CD Review

Just in case you have a spare hour in the next fortnight, I was delighted to make my radio debut on Radio 3's CD Review a couple of weekends ago, talking about some new French chamber music recordings.

There's some lovely music to be heard, including two recordings of Franck's Violin Sonata, a disc exploring Chopin's Cello Sonata and music by Franchomme, the great French cellist who inspired him, another showcasing French clarinet music on period instruments, and to round things off, countertenor Philippe Jaroussky turning his velvety tones to French mélodie. And later on, there's JS Bach's St Matthew Passion to conclude the programme. Here's the link:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b05pqp68

Chopin in Mallorca

On holiday in Mallorca a fortnight ago, I visited Valldemossa, the village in the mountains where Chopin spent a winter between 1838-1839, and worked on his Preludes. It wasn't a happy time for Chopin or his lover, the novelist George Sand. But despite their problems, Sand still found some solace in this corner of the island:

'When the sight of mud and fog in Paris makes me miserable, I close my eyes and see again, as if in a dream, that green mountain, those fawn coloured rocks, and that solitary palm tree lost in a pink sky … It is one of those views that completely overwhelm one, for it leaves nothing to be desired and nothing to the imagination. All that a poet or a painter might dream of, Nature has created here.'

Pictured above is the view the pair enjoyed from the empty Carthusian monastery where they rented rooms for most of their stay. 'Chopin's cell', as the museum now describes it, might be cold and stark, but the view must have made up for it – you get a sense of the landscape's green lushness, despite its rockiness, and its expansive sweep, in the photo above, even though it was taken in cloudy weather. And just below the wall, out of shot, were trees replete with oranges.