Trio Sōra, with feet

Last week saw what is these days a rare visit to the Purcell Room on the South Bank, to hear the Trio Sōra, the winners of this year's Parkhouse Award. References 1 and 2 respectively.

A gloomy winter evening and there had been trouble on the lines earlier in the day, but the only trace was a short wait at Raynes Park.

Into the Queen Elizabeth Hall, which was busy but without gratuitous music, for which I was grateful. But they would not give me my wine in a glass despite explaining that I had no intention of taking it into either hall. It seems that the rule is no glasses once the warning bell has been rung. Which, given the staggered starts of the two venues, was well before my off. Which was perhaps why I remembered to take my warfarin.

The larger hall had Andy Mackay, who attracted a large, older audience with a bit of a whiff of jazz about them. Some lager drinkers, some flashily dressed older ladies. I could also buy the shirt, should I fancy one, and the stall holder seemed a little shocked that I had heard of neither the man nor his brand, at reference 3.

The smaller hall had a rather fancy audience, and the chap sat behind me sounded as if he was rich, possibly one of the sponsors of the Award. Talk of lunches with the great and the good of the music world. Almost certainly one of the supporters listed at the end of the programme. They managed without the Powerpoint slides about coughing that they have fallen for at the Wigmore Hall, but we did have a voice from the ceiling on the same errand. Nevertheless, a handsome hall, looking well for its refurbishment.

We had the UK première of Camille Pépin's 'The Road Not Taken' first, the title being taken from a poem by Robert Frost. A piece which had a rather folksy flavour to me. Followed up by the rather more substantial Beethoven (Op.70 No.2) and Schubert (D929), although I think I would have like this last even better had they eased up on the dynamic contrasts. But that's young people for you. A piece which sounded very familiar, so I wondered whether material from it had been recycled elsewhere in the oeuvre, or vice-versa. By way of encore we had the third movement of a 1997 piece called 'Phoenix' from a Canadian lady called Kelly Marie Murphy. I can't remember much about it, but my note says very bouncy.

A rather nervy young lady turning the pages, rather sticky looking in the case of the Schubert. An interesting property of the pianist, turned out in a tight white trouser suit, was that she looked a lot younger from the side than she did from the front. Altogether a rather femmy evening, with three lady performers, a lady page turner and two lady composers, the first of whom came and took her bow after the first piece.

I was certainly reminded that I like trios. Something to be looked out for going forward.

Trains still not quite right afterwards, but I was home fast enough. And first down the stairs at Epsom, although the hurry was superfluous, there being a superfluity of taxis. TB shut at 2245; an establishment which has clearly moved onto flexible working hours.

Reference 1: https://www.parkhouseaward.com/.

Reference 2: http://triosora.com/en/home.

Reference 3: http://www.roxysax.com/. For Andy Mackay.

Reference 4: http://camillepepin.wixsite.com/composer. For Camille Pépin.

Reference 5: https://kellymariemurphy.com/. For Kelly Marie Murphy. Another Canadian musician, only a few days after the Canadian singer - Heather Newhouse - working out of Lyon. And back in 2014, we had James Ehnes, from Brandon, Manitoba.

Reference 6: https://psmv3.blogspot.com/search?q=trios. Trios past, lots of them.