The Phantasm consort, plus Elizabeth Kenny, giving us works by William Lawes and Matthew Locke, court musicians both, between them spanning most of the seventeenth century and with Lawes managing to get himself killed, fighting for king and country, in 1645.
On the way, noticing for the first time a cross in a kerb in Cavendish Square, along the lines to those noticed last year at reference 3. This being after coffee, smarties and not your grandma's Australian Riesling from the All-Bar-One in nearby Regent Street.
For a change, we were sat quite near the front, on the left, just behind the BBC producer's desk. A small, elderly brown-wood table which had a quaintly Heath Robinson look about it, with its rather heterogeneous collection of electrical odds and ends needed by the producer. Near enough that we could hear her mumbling into her microphone for the benefit of the radio audience while the viols tuned up. A business which seemed to take up a lot more time than it would, for example, for a string quartet - and with the story being that the tuning used for viols was a lot more tricky, not helped by their going out of tune very easily and rather quickly. Modern tempering not having been invented in the seventeenth century, or at least, not having percolated to England. This despite Charles I's extensive patronage of the arts. Ruinous even.
Some speculations arising from all the viols being played upright, in the way of a cello, rather than under the chin, in the way of a violin. With the underarm playing looking oddly awkward to the untrained eye - and it is certainly true that overarm throwing (of baseball) is much stronger than underarm throwing (of rounders). On the other hand, it seems that string players can hold their arms out straight - a game we used to play with the children - for vastly longer than anyone else.
All good stuff, but I think that I would have preferred to be a little further away, to get a more blended sound.
Down to the basement, not busy at all, unlike the last time that we were there when it was full. See reference 4. I had an Italian take on lentil soup, nothing like the lentil soup I made and certainly involving plenty of tomato. But perfectly satisfactory, none the less. Followed by salmon fish cakes. Followed by something described as a rhubarb and almond tart, but which turned out to be a wedge of almond and raspberry jam tart with a dab of rhubarb on the side. All in all, another good meal.
Enlivened by a party near us who did not seem to be musical at all, much more the sort of party one would expect to encounter at the seaside - but unfortunately we were not near enough to pick up from where they were actually from and I had not drunk enough to have had the brass to ask them. While most of the front of house staff were at their lunch by the time that we left and were slightly embarrassed to be caught tucking into something which looked like it came from the nearby Pret. One would have thought that a restaurant would manage to find something more suitable for eating in front of the punters.
On to a quick run around the Wallace collection. Struck by the coquettish posing of the two farm girls in the Rubens' landscape. Also by the officer standing behind his firing line in some battle in a painting by Vernet. Enjoyed the Guardi, which made a nice change from our more usual diet of Hampton Court Canaletto. Quick peek at the Fragonard swing and the crowd in front of it. An interesting painting, but I don't understand why it is so popular - it is not as if there is not plenty of other good stuff in the vicinity.
And so into Bond Street tube station to jubilee it back to Waterloo.
Reference 1: http://www.phantasm.org.uk/. From which I have taken the illustration to this post.
Reference 2: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cambrian_explosion.
Reference 3: http://psmv3.blogspot.co.uk/2016/06/bentinck-street.html.
Reference 4: http://psmv3.blogspot.co.uk/2017/04/art.html.
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