PrettyInScarlett

A special solo trip to the Norwegian Church arts centre on 9 th March to see Icelandic band hjaltalín together with support from Dry The River. I heard about the show via email lists from the people behind Swn (join the list/ Facebook group if you haven't already). Partly from lack of time, I treated the evening as a 'random gig number 3' so wasn't sure what to expect! Turns out it was an excellent evening (shades of last year's Woodpigeon gig) & pretty much a capacity crowd. A note for cake lovers -the cafe/bar at the Church was still selling foodie bits along with drinks, had a hard time resisting! Dry The River were very good. I don't know much about their background (plenty of scope online as they have both a website and myspace ), but their set (all new stuff - believe the debut album is currently being recorded) seemed to me to show shades of William Elliott Whitmore , Jeff Buckley; lo fi indie ish with a bit of modern folk thrown in. Very int...

Summer finally seems to be on its way, along with 2 excellent shows in a week! Another first on Tuesday 19 th - a concert in the Cardiff University School of Music 's hall. Originally booked as a 'why not' kind of thing, the recital by Emma Johnson (clarinet) and Pascal Rogé (piano) was very interesting. The set (courtesy of the CUSM website): Weber – Sylvana Variations Debussy – Rhapsodie Brahms – Sonata op. 120 no. 1 in F minor Bernstein – Sonata Stravinsky – Three pieces for clarinet solo Debussy – La Cathedrale Engloutie (from Preludes Book 1) Aaron Copland – Nocturne Milhaud – Scaramouche Suite Personal favourites from the evening, both Debussy pieces and the encores, which were Debussy's 'la fille au cheveux de lin ' and a Benny Goodman solo (not sure which) on the clarinet. The hall was fairly full and show well received, so all in all a good warm up for the duo's later concert at Cadogan Hall, London on 28 th May. Back to something a l...