Matt Anderson Jazz Quartet at Leeds University School of Music

A new academic year at Leeds and the first term along boasts a pretty good lineup of lunchtime concerts at the School of Music. The first one saw Matt Anderson Jazz Quartet - Matt Anderson (saxophone) Martin Longhawn (piano) Sam Vicary (double-bass) Sam Gardner (drums). This quartet of long-time collaborators and friends was formed during studies at Leeds College of Music; now living further afield, this was a unique opportunity to hear them play together once more.

A really fun hour of music - not my normal style of music but well performed, with very good examples of communality in music making. Pieces by Gardner, Anderson and Longhawn as well as American Songbook classic and final Charlie Parker.

The rest of the Lunchtime Concerts are listed at http://concerts.leeds.ac.uk/

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Angela Hewitt Week, 14th-20th May 2012

I just received information from a friend about Angela Hewitt Week in Ottawa, 14th-20th May as declared by Mayor Jim Watson. Ms Hewitt is performing with Chamber Players of Canada on Friday 18th May; there will also be An Afternoon With Angela Hewitt on 20th May at the National Arts Centre hosted by the Canadian Friends of the Trasimeno Music Festival .

Pigeon Funk

Notes on a very random purchase. Earlier today I acquired Venetian Snares 'Rossz Csillag Alatt Sz ü letett ' purely on the basis of the language and artwork. Its certainly something different - and most definitely not pop. After a bit of searching: Venetial Snares is, according to Wikipedia, the performing name of Aaron Funk, who seems to specialise in experimental tracks in odd time signatures. Article here . The sleeve notes for this album (whose title is Hungarian for 'Born under a bad star') poses the question: what if, for just a day, we could both be pigeons? Interessant. Apparently this concept (a day in the life of a Hungarian pigeon) is non-typical of Venetian Snares sound, but one could ask, does Mr Funk do 'typical'? On first listening, the sound of this CD mixes classical/traditional Hungarian sounds and breakbeats. but aside from that? Definitely a 'listen for yourself' artist; try the website , fan site or myspace .

The Venezuelan maestro comes to Cardiff

A highly anticipated evening of entertainment for M and I, we headed to St Davids Hall to see the conductor of the moment, Gustavo Dudamel , conduct the Philharmonia Orchestra . Highly entertaining, too, and the place was pretty full, though possibly not sold out. We had anticipated the first piece to be Antonio Estevez' 'Mediodia en el llano', but a last minute change meant the first work was (I believe - the posters up in the venue were rather short on info!) Berlioz' Roman Carnival. Initially we may have been a tad disappointed but the replacement work was excellently peformed, cue many smiles. Unfortunately, the smiles soon evaporated, as the second, and for us, least interesting piece, was Mozart's Piano Concert No.17 K453 with Emanuel Ax on piano. M described Ax as mellow, I described him as dull. That may be because neither of us are really into Mozart, but compared to previous visits to St Davids Hall to see pianists Noriko Ogawa and Freddy Kempf, we really...

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