About
BIG DOUBLE REED 2011.
Another great year! Pictures, videos and news to follow shortly.
Big Double Reed Day 2010:
The stillness of the city streets near the Guildhall can quite be disconcerting at weekends. However, Sunday 10th October was a rather different affair with 342 bassoonists and oboists converging on the Silk Street premises for a challengingly early start! The line of oboe and bassoon cases bobbing down the streets made it easy for those who don’t know the Guildhall to find out where to go! And with ages covering seventy years this really was a day of celebration for everything double reed.
The BIG Double Reed Day is the brainchild of Bob Porter, Head of Wind at Junior Guildhall, Artistic Director of the Brandenburg Sinfonia and bassoonist with the London Mozart Players. You may remember last year reading about the Big Bassoon Day. This event held in February 2009 saw over 100 bassoonists gathered together for a fun packed day. The question on everybody’s lips after the success of that day was “what next?”. The answer of course - bigger and better! And so the event was thrown open to all double reeds and the news rapidly spread through emails, Facebook and an informative website - http://www.bigdoublereed.com/
With a great list of sponsors also promoting the event a higher attendance was expected but nobody had predicted this bumper attendance! These were: The Associated Board of the Royal Schools of Music; The Brandenburg Sinfonia; The British Double Reed Society; Crowthers of Canterbury; Croydon Music Service; Fox UK; The Guildhall School of Music & Drama; Howarth of London; June Emerson Wind Music; The London Symphony Orchestra; and Merton Music Foundation.
One of the challenges that these large numbers brought with it was that the larger rooms at the Guildhall were very quickly filled and the ones left could only fit smaller numbers and that meant more tutors! With a flurry of emails, texts and phone calls, professional players and teachers were drafted in and put to work. In fact the list of the “good and the great” reached fifty - see the "NEWS" page for a list of tutors
Registration started at 9.00am but a queue was already forming at 8.45 and it soon became apparent that one small entrance filled with instrument cases was what might be termed a “bottleneck”. But after the initial confusion all attendees were furnished with a fabulously stylish black “BIG Double Reed Day 2010” T shirt and sent off to different rooms in the Guildhall for the fun to begin.
Trade stands got busy fast and the foyer was filled with the sounds of players trying oboes and bassoons as well as contra rumblings. Whilst attendees ate lunch the Royal Academy of Music Bassoon Ensemble directed by John Orford alternated with the bassoon quartet “Reed Rage”.
It was then time for the main solo recitals in the main hall. First, oboes - starting with a quartet from Gareth Hulse, Katie Clemmow, Jo Lively and Alison Teale, followed by solos from Richard Simpson and Alison Teale (cor anglais) and finishing with The Oboe Band (the delightful sound of three baroque oboes and baroque bassoon).
The bassoon recital started with the young bassoon quartet Acer Saccharum back from their recent Beijing trip, followed by Meyrick Alexander, more from The Oboe Band, Karen Geogehan (playing a movement from the Rossini concerto that can be found on her latest album just released on Chandos) and finally the Royal Academy of Music Bassoon Octet.
The afternoon was dominated by masterclasses for the bassoonists and reed making for oboes (who had done their masterclasses in the morning) but this soon led to ensemble rehearsals for the final concert. By this time you would have thought all the players would have been flagging but apart from the few whisked off home early by parents, the majority were there right to the end performing in the massed ensembles. And what better way to end a day of double reed fun than a huge gathering of all ages playing Handel’s Hallelujah Chorus!
A memorable day.
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The complete list of Tutors for 2010 Big Double Reed Day was:
Meyrick Alexander, Ruth Beresford
Ruth Bolister, Rachel Broadbent
Sarah Burnett, Rosie Burton
Rhuti Carr, Katie Clemmow
Geoff Coates, Sarah Cobby
Rosie Cow, Ian Cuthill
Alex Davidson, Anna Durance
Nicola Fairbairn, Iona Garvie
Martin Gatt, Sara Grint
Tom Hardy, Paul Harris
Peter Harrison, Gail Hennessey
Graham Hobbs, Steve Hudson
Gareth Hulse, Sarah Humphreys
Nick Hunka, Ilid Jones
Robin Kennard, Jo Lively
Aisling Maguire, Stephen Maw
Cath Millar, Kim Murphy
Frances Norbury, John Orford
Emily Pailthorpe, Bronia Parry
Melanie Ragge, Helen Rawstron
Joel Raymond, Stuart Russell
Joe Saunders, Emma Selby
Richard Simpson, Rebecca Stockwell
Alison Teale, Lizzie Trigg
Laura Vincent, Rebecca Wood