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| Foyer of Wigmore Hall in 1901 when it was Bechstein Hall (Photo courtesy of Wigmore Hall) |
Like many major cities, London's concert halls are largely recent phenomenon and old halls have had a habit of disappearing. Kingsway Hall (beloved of recording companies) was deemed unsafe and demolished in the 1990s, Aeolian Hall still exists but is now Sotheby's in Bond Street, whilst the Queen's Hall in Langham Place was demolished thanks to bomb damage. But there is one hall that has stuck it out and, in terms of ambience and sound, remains thankfully unchanged. This is Wigmore Hall.
Opened as Bechstein Hall in 1901, the venue is celebrating its 125th anniversary this year. The building was designed by Thomas Collcutt (whose other buildings included the Palace Theatre and Lloyd's Register of Shipping) for piano manufacturers Bechstein to showcase their pianos, and the interior still features the mural The Soul of Music in the cupola, designed by painter and muralist Gerald Moira, as striking then as it is today.
The opening concert was on 31 May 1901, and to celebrate Wigmore Hall is having a 125th anniversary festival from 25 May to 7 June, full of all sorts of goodies. Things kick off at lunchtime on 25 May when the Modigliani Quartet joins forces with the Leonkoro Quartet, winner of the 2022 Wigmore Hall International String Quartet Competition, for Mendelssohn's Octet. The festival closes with violinist Christian Tetzlaff celebrating his 60th birthday with unaccompanied Bach, the Six Sonatas and Partitas.
There will be the launch of Julia Boyd's book, There is Sweet Music Here, celebrating 125 years of the Hall. On 31 May 1901, the opening concert featured Busoni, Ysaye and other distinguished soloists in a programme of Beethoven, Schubert, Bach, Schumann, Brahms and more. A gala concert with Thomas Adès (piano), Alina Ibragimova (violin), Cedric Tiberghien (piano), Louise Alder (soprano) and Joseph Middleton (piano) will reproduce many of the elements from that first concert, missing out the songs by Delayre, Wekerlin and Auber and adding music by Thomas Adès.
Soprano Lise Davidsen and pianist James Baillieu will be giving an all-Schubert recital on the very day of the anniversary. Another anniversary gala, the day after, features pianist Igor Levit in Ravel's Kaddisch, Shostakovich's Piano Sonata No. 2 in B minor and Liszt's Après une lecture du Dante 'Fantasia quasi Sonata'. And soprano Carolyn Sampson and pianist Joseph Middleton will be exploring songs from 1901, the year the hall was born, from Bonis, Hahn and Massenet to Strauss and Schoenberg, plus Mahler, Debussy and Charles Bordes.
The festival features two grand old men of Early Music. Jordi Savall directs his ensemble Hesperion XXI and singers from La Capella Reial de Catalunya in a programme of Monteverdi and his contemporaries, whilst William Christie directs Les Arts Florissants in Handel's Acis and Galatea.
Soprano Asmik Grigorian and pianist Lukas Geniusas create a programme that begins with Rachmaninov's Vocalise and explores that genre ending with Strauss's Four Last Songs. Baritone Christian Gerhaher and pianist Gerold Huber's programme centres around Beethoven's An die ferne Geliebte and Mahler's Lieder eines fahrenden Gesellen. Tenor Ian Bostridge and pianist Piotr Anderszewski will be performing two great Schumann cycles, Dichterliebe and Liederkreis Op. 24
The pianistic line-up also includes Alexandre Kantorow [whom we heard last month in recital in Lucerne, see my review] in Liszt, Medtner, Chopin and Beethoven; Yunchan Lim, the youngest ever winner of the Van Cliburn Competition in 2022, in fantasies by Chopin, Schumann and Schubert; Angela Hewitt in Bach, Beethoven, Haydn, Mozart and Schubert; and Lukas Sternath in Liszt and Schubert
Pianist Igor Levit also joins the Leonkoro Quartet for two programmes which include Brahms' Piano Quintet in F minor, Op.24 and Schumann's Piano Quintet in E flat, Op.44, whilst violist Tabea Zimmermann joins the Belcea Quartet for quintets by Mozart and Brahms.
London Voices, which was founded back in 1973 by Terry Edwards and which is now directed by Ben Parry, will perform Stockhausen's classic Stimmung. Vocalist Elaine Michener joins lutenist Elizabeth Kenny for a programme that mixes Dowland, Strozzi and Robert Johnson with Bob Marley, Joni Mitchell and Robert Johnson the Blues maestro. Other guests at the festival include singer, composer, fiddle player and banjo virtuoso Rhiannon Giddens, and cellist Abel Selaochoe and his Bantu Ensemble
Full details from Wigmore Hall's website.
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