New art-song recital series at Pizza Express' The Pheasantry in Chelsea

The Pheasantry, King's Road, Chelsea

Apart from the obvious, Pizza Express is perhaps best known for its links to cabaret and jazz with its three different music venues in London. But things are expanding and at The Pheasantry in the King's Road, Chelsea, they are presenting a new monthly series of classical song recitals curated by the pianist William Vann (who is music director of the Royal Hospital, Chelsea, just down the road).

The first concert in the series is on Tuesday 8 January 2019 and demonstrates the seriousness of the enterprise as Vann accompanies bass Matthew Rose in Schubert's Winterreise. I heard Rose performing Winterreise just before he recorded his fine account of the work [available from Amazon] and am looking forward to hearing him in the work again.

Further ahead, the recital series includes soprano Julia Sitkovetsky, mezzo-soprano Martha McLorinan and William Vann in an evening of Russian song focusing on the songs of Rachmaninov (7 February 2019) and, baritone Gareth Brymor John and William Vann in The Children's Hour (6 March 2019), a programme of songs for and about children with music by Brahms, Howells, Ives, Lehmann, Loewe, Mendelssohn, Schubert, Schumann, Stanford and Warlock, culminating in Richard Rodney Bennett's 2002 cycle Songs before Sleep with texts taken from the Oxford Book of Nursery Rhymes, but Bennett's approach to the texts very definitely leaves childish things behind.

Full details from the Pizza Express website.