Spring Again

New Season, New Concerts. Daniel and I started at the beautiful, ornate Caledonian Club in London, with an evening recital (followed by an extravaganza of fudge and whisky... I can assure you the legendary Scottish miserliness is a myth!).

This was the first outing for our new Mozart/Prokofiev/Dvorak programme; K454 Sonata, Cinq Melodies (originally for voice, without words), and Dvorak Sonatina.

The Dvorak Sonatina is an interesting one. It's more often than not found in grade books, and performed by young violinists with examinations to pass... it deserves far better concert-platform exposure, and I intend to make it so. Written in the same year as the American Quartet and the Hovis Symphony [or was it the New World?], it has a kind of folksy quality that must derive from its modal changes, native american motifs, and rustic simplicity. Fittingly, the piece is sometimes nicknamed Indian Lament. Worth checking out.