Archive for: Live Concert

London Mozart Players
Simon Blendis (director)

LMP is delighted to be performing in the Sundown Sessions at Crystal Palace Park as part of the South Facing Festival. Relax in the sunshine in the Crystal Palace Bowl as LMP string players serenade you with Strauss, perk you up with Piazzolla and get you moving with Mozart! Dance melodies abound in this cornucopia of Classical delights from the London Mozart Players – Crystal Palace’s very own orchestra. Bring your dancing shoes!

FREE fun entertainment for all the family. No tickets required, just turn up!

Programme includes:
Mozart Eine Kleine Nachtmusik
Brahms Hungarian Dance
Strauss Pizzicato Polka
Strauss Blue Danube
Bartok Romanian Dances
Piazzolla Libertango
Jaffa – Fascination + Jura Jura
Copland Hoedown

…and much more!

For more info about the South Facing Festival Sundown Session, click here.

Beethoven Trio in C minor, Op.9 No.3
Dohnányi Serenade in C major for violin, viola, and cello, Op.10
Mozart Divertimento for violin, viola and cello in E flat, K.563

London Mozart Players Chamber Trio
Ruth Rogers violin
Fiona Bonds viola
Sebastian Comberti cello

London Mozart Players brings perfection in triplicate to the beautiful church of St Mary’s, Putney, this September, with the LMP Chamber Trio performing three of the repertoire’s most celebrated string trios in an intimate and elegant chamber concert.

The concert opens with Beethoven’s Trio in C minor, in which the composer’s unmistakeable personality shines through as he masterfully weaves together an engaging battle between the major and minor keys of C. The dramatic tension of the first movement contrasts sharply with the heavenly slow movement in C major, followed by a rhythmic minor Scherzo, a major Trio and a final scampering Presto. It’s one of Beethoven’s best early works and points to his more serious later endeavours.

Composed in 1788 when Mozart was at the height of his powers, the divertimento K.563 was written as ‘entertainment music’ – a mixture of sonata form and dance-like movements. Mozart certainly mixes things up, with the masterful Allegro followed by a lyrical Adagio then a Minuet written in the manner of a lively peasant dance; this is in contrast to the song-like Andante which precedes yet more dance themes in the Allegretto Minuet, before the final Rondo ending with fanfares. It’s a complete concert within one work and undoubtedly one of the most accomplished pieces in all chamber music.

Beethoven and Mozart provide the classical framework surrounding Ernö Dohnányi’s late 20th century masterpiece. With echoes of Mozart, Schubert and Brahms, Dohnanyi’s passionate and evocative Serenade remains true to the nineteenth century serenade tradition, and yet its concise, spare form and its many references to Hungarian folk music, hint at what is to follow in the next century.

A trio of trios! Join Ruth Rogers (violin), Fiona Bonds (viola) and Sebastian Comberti (cello) in the heart of Putney for this sublime showcase for the string family.

Mozart Divertimento in D K.136 for string quartet
Tchaikovsky ‘Souvenir de Florence’ for string sextet

Simon Blendis violin
Harriet Haynes violin
Matthew Jones viola
Agnieszka Zyniewicz viola
Sebastian Comberti cello
Leo Popplewell cello

LMP principals join forces with outstanding recent graduates from the Guildhall School of Music to perform Tchaikovsky’s dazzling masterpiece ‘Souvenir de Florence’, alongside Mozart’s youthful and sparkling Divertimento in D. The concert will take place in the remarkable setting of Omved Gardens in this year’s Highgate Festival.

This year the Festival gives a special platform to the ‘lost generation’ of young artists, those who were starting their careers as the Coronavirus pandemic struck. Here three superb young musicians will play side-by-side with LMP principals in what promises to be a moving and powerful concert in the hidden oasis of Omved gardens, nestled in the heart of London’s Highgate Village.

Pre-concert event
Entry to the gardens for the evening concert is from 6.45pm with music from Royal College of Music students Lily Harwood (violin) and Rosie Rowe (viola) who will be playing a variety of violin and viola duets. The main concert begins at 7.45pm for one hour.

This project has been generously supported by Felix Appelbe and The Contributive Society.

Roald Dahl & Martin Butler Dirty Beasts
Roald Dahl & Paul Patterson The Three Little Pigs

London Mozart Players
Polly Ives narrator
Rosie Brooks artist

Music, art and hilarious stories combine in a concert that’s perfect for the whole family.

A ‘big and wonderfully clever pig’, a ‘Tummy Beast’ that lives inside the stomach of a boy, telling him to eat sweets, and a crocodile who eats three boys and three girls every Saturday, are among the characters of  Dirty Beasts, Roald Dahl’s collection of comic and absurd poems. These gruesome and hilarious stories have been set to colourful music by Martin Butler, and LMP and narrator Polly Ives will bring them to life alongside Dahl’s subversive take on The Three Little Pigs with music by Paul Patterson. Hilarious happenings follow the little piggies as they build their houses, with some outrageously comic twists to the familiar story. Paul Patterson’s sprightly and exuberant score has plenty of musical allusions to keep the grown-ups entertained too. You can be sure that Polly Ives will deliver the necessary huffing and puffing!

Artist Rosie Brooks will also be on hand to illustrate the concert in real time, drawing the characters as the musicians play the music, with her easel projected behind the players so you can see the painting develop. This really is a concert for all the senses!

LMP’s family concerts always sell out, so do book early.

 

 

THIS EVENT IS SOLD OUT! NO TICKETS WILL BE AVAILABLE ON THE DOOR.

Roald Dahl & Paul Patterson Little Red Riding Hood
Alan Ridout Ferdinand the Bull

London Mozart Players
Ruth Rogers director
Polly Ives narrator (Little Red Riding Hood)
Ruth Rogers and her son Alexander narrators (Ferdinand the Bull)

LMP is delighted to be part of the Wandsworth Arts Fringe, with concerts for all the family in one day, at St Mary’s Putney.

Taken from Dahl’s Revolting Rhymes, ‘Little Red Riding Hood’ is ideal for the under-10s, but is also a sharply funny and inspiring treat for adults. It’s half an hour of pure magic that never fails to entertain. ‘Ferdinand the Bull’ is a charming story of a bull with a big heart who would rather ‘sit quietly out under the tree’ and smell flowers, than fight in bull fighting arenas.

Entertaining, engaging and full of fun, this will be a wonderful way to introduce budding musicians to the instruments of the orchestra.

 

 

Britten Simple Symphony
Ireland Downland Suite
Finzi Eclogue
Holst St. Paul’s Suite
Elgar Serenade for Strings 

No interval

London Mozart Players
Mark Bebbington piano
Simon Blendis director

The opening concert of the third Summer Music in City Churches is a glorious programme of British music for strings. Celebrating the longed-for return of live music and the re-opening of churches, the festival’s theme is SUNSHINE AFTER RAIN: concerts filled with joyful, optimistic music to lift the spirits, with interludes for reflection too. Summer String Serenade sets the scene perfectly, with lively, evocative music rooted firmly in English folksong and countryside, and characterised by masterful orchestration. An abundance of timeless, bucolic sunniness characterises both Holst’s St Paul’s Suite and Ireland’s Downland Suite; between them the London Mozart Players are joined by pianist Mark Bebbington for Finzi’s Eclogue: ‘a rapt but not untroubled meditation’ (in the words of the composer’s biographer) in which the summery, pastoral scene is permeated with aching nostalgia and bittersweet tenderness. The programme opens with Britten’s exuberantly witty and youthful Simple Symphony and culminates with another early masterpiece: Elgar’s evergreen and much-loved Serenade for Strings. It all takes place in the historic church of St Giles-without-Cripplegate in the heart of the Barbican. 

Eves Waynflete Fanfare
Parry arr. Lawson I Was Glad
Howells arr. Neary A Hymn for St. Cecilia
Roderick Williams To Autumn
Vaughan Williams Five Mystical Songs
Barber Toccata Festiva
Wesley Ascribe unto the Lord
Tavener Svyati
Parry Blest Pair of Sirens

London Mozart Players
The Waynflete Singers
Roderick Williams baritone
Andrew Lumsden organ
Alice Neary cello
Martin Neary conductor
David Hill conductor
Andrew Lumsden conductor

The Waynflete Singers conclude their fiftieth anniversary season in celebratory style with a Gala Concert which re-unites them with former music directors Martin Neary and David Hill. Both musicians have chosen to conduct works that reflect their own particular tastes, while at the same time showcasing the typically wide repertoire of the Waynfletes. Martin Neary’s long association with John Tavener will ensure a very special musical experience while David Hill’s love of English music will illuminate the magic of Vaughan Williams.

Mozart Magic Flute Overture
Tchaikovsky Violin Concerto
Haydn Symphony No.104

Jonathan Bloxham conductor
Leia Zhu violin
Simon Blendis leader

13-year-old Leia Zhu will perform Grayshott’s first-ever performance of Tchaikovsky’s Violin Concerto in D. Also on the programme Mozart’s Overture Magic Flute and Haydn’s Symphony No.104

London Mozart Players
Isata Kanneh-Mason piano
Simon Blendis leader
Stephanie Childress conductor

Mendelssohn Piano Concerto No.1 in G minor, Op.25
Beethoven Symphony No.2 in D major, Op.36

Charismatic young pianist Isata Kanneh-Mason, the eldest of the Kanneh-Mason siblings, and acclaimed conductor Stephanie Childress, join LMP for a concert programme that fizzes with life-affirming exuberance.

Beethoven’s majestic Symphony No.2 takes the orchestra on a journey of expression and invention from its opening through to the ravishing finale – complete with a magnificent coda that ends the work with a flourish of timpani- and trumpet-laden triumph.

But the spotlight is on our soloist Isata Kanneh-Mason, who performs Mendelssohn’s first piano concerto, a showcase of captivating melodies and glittering passagework that will highlight the prodigious talent of our virtuoso performer. A BBC Young Musician finalist, four-time winner of the Royal Academy Iris Dyer Piano Prize (among many other prizes) and multi-scholarship winner, Isata is much in demand in concert halls around the UK and abroad, and LMP musicians are hugely looking forward to performing alongside her.

‘She is a pianist who makes lines sing beautifully and virtuosic passages dance, finding intimacy and eloquence at telling moments…’ – BBC Music Magazine.

There will be two concerts on the same day to accommodate social distancing. This concert will be filmed for later release on the LMP website. 

---

As part of LMP’s 100k Challenge (to reach 100,000 children and young people through music in 2021) we are working with schools and music hubs across the UK to make our Spotlight concert films available to schools for a limited time, for free, along with specially curated ‘listening guides’ for different age groups.

If you would like your schools to be part of this initiative, please contact Tegan Eldridge for more information.