5 new videos uploaded to youtube

This was a new experience. I had to make a demo video recording and I thought I would use this opportunity to update my youtube channel. It was not an easy task, I could not find anyone with a video camera at a short notice so I decided to use my laptop's buil-in webcam. To compensate the picture quality I used an external digital recording device to capture a high-quality stereo sound of my new harpsichord and then mix it together.
On top of that I was making these recordings in a practice room that is in the basement of Goodenough College. Surely not the best natural acoustics for a classical music recording...
However, with some determination and access to technology I managed that! You can check the final results on my youtube channel:

Baroque Music in Latin America

Fascinating, a Polish Jesuit, Professor at the University in Poznan, Piotr Nawrot, seems to be doing the most important work for the re-discovery and preservation of Baroque music in Boliwia.

Instead of any comments this fascinating video tells the story:

CBS News: Searching for Baroque in Bolivia

Magical places

There are some places where there is magic.

13 September 2008, Finchcocks, Kent. A wonderful mansion house with a beautiful garden. The sunshine playing with shadows among the flowers, vegetables and trees, overlooking vast spaces. And in the middle of all this, a house with old harpsichords, fortepianos, virginals, clavichords, spinets and other little gems. A concert in the evening was very well attended, and the sound of the clavichord, that I was playing (built by Arnold Dolmetsch in the USA in 1909) grasped the attention of the listeners in this house surrounded by silence.

11 September 2008, Handel House, Mayfair, London. This building was once home for G.F. Handel, who used to rehearse his singers here. In the same room today there is a harpsichord (built by Bruce Kennedy) and often this becomes a cosy concert venue. It is always pleasure to play here, as the atmosphere is very intimate and the audience full of attention.
I had my "Bach Showcase" on 11th September. It was a challenge that I imposed on myself, to play the French Ouverture, Italian Concerto and the Chromatic Fantasy and Fugue one after another. A demanding programme, at the same time very rewarding. Performing some of the best music ever composed and sharing it with the audience, this is what can be called the joy of playing concerts. 

And how could I not mention that the same building was briefly a home for Jimi Hendrix...

24 August 2008, Lutheran Church, Gizycko (Poland). An evening shared with friends. A concert with two people so dear to me, Krzysztof Urbaniak and Olga Maracewicz. A concert that turns to being the pure joy of creating something good together. Enjoying the time spent together during rehearsals, then on stage, and finally after the concert. More than that, playing a concert so close to my hometown, in this beautiful part of the country, in a little town surrounded by lakes and woods... It was a lovely evening.

16 August 2008, St Cecilia Hall, Edinburgh. An oval room full of people coming to listen to a recital on two amazing instruments. Both original harpsichords, one built in 1620, an Italian instrument, the other one made in 1755 by Kirckman, an English maker. And those two are just a fraction from more than 40 origianal keyboard instruments housed in this world-famous collection, with the Taskin being probably the most often copied harpsichord in the world... Very inspiring. 

And then the Holyroodhouse Palace with the ruins of the ancient Abbey, full of commemorative tomb stones, a moving, yet silent witness of people's faith and hope.

Spotlight on the soloist

Solo = alone. How strange is this profession. They do everything for you, ask you if you need anything and make sure you have it. They give you a separate room, guard you so that you can keep quiet and focused, jump around to please you, then you go on stage, 80 people watching your every gesture, listening, clapping, very enthusiastic, sometimes (afterwards) coming to congratulate you and then.... you are left alone wondering what to do in an unknown city. 

You start thinking why is it just now that your friend, whom you were about to see, is not well and cannot meet you, or why you do not have a tour manager that would always be 'at hand'...

Perhaps this is just about time to enjoy those blessed moments when you do not need to do anything, just walk around, admire the city... unless you decide to update your blog :)

If it does sound negative then that is not the intention of the author of these words. In fact, performing solo recitals is the best experience this profession can provide and for those few moments it is worth working hard, and surviving all stress. Even more so if the instruments are original 1620 Italian, and 1755 English harpsichords. This is like a time capsule to the past.. Russell Collection has tens of various original instruments and it is a unique, world-famous place, with allegedly the oldest concert in hall in Edinburgh - a magical, wonderful spot hidden amongst the noise of the big city...

(Edinburgh, 16 August 2008, after the recital in St Cecilia's Hall. A photo from the ruins of the Abbey of the Palace of Holyroodhouse)

Staggering news

It was very unfortunate that the first thing I read this morning was an article about the brutal assassination of a teenager in London. One of the 27 teenagers that have recently been killed in London. What is so shocking is the reaction of a gang of his murderes (the youngest aged 14), among them girls laughing and shouting "kill him" while he was begging for life and lying covered in his own blood. Then, there were people passing by who have witnessed it all but did not do anything to help. It all does not make sense. Very upsetting.
And then Burma devastated by a cyclone with hundred thousand people who simply perished.

This is a context for other people making their own little wars every day, creating problems, arguing about unimportant things, injuring each other emotionally. Why do we do that?

I believe that we can only do good things in a microscale (sometimes they may become huge). They have to start in ourselves and around us, maybe with a smile at someone who seems to be upset and is sitting in front of us on the tube. There is no point in making this dangerous world even more unpleasant.

There is beauty, there are friendships, there are a lot of little nice things so to the same extent as the beginning of my day was upseting, its end was calming. I have seen a beautiful new moon on a bright sky, and it all resembled 'The Tales of Narnia", especially the lantern...

And music of Weckmann and Sheidemann reflecting true human passions, the same ones as ours... Scheidemann died in a plague. Probably as unexpected as a cyclone. How fragile is human life. Yet, how powerful! He composed great music, a scource of beauty to which we can refer 350 years later...

Eu não falo Portugese

I did not know that Portugese court stayed in Brazil. It happened in 1808 and I think it is fascinating as there must have been artists attached to the court! My new task is therefore to do some research about that time in Brazil and perhaps to find out what was the music like before then and whether it had a lot of things in common with the European baroque and early classical time... I am excited, but I cannot speak Portugese... That is where the internet comes handy and I have started learning but I think I will have to rely on my friends most of the time; that is even better as I will be able to meet more people form that beautiful part of the world. Too early to plan a trip but dreams sometimes come true!

Not long ago I was having a walk with one of my friends, we went from Bloomsbury, through Holborn to Covent Garden and we had lunch in a Brazilian place with a lot of nice people around. Then, as my birthday gift, she gave me a CD with some Brazilian music (bossa nova, samba...) - absolutely marvellous and I cannot stop listening. And, amusingly, not before long I ended up on stage in Guanabara, a Brazilian club in London, with all the club singing 'happy birthday' to me and my friend celebrating on the same occasion. The music there was excellent!

Something is in the air and I have the feeling that I cannot let it pass by...

Back to work, Parfumes of Kensington & Chelsea

It had to be a very quick recovery. After a few days of staying at home, taking medicines and eating garlic this morning I had to be up and about and performing on a Garlick instrument, how amusing... Great music by Biber, Marini & Veracini, some Italian style and freedom, movement and passion. Then Telemann and Castello, oh how fantastic it is to be able to bring to life works of people who passed away three or four centuries ago.

What makes it the most exciting though is the fact that they works show how similar people of all centuries are. We all share the same sorrows, fears, joys, feelings, love and despair. It is like touching a pillar in a Cathedral from 13th cntury, putting your fingers in the same place where another person put them in the past that is beyond our imagination. Actually, it is better, because it is bringing those people back to life, allowing them to breathe and speak through their music.

In the evening, Kensington & Chelsea, a wonderful area, living its own luxurious life, nice and peaceful, full of beauty, perhaps only on the flawless facade masking true lives. How very Classical. A wig and a lot of white face powder. But people I met are nice, real and true.