A Violin Recital by Alexandra Wood

I do a poor-enough job when writing reviews of rock and pop gigs that I wonder whether I should bother trying to review events I attend of other musical genres in which I have virtually no knowledge, such as classical concerts.

However, as Rebecca has a better background from which to suggest things to attend, I’m now getting to the odd classical concert here and there, and I’d like to keep track of what I’ve seen and whether or not I liked it. If nothing else, it will hopefully provide some wider promotion of the events.

Phew, now that’s out of the way, I can say that on Sunday we went to see a violin recital put on by the Selwyn College Music Society.

It was a fairly intimate affair, with around thirty of us gathered in the rather grand Selwyn College Hall to hear Alexandra Wood playing the violin, accompanied on the piano by Huw Watkins.

The evening’s programme ran as follows:

• Mozart - Sonata in D major K306
• Watkins - Romance
• Schumann - Sonata in A minor Op. 105
• - Interval -
• Fauré - Sonata in A major
• Bartók - Romanian Folk Dances

The pieces after the interval were my favourites, although I did enjoy all of the sonatas. Huw Watkins’ piece Romance wasn’t particularly romantic, there was a tension and drama to the music which made it seem more adversarial.

Alexandra is a very good violinist. I was quite surprised at the range of sounds that she could produce from the instrument - during one of the folk dances I could have sworn that someone was playing a penny whistle and was amazed that it was coming from the violin.