Farnham Chamber Music Club

Making Music at Home

Audrey — Wed, 23 May 2012 16:34:18 +0000

On Sunday we held the club’s annual party, at which members played their usual eclectic mix of music in an informal concert. this was followed by drinks and ‘bring and share’ finger food. Some members had brought a guest along and one lady commented that she was encouraged to hear the wide range of music performed, as she had thought that a ‘chamber music club’ sounded rather ‘high-brow’.

The perception of this form of music-making as being somehow elitist is a modern phenomenon. The term simply means small-scale music that can be performed in a domestic setting. Most of the classical music composed for small ensembles was written for a patron to perform, or have performed, in his or her home. It is, I think, the most satisfying way of making music.

Most of the music performed in our concerts is first explored by members getting together in their own homes to try it out. Some of the repertoire shared in this way doesn’t make it into a concert program. The pieces that do are still performed in an intimate, large drawing room type of setting, in the lovely converted barn at Quinnettes.

In the past, there has been a lot of music-making going on in the club purely for the satisfaction of members, with no intention of offering it for a concert programme. Recent years, though, have seen less of this aspect of club activity, so we are now creating an “At Home” list of members who want to revive it. It is an opportunity for members who do participate regularly in concerts to share other repertoire which, for one reason or another, they do not feel is right for a concert. It also allows those who are new to ensemble playing to familiarise themselves with the demands made by groups of varying instrumentation and to discover new repertoire. When it comes to making music, there’s ‘no place like home!’

New Season of Club Concerts

Audrey — Sat, 08 Oct 2011 11:24:27 +0000

The new concert season is upon us! The first concert for 2011-2012 is on Sunday, 16th October, and here, hot off the press, is the programme:

Liszt Petrach: Sonetto No.123 Piano

Schubert: Der Wanderer Op. 4 No.1, An Die Musik Op. 88 No. 4, Litanei auf das Fest Aller Seelen DV 343 Bass & Piano

Frederic Mompou: El Carrer, El Guitarista, Ei el Vell Cavall (from ‘Suburbis’) Piano

Crusell: Quartet Op. 7 in D major Clarinet, Violin, Viola, Cello,

Rachmaninov: Vocalise Op 34, no 14 Clarinet & Piano

Enjoy!

p.s. As usual, the concert takes place at Quinnettes, Farnham Road, Churt, GU10 2NU, and commences at 7.30 pm. For full details of the location, see: Location

Amateur Chamber Musicians Festival

Audrey — Sun, 22 May 2011 21:10:44 +0000

Those readers who chance upon this blog from the ‘other side of the pond’ may be interested to hear of this year’s inaugural “Amateur Chamber Musicians Festival”, at Manhattan School of Music. Sadly, I only heard of it today, so it’s too late for this year, but you may like to look out for it next year. This year’s Artistic Directors are Linda Chesis and David Geber.

The idea of the festival is to give experienced adult amateur musicians the opportunity to study, rehearse and perform repertoire with professional chamber musicians. One participant has described it as ‘fabulous’ , with a “wonderful choice of music and superb teaching.” It’s a very full week, with around 5 hours of rehearsal/coaching each day and evening activities including Alexander technique, performance psychology and opportunities to attend concerts in New York. A very special opportunity for amateur musicians! See the MSM website.

http://acmf.msmnyc.edu/home.aspx

Slow It Down A Bit!

Audrey — Wed, 13 Apr 2011 13:28:19 +0000

Very often, when amateur players finally locate the sheet music for pieces they have heard on CD and are longing to tackle themselves, they find that, although they can have a good stab at playing the notes, they are not able to sustain a tempo appropriate for ensemble performance. This is the time to remember the advice of teachers: “Practise with a metronome, beat to beat, bar to bar, etc.; practise passages of continuous semiquavers in different rhythms and articulations; start at a slow speed and increase the tempo by just a couple of ticks at a time”.

Before attempting to play with a group, it is rewarding and encouraging to play along with a professional recording and, thanks to technology, it is now possible to slow the speed of an audio CD without changing the pitch. Some CD recorders can do this but a hardware solution is expensive. Happily, there are also several software applications that will do this. Possibly the best is “Amazing Slow Downer.” This program works with your CD-ROM drive or MP3/Wave/WMA/Ogg/FLAC/AAC/M4A files on your hard disk and does all processing in real-time. It can also change the pitch up or down in semi-tones or fine-tune in cents (100ths of a semi-tone) to suit your instrument. Preset configurations can be saved, as can processed and karaoke recordings. See: http://www.ronimusic.com/

Practice Support for Amateur Chamber Music

Audrey — Wed, 23 Mar 2011 13:27:18 +0000

It’s a great help when preparing a new piece to be able to hear how one’s part goes and there is a wealth of chamber music freely available online in MIDI format. This is synthesized music, sometimes converted from live performance data. The full score can be played back or individual parts can be muted. In this format, we can change the tempo of a piece without affecting the pitch, so it can be slowed down to a suitable practice speed. The music can also be transposed to any key.

Most midifiles can be listened to online with the default media player on the computer but if we wish to edit files in the ways suggested here, we need a midi-player. For Windows, the excellent VanBasco Karaoke Player can be downloaded from http://www.vanbasco.com. A selection of MAC players will be found at http://www.macmusic.org/software/cat.php/lang/en/id/7013/

One of the best sources of music in MIDI format is on the Classical Archives site. This is THE classical music site, where you can also listen to radio and buy mp3 files, listen to audio samples and read interesting articles and interviews with classical performers. Free limited membership of the site allows the user to stream music limited to 1-minute clips, purchase MP3 downloads (at full price) and download 5 free MIDI files per day. For a reasonably priced subscription, one can listen to full works in audio and download 100 midifiles per day

String players may also be interested in the midifiles available from Pat White’s collection at http://stringsound.com Clarinet players will find much music at http://www.woodwind.org/clarinet/Music/index.html and flute players should visit http://www4.osk.3web.ne.jp/~kasumitu/eng.htm

Happy hunting!

A Great Resource for Amateur Players!

Audrey — Mon, 14 Feb 2011 13:36:11 +0000

This link, suggested by Frances, is a very interesting one! The International Music Score Library Project at http://imslp.org aims, eventually, to provide music scores of all public domain music, free of charge, online. People who have scanned scores which are in the public domain, or own the copyright of works they are prepared to make freely available, contribute them to the project. Compositions can be searched under various categories, currently: Composers, Arrangers, Editors, Librettists, Translators, Nationality, Time period, Work genre.

There is a music blog, The ISMLP Journal with extremely varied and interesting content and Forums, where contributors and users can discuss a variety of topics.

These links should prove a great resource for club members and amateur or professional musicians of all kinds. Enjoy!

Mozart Chamber Music Concert

Audrey — Thu, 18 Nov 2010 00:24:22 +0000

The club’s next concert, on 21st November, is Mozart-themed evening and it’s very much a clarinet affair – well, Mozart was very enamoured of the instrument! So, we have a positive cornucopia of clarinets. There is the well-known trio, K498, for clarinet, viola and piano but also several fragments for clarinet/s and strings. Some of the pieces involve bassethorns, a form of clarinet favoured by Mozart but now rather a rarity, so the evening offers an unusual opportunity to hear Mozart’s music played by instruments closer in sound to those of his own time. The programme also includes Nocturne K438 and Canzonetta K549 for soprano, mezzo-soprano and bassethorn trio. See the full programme at www.fcmc.org.uk.

Chamber Music Concert, 17th October

Audrey — Sat, 09 Oct 2010 15:02:26 +0000

Here are the details of the treats club members have in store for us on 17th October -a lovely varied programme, as usual!

FARNHAM CHAMBER MUSIC CLUB
At Quinnettes, Churt

Sunday 17^th October at 7.30pm

Handel – two arias from Samson (trombone & piano)
Total Eclipse, Honour and Arms

Debussy – Claire de lune (piano)

Robert Johnson (c1583-1633) – Come heavy sleep (Lute & voice)
Alonso Mudarra (c1510-1580) – Claros y Rescos Rio
John Dowland (1563-1626) – His Golden Locks
Alfonso Ferrabosco the younger (c1575-1628) –
Come my Cecilia

Brahms Op 118 for solo piano (piano)
Romance & Ballade

Spohr – three of Six German Songs Op 103 (soprano, clarinet and piano)
Zwiegesan, Sehnsucht, Wiegenlied

Chopin – Introduction, theme & variations sur un air (piano)
allemend

New Season of Amateur Chamber Music

Audrey — Tue, 21 Sep 2010 15:43:57 +0000

After the summer break, club members are gearing up for the first concert of the 2010-2011 series. This takes place on 17th October, at 7.30 pm. There are very few places where one has the opportunity to listen to the amazingly varied programmes of chamber music that we enjoy at club concerts and this first concert is eagerly anticipated!

Quinnettes, the 15th century barn where our concerts take place, is “about as close as anyone can get to the drawing rooms where this music would originally have been performed”, so it is a lovely environment in which to share the pieces we have been preparing.

Concert dates for October 2010 to May 2011 are as follows:

October 17th
November 21st
December 12th
January 16th
February 20th
March 20th
April 17th
May 15h

Visitors are welcome to come along to a concert , to meet us and get the feel of things before signing up as a player or listener (annual membership: £15).

We look forward to seeing you there!