Monthly Archives: April 2013

Feast Of Fiddles – April 2013

Experience: 10/10

Venue: Clair Hall, Haywards Heath

Date: Thursday 4th April 2013

This was fantastic! The fiddle line-up consisted of Peter Knight, Garry Blakely, Ian Cutler, Brian McNeill, Phil Beer, Tom Leary and Chris Leslie. The rest of the band were the usual suspects – a great combo.

They started off with some tunes, then more tunes – sorry, they didn’t give us the names and I’m not that familiar with their repertoire – and then Hugh actually said hello to us. He mentioned the new CD Rise Above It (we’d already spotted it, and bought our copy) and after Lochanside to Maribor*, Garry did his solo spot: Sons Of The Soil*, with Peter, High and Brian doing the backing vocals. Garry then introduced Tom Leary, who arrived with Chris Leslie, and the trio then did three tunes, with Chris playing a woodwind instrument which had a lovely haunting sound. There was a minor problem with feedback, soon sorted, and they began again. One of the tunes was called Tartan Slippers.

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The Captain of Köpenick – April 2013

Experience: 7/10

By Carl Zuckmayer, new English version by Ron Hutchinson

Directed by Adrian Noble

Venue: Olivier Theatre

Date: Wednesday 3rd April 2013

I wasn’t sure what this would be like, but as we’ll be seeing Arturo Ui again this year at Chichester, this seemed like a good play to contrast with it. They started on an empty stage with a black background which had a working clock projected onto it; according to this clock the performance began at ten to seven. Lots of prisoners came on stage and formed up into rows, singing a hymn. There was some dialogue at this point, but the music was too loud for us to make out much of it. At the end of the song, two of the prisoners were due for release, but there was a problem. One of the prisoners had the correct papers but the other, Voigt, had none.  There followed some amusing exchanges as the Prison Director didn’t want to free Voigt until he got his papers but the guard refused to take him back as there weren’t any papers authorising his return to prison. Eventually the Director was distracted by memories of his time in battle, and Voigt was released into the care of Kalle, the other prisoner being released and Voigt’s friend.

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