Concert pianist Lieselotte van Tol and I are busy working on a new programme of English Song, including works by Britten, Amy Summers, Vaughan Williams, and Michael Head. We have concerts planned in Leiden, Rotterdam, and Schiedam: watch this space for more information!
I love singing with Simple Harmonic Motion, a band who use rock instruments to create symphonic soundscapes for classical music, as well as their own tone poems.
I’ve recorded two LPs with them: “Fantasia” and “Variations.” The label, Floating World Records, has prepared an album called “Voices in a Modern Style” which is to be released on limited edition purple vinyl. I am so excited about this and I can’t wait to see the LP!
We had a concert in Hatherop in the Cotswolds to celebrate the LP, together with Cotswold Voices, and there are more concerts planned in the coming year. Do watch this space and follow Simple Harmonic Motion on Facebook for more information.
To buy the album directly from the record label, follow this link.
This year I was honoured to be invited by the Australian Ambassador to the Netherlands, His Excellency Dr. Greg French, to sing the ANZAC Day ceremony in The Hague. He chose two poignant songs that were fitting: the first, the ANZAC version of “I am Australian” which is about how remembrance can unite people, and the second, “A Song for Grace,” which is the personal story of a lady who lost her brother in the war. You can listen in the video below.
There were over 250,000 casualties in the Battle of Arras. For perspective, that is the equivalent of the entire population of Brighton or Aberdeen. It was brutal: characteristic of the First World War it was men and boys fighting against machines, machines designed to obliterate.
Some 24,000 allied troops spent their last night in the tunnels under Arras, rushing out before dawn on 9th April into the first day of battle. Each year, at dawn on 9th April, ambassadors and representatives of the nations involved in the battle gather for a dawn ceremony at the Wellington Tunnels. This year there were representatives from New Zealand as the tunnels were dug by largely Māori tunnelers.
The ceremony included readings of letters and diaries: it focused on the experiences and memories of those who fought in the battle., not on politics or victories My two songs were also from the First World War. It was poignant to see the peaceful sunrise knowing the hell the men went through in 1917.
Dutch concert pianist Willem Brons is a national treasure, still performing in the famous Concertgebouw in his eighties and giving master classes as far afield as Japan. It was an honour to join him and the Leidse Cantorij under the direction of his nephew, Hans, to perform Liszt’s Via Crucis. In contrast to his more flamboyant style, Liszt’s stations of the cross are intimate and bare, sometimes with a single line in the piano. Willem’s rendition captured the intense suffering of Jesus and, at the end, the fragile gimmer of hope.
Together with singers Nataliia Cioban and Marnie Baumer, I joined the Band of Liberation for a fundraising concert for their trip to Normandy this June. The band will support ceremonies of one of the British Parachute Regimental Association. Although I won’t be able to join them in Normandy, I was glad to support their tour by singing during their concert in Leiden’s City Hall: it was so much fun sharing the stage with Nataliia and Marnie!
This spring I’ll be singing at several wonderful events.
On Palm Sunday, I’ll join concert pianist Willem Brons, a national treasure in the Netherlands, to perform Liszt’s “Via Crucis.” Liszt is well-known for his flamboyant piano music, but “Via Crucis” is much more intimate and vulnerable: it’s a very powerful piece.
I’ll travel to Arras in northern France to sing for the commemoration of the Battle of Arras which took place 109 years ago. The ceremony will take place at dawn at the Wellington Tunnels where many of the allied soldiers involved in the attack spent their last night.
On ANZAC Day I’ll be singing in CWGC Ockenburg in the Netherlands during a dawn ceremony organised by the Australian Embassy to the Netherlands.
Then on 29th April I’ll launch my new LP with Simple Harmonic Motion, “Voices in a Modern Style,” in a beautiful church in the Cotswolds in the heart of England. For more information and tickets, please follow this link.
But first, I’ll be singing during a fund raising concert to support a Dutch band who plan to travel to Normandy to support the ceremonies of the Parachute Regiment over D-Day, on 28th March in Leiden’s City Hall.