Duo Beasoleil 15 Mar 25
Well that was different! We celebrated our strategic partnership with Live Music Now (Scotland) by being the venue for their 5th and final celebration of their 40th anniversary with a reception and concert on Saturday 15th March - the “Ides of March”. Despite the potentially inauspicious date the “Ides” were kind to us and we enjoyed the company of a group from Munich, where Yehudi Menuin had originally set up Live Music Now. They also provided Duo Beasoleil (Giuliano Loli Piano and Matthias Well Violin) who took us from popular classics to gipsy Jazz, a great segway into our next concert by Rose Room in Gasta at the end of April.
The attendance was slightly larger than average at 58, but sadly few accepted the offer of free food and wine before the event. A good evening was nevertheless enjoyed by guests and regular attendees.
Skye Chamber Music presented a concert entitled ‘Get Your Act Together: Stories on Stage’ performed by Flutes and Frets supported by Making Music’s Philip and Dorothy Green Young Artist Scheme on Wed 19th Feb. Few in the audience knew what to expect when they arrived at St Columba’s Church. What a treat awaited us. A young duo of talented musicians, Beth Stone and Danny Murphy, took us through 600 years of music from Gregorian chants to Stephen Sondheim’s ‘A Little Night Music’ by way of Renaissance pieces, to the Baroque era and on to Rossini and Greig. The music was enhanced by being played on traditional instruments with Beth, on flutes, introducing us to 4 different instruments from Renaissance to modern, while Danny moved from lute to theorbo and then to 19th Century guitar and then modern. Each instrument was described by the player and the evolution of the music explained. The enthusiasm and passion of the performances shone through and the we left both entertained and educated.
Nikita Lukinov 25 Jan 25
The 9th annual Classical Celebration organised by Skye Chamber Music took place in the Fingal Centre on Thursday 12th December. The focus of the evening was to provide a platform for local musicians to perform classical music in small groups, whilst the audience enjoyed a ‘Glyndebourne in Skye’ experience bringing their “posh picnic” to brilliantly decorated tables.
It was a superb evening which would not have been possible without the fantastic work of all the musicians who took part. Alan Donald (Viola), Meg Rosher (Flute), Bar Purser (Cello) and Roxine Llewelyn-Porter (violin) played in various groupings with Peter McLaren and Jacqui Ross at the piano. We heard Bach, Goldberg, Mozart and more and the standard of their music was outstanding. This year for the first time we also offered a platform to High School music pupils as, unfortunately, their performance evening had been cancelled. We heard from Lucia Ceccini Fraser, Matilda Ng and Ruairidh James with brilliant pieces played on our community Bechstein Piano. Carel Goodheir gave us a recitation of Lord Lundy which went down particularly well with the younger members of the audience!
Annie MacDonald (Staffin), who is in her final year at the Royal Conservatoire in London, completed the evening singing three arias for us accompanied by Elaine Ferguson, and also gave us a Gaelic song from her MOD repertoire!
The whole evening was brought together brilliantly by Gilleasbuig Ferguson, in his element letting us know about the musicians, their prowess and the pieces they were playing, including the rarity of some of the music.
Feedback from the audience was overwhelmingly positive, and the youngsters attending were very well behaved!
Skye Chamber Music aims to continue to expand the evening in future years, moving away from the busy Christmas period.
