Salon Tuesdays - a musical haven in the midst of the city

Sarah Gabriel and Oliver Gerrish

Frodo and Titania...

Soprano Sarah Gabriel and I set up Salon Tuesdays at The Georgian Group three years ago with an inaugural concert with Christopher Suckling's Abbandonata. We performed to a full house and it was a thrill for the three of us to be reunited after we had met some months before when Christopher directed Hasse's Artaserse, in which Sarah played Mandane and I the evil lead Arabano. It was wonderful to have a chamber instrumental ensemble of such calibre in the Georgian elegance of Number Six Fitzroy Square.
During this concert we performed rarely heard cantatas by Handel and Corelli sonatas.

Sarah Gabriel rehearsing a mad Handel cantata with Chris Suckling playing and directing

Abbandonata - minus director/cello Chris

Harpsichordist Erik Dippenaar

These Robert Adam rooms were tailor-made for this sort of music and have now had more musicians in them in the last three years than probably for over a hundred years before that. In the winter the candles are lit, the tree decorated and the atmosphere is cosy, in the summer the sun streams through the fourteen foot high sash windows and illuminates the grand rooms.

Oliver Gerrish, Sarah Gabriel and Erik Dippenaar

Harpsichordist Nathaniel Mander

Bass Matthew Altman, Nathaniel Mander, Sarah Gabriel, Oliver Gerrish and tenor Ben Fleetwood Smyth

Since forming Salon Tuesdays with Sarah we have had the honour to perform alongside some of the best musicians of our generation; harpsichordists Erik Dippenaar, Nathaniel Mander, Christopher Bucknall and Oliver-John Ruthven, trumpeter Simon Desbruslais, violinists Oliver Webber and Davina Clarke, amongst others, tenor Ben Fleetwood Smyth and countertenor Raffaele Pe...to name just a few of them.

Harpsichordist Oliver-John Ruthven

Violinist Davina Clarke makes order out of disorder!

Countertenor Raffaele Pe giving some rest the thumbs-up!

Countertenors Oliver Gerrish and Raffaele Pe

Raffaele Pe - Italian singing and fashion from Milan!

Oliver Gerrish - hoping the garish tie will take people's attention away from some of his Italian!!

Sarah Gabriel and harpsocordist Chris Bucknall

Pre Salon Tuesday's Christmas Concert 2012

Trumpeter Simon Desbruslais

Salon Tuesdays, I hope, combines music, setting and socialising to create an evening quite unlike most in London. There is no starchiness; here is real music, freshly presented in a building built for chamber ensembles.

ENCORE!!

The next Salon Tuesday is on Tuesday 26th February at 7.30 pm, 6 Fitzroy Square, London, W1T 5DX. It will feature Soprano Philippa Murray, countertenor Oliver Gerrish and harpsichordist Katie De La Matter.

Tickets on the door: £20, £15 for Young Georgians (includes some wine!)

For more information about the Georgian Group please go to www.georgiangroup.org.uk

                        All images in this blog are under the copyright ownership of Oliver Gerrish