Requiem Archives » Angelina Egerton

Remembrance, York Minster and birthdays!

14 November 2013 No Comments

Last Saturday I was playing the Faure Requiem in York Minster with York Musical Society. I seem to be flitting over the Yorkshire/Lancashire border very regularly at the moment, but it’s lovely to get so many chances to visit York. I arrived just in time to nab the last parking space in the tiny Minster car park, and wheeled my harp into the building. York Minster is absolutely stunning, maybe I’m biased because I’ve grown up in this city, but I think it’s just gorgeous. It has a window the size of a tennis court!

Before the concert we had a few seconds of silence for Remembrance Day. The silence was so different from the ‘silence’ you usually get at a concert – there was no shuffling, no coughing, just heavy, thick, silence. In that huge space this was absolutely amazing. Before the concert I had gone for some food with my dad, and afterwards I gave him a lift back to his car. Now, I know the roads of York… I do, honestly! So I have no idea what possessed me to turn the wrong way down a one way street. It was only the beep of a taxi driver that alerted me to the situation. So I’m sorry ladies, but I did nothing for our reputation as competent drivers that night!

This was also the week of my birthday! I couldn’t help but think of that scene in Some like it Hot where Sugar Kane (Marilyn Monroe) laments the fact that she’s turning twenty-five – ‘that’s a quarter of a century, makes a girl think’. I celebrated with a gorgeous meal out followed by some quiet drinks in town. The following day I went for a walk in Heaton Park, North Manchester. I’d never been before but it is lovely! All the people walking dogs made me really really want one of my own, one day! We got the perfect autumn day as well – sunny, and feeling crisp but not too cold. I couldn’t resist taking some snaps:

Next week is due to be another busy one, with gigs in Leeds and Nottingham. I have also added a new page to this website, ‘Upcoming Concerts’ – with details of where I’ll be playing over the next few months. Please also check out the updated site for my Harp Quartet CLOUDS as details are coming very soon of our exciting December concerts!

Harrogate revisited…

I have wondered whether or not to write about this gig, because the whole day was just pretty stressful and I try to keep negativity out of this blog. But as this whole thing is about being honest about what the music business is like, I’ve decided to include it.

Let’s start with the good:

My parents came to watch the concert – it’s always so lovely to see them and to have some supporters in the audience, someone to play for.
The playing itself was lovely, it’s music I enjoy playing – particularly the Agnus Dei from Howard Goodall’s Requiem, that’s a really nice part to play.
There was wine in the interval.

Ok that’s done, onto the rest of the day:

Harrogate, despite being a small town, seems really difficult to find your way around – due to all the one-way systems that my sat-nav is too old to know.
Once I’d found the church I had to unload, up a few steps but no big deal. The next task was to find a car park.
Found one! Full.
Found another one! The machine gave me a ticket before letting me in and I dropped it on the floor! So embarrassing, I had to actually stop the traffic after parking to go and pick it up from where I’d dropped it.

Once I’d found my way back to the church (thank you smartphone GPS) I just turn around to put my bags down and turn back around to find a man I’ve never seen before grab my harp and say ‘ooh it’s pretty heavy isn’t it!’ Cue a rather annoyed ‘excuse me I’ll do that!’ from myself and he wanders off smiling to himself – infuriating!

The conductor – a lecturer from Leeds Uni, asked me to go to the other side of the podium once I’d got settled down – I wish he could’ve introduced himself to me and asked me to set up there when I’d first arrived. I’m pretty sure he had no idea of my name until I gave him my business card after the concert. Being referred to as ‘harp’ all day is a bit depressing. There are some more things I could say but I will leave it there.

The second half of the concert was a performance of Carmina Burana by what was frankly a gigantic choir including a school choir – I’m sure several of whom didn’t sing a single note. I watched from the front row with my parents.

Oh, and one more thing, music geeks will relate to how annoying this is. The audience applauded after every movement. I’m sure it added at least 20 minutes to the overall running time of the concert. I found the perpetrator who started the applause and glared at her several times to no avail. My mum and I couldn’t stop ourselves giggling due to the fact that my dad had brought a score along so he could sort of ‘read along’ with the concert – and he sniggered to himself every time something went wrong – in the front row. Amazing.

So after the concert all the was left to do was get paid (yay!) and drive home through what was probably the worst fog I’ve ever seen. Ever. So as you can imagine I was very relieved to arrive home to a nice glass of sherry and a catch up with the parents.