music & art
FOCUS: Music Cat Groom, our new Director of Music, reports
Anne Denholm, Harpist to HRH The Prince of Wales, made Fitz her first port of call after playing at the Royal Wedding in May 2018. Anne regaled us with music ranging from Grace Williams’ glorious Hiraeth to John Metcalf’s splendidly bananas Dance from Kafka’s Chimp. Pop-Up Opera, founded by alumna Clementine Lovell (Arch & Anth 2000), returned to Fitz in November 2017 with Humperdinck’s Hansel and Gretel. The Fitzwilliam String Quartet have continued to be regular performers at Fitz, most recently of Shostakovich’s mesmeric E flat minor Quartet no. 15. An evening entitled ‘Encounters with Persian verse, art and music’ featured soprano Abi Crook (Law 2016) with the renowned Ligeti String Quartet and harpist Keziah Thomas performing music by Seb Blount (Music 2015). An academic lecture on early Persian poetry as well as good food and contemporary art also contributed to a miniature festival brought to a breathtaking close by the amazing duo Nasim-e Tarab. Monday evening informal FCMS recitals have been successful and well-supported by both performers and audiences. P22 FITZWILLIAM COLLEGE NEWSLETTER
Repertoire has ranged from solo Bach to the comedy songs of Flanders & Swann, via Chopin and Shrek! More formal student concerts in the Auditorium and Chapel have included several themed concerts of solo vocal music; a lecture recital on Schubert’s keyboard writing by Pierre Riley; and a solo piano recital by Simon King. A largescale concert of original orchestral music by student composers was held in Lent Term, co-ordinated by Seb Blount and featuring his spectacularly sonorous work The Funeral Rites of King Skjöldr along with Abigail Birch’s evocative The Labyrinth of Sallertaine. With two countertenors active in College musical life this year, programming Purcell’s double-countertenor showcase Come, Come Ye Sons of Art Away was irresistible. The College’s community of legators was the lucky audience, and Isaac Jarratt-Barnham (Philosophy 2014) and Adam Fyfe (Classics 2016) were aided and abetted by an all-Fitz cast of singers and players. A termly Graduate Salon has been reintroduced, and contributions have ranged from poetic recitations in Italian to duo improvisation for Celtic harp and Indian tabla, the latter played by the extraordinarily gifted Bye-Fellow Dr Deepak Venkateshvaran, breaking from his day job as an internationally-respected research physicist. In-house activity by the College’s resident student ensembles has included performances at Winter Wonderland and at the FCMS Summer Garden Party by the Barbershop, the Sirens and Fitz Swing, and the Cheese and Wine evening held by the Sirens with support from a Fitz mixed a cappella quartet and from Simon King at the Steinway giving us themes from the movies. Fitz Swing also performed an exceedingly well-attended
John Cleaver
On 22 May 2018 Fitz’s student musicians welcomed Senyor Josep Carreras to his Honorary Fellowship with a concert of Catalan music performed in the Chapel. A collective of singers accompanied by medieval harp and a battery of percussion instruments presented a catchy set of pilgrimage songs from medieval Montserrat. Pierre Riley (PhD Music 2016) and Simon King (Chemical Engineering 2017) performed some exquisitely poetic Mompou piano miniatures, and Rob Nicholas (NatSci 2016), Hannah Sherry (MML 2017) and Richard Bateman (PhD English 2013) gave Soler’s Fandango a spirited rendering.
evening Auditorium gig of their own in Michaelmas Term. The Orchestra on the Hill (with several Fitz members including Pierre Riley as directing soloist) and the newly-formed Hill Chorus both performed at Fitzwilliam this year. Outreach has continued to be an important element of music at Fitz, and we’ve once again hosted workshops for young string players from Martin Outram and Akiko Ono along with the Young Women’s Conducting Workshop, and a visit from Cambridge Youth Opera. For all things music at Fitzwilliam and to find out more about Cat Groom, visit: www.fitz.cam.ac.uk/music