Tuesday evening

I went to the Trevor Pinnock concert last night. It was at Cadogan Hall near Sloane Square. As it turns out, much closer to Sloane Square than I had totally realized. If I had just looked up and read the glowing blue sign I could have saved myself a good 10 minutes of wandering around with my A-Z getting increasingly more confused and panicky because the concert starts NOW. Ah well, I’ll know for next time.

The hall is a converted Christian Science Church and it is *lovely.* The lower seats are steeply raked and the gallery is low so it has a very intimate feeling even though it seats 900 people. The walls are cream with metallic painted accents and the lighting was very warm. It reminded me of our living room at home in the winter when it has been dark out since 4pm and Laine has turned on all of the lights in the living room and everyone is warm and cozy and sitting around reading. Which is, I think, a fairly impressive thing for a concert venue to remind me of.

I sat on the stage left gallery in the second row practically hanging over the stage. I couldn't see the violins hardly at all, but it did mean that I had a nice view of Peter’s playing and also of Trevor’s face or hands when he conducted depending on which was the harpsichord was turned. He fairly glowed.

I most enjoyed the Concerto No. 3 in G Major, BWV 1048 and No. 2 in F Major, BWV 1047. Do you get the feeling I have the program right next to me? You bet I do. No. 3 was great because the energy level was through the roof. No. 2 was great because the soloists were flying. And, of course playing very nicely as well.

Okay, I'm pretty sure I should never try to get a job as a music critic. Let's talk about me some more! I couldn't stop chatting to people. I met a nice lady in the stairwell, the man sitting next to me who had been given the ticket by a friend of his (quite enjoyed the concert, thanks), the Italian woman behind me, the entire class of Canadian exchange students who were at the concert as part of their music course (they said to tell Peter that he had done a very good job that night), and Katie- an acquaintance of mine who is in the Music Therapy course.

Katie invited me out to the pub with her crowd of friends after the concert. I can't remember any one's name, but they are all amateur or semi-professional baroque string players and they need a bass player for a concert on Dec. 8th. Handy, huh? I don't know yet if it will work because I only have a modern bass, but I'm going to talk to Peter about that when he gets back from Hamburg. Anyhow, pub time with them was wonderful. They're a large group of friends who are all interconnected in a variety of different ways who have known each other for years. I felt quite honored to have been included.

Then I came home and fell in to bed.