', but none of the three that I checked involved going to hear a symphony of the present sort.

Reference 4: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fleabag. Including, this morning at least, no fewer than 65 references, most of them clickable, although not by me.

Reference 5: https://psmv3.blogspot.com/2016/02/master-builder.html.

Reference 6: https://psmv4.blogspot.com/2019/05/boring.html.