Open Academy collaborates with Resonate Arts to host a series of monthly concerts, held this year on Friday afternoons. The concerts, titled ‘Music for the Moment’ are split between St Marylebone Parish Church and Wigmore Hall, and particularly welcome people living with dementia, and their friends, family, and carers, to come and listen to students from the Academy. Refreshments are served before and after the concert, with audience members given the opportunity to chat afterwards with the performers.
‘Music for the Moment’ has featured two concerts since the start of the academic year. On Friday 30 September, flautist Jessica Scott performed in St Marylebone Parish Church, accompanied on piano by Academy alumna, Yana Khvan. Jessica is one of the Open Academy fellows for this academic year, following the completion of her postgraduate degree at the Academy during the summer.
Jessica’s programme featured works by Mozart and Telemann alongside Debussy’s Syrinx for Solo Flute and Forest Bell Birds by Carlson. The concert was supported by staff from the church, and pupils from St Marylebone CE School for Girls.
On Friday 4 November, the second concert in the series was hosted at Wigmore Hall. This concert featured the Kyan Quartet who are this year’s Open Academy/Wigmore Hall Learning Fellowship Ensemble. This fellowship enables the Kyan Quartet to participate in activities with both Wigmore Hall and Open Academy. The concert featured works including Haydn’s String Quartet Op. 33 no. 3, ‘The Bird’ and an exciting rendition of Jessie Montgomery’s Strum.
This was the group’s debut performance at Wigmore Hall as a quartet, and violinist Naomi Warburton commented that “the warmth and support of the audience made us feel completely at home. It was also such a rare joy to have spontaneous applause between movements of pieces. After the concert we got to share our love of music in conversation with audience members, and this brought together the feeling of connection that we had with everyone throughout the afternoon.”
The next ‘Music for the Moment’ concert will take place on Friday 2nd December at Wigmore Hall. The concert will feature Academy vocalists Harriet Cameron (Soprano) and Thomas Fesmer (Bass), accompanied on piano by Yupeng He. For more information and to book your free ticket, please click this link.