Festival 2009 - the Director’s cut

There was a time, back in the dark days of Autumn 2008, when Hege and I thought Loch Shiel 2009 would probably just consist of a long weekend. The bank balance was looking pale, official funding bodies tight-lipped. I was starting to think that my own violin would be providing the only entertainment. So what went right?

Well, you’ve got Sue, Scott and Lucy to thank for ensuring that the festival ran until Friday – they weren’t available earlier – and Jubovski for starting us off on the Saturday – they couldn’t do later! Thereafter we felt compelled to fill the remaining time in as best we could...

Jubovski got the week off to a storming start. I’d worked extensively with Jub (the bass player) back in the 90s, and the other two a couple of times, so I knew that we’d be in for at least an interesting evening. It was far more than that - it was magic, cheeky, inspired and uplifting. The trio were kind enough to let me join in on a couple of their numbers - we had a few minutes’ anti-rehearsal in the afternoon, after which it was agreed that in any case the performance wouldn’t be anything like that. I was also pleased that I managed to smuggle a piece of serious, hard-line contemporary music into the programme (Finnissy, always one of my favourite of today’s composers) – and nobody seemed to mind... it won’t be the last time...

Slightly more genteel pleasures awaited at the other end of the loch on Sunday. Jamie Macdougall, accompanied by the excellent Bill Lloyd (the only Festival artist with four consecutive Ls in his name) was on enchanting form with some of Haydn’s Burns settings, while the Edinburgh Quartet showed us inside two of Haydn’s sublime op. 64 quartets. They then played a recital at Glenfinnan the following day which included Matyas Seiber's gorgeous Quartetto Lirico.

Tuesday saw Glenfinnan Church packed out for a combination of true trumpet virtuosity and good old-fashioned variety entertainment – Mark Kesel, with Ian Westley at the piano, playing two suitcases full of trumpets and related objects. I particularly enjoyed “Some Enchanted Evening”, played with great sensitivity on the flugelhorn - the first time either one of those or any music by Richard Rodgers have been heard at this festival, I’m pretty sure. Open-air foyer music beforehand was provided by a couple of local students, and very good they were too.

Wednesday was the closest we got to my fears of having to play all the music in the festival myself – Robin Holloway’s Sonata for Solo Violin lasts 25 minutes and stretches the instrument in pretty much all the ways it can be stretched while remaining listenable. The intention had been for the Elgar Sonata to provide some luxurious relief afterwards; unfortunately as the piano (in the Salen Hotel) was over a semitone flat it was a pretty strenuous experience for Jill (Morton) and myself. Passion, and Elgar’s haunting score, did however manage to triumph over circumstance!

Thursday was one of the best days of the week – a walk on Morar Sands, just down from the hotel where Arnold Bax spent his 1930s winters, in brilliant sunshine, followed by a magnificent dinner back at the Prince’s House, Glenfinnan, where Bax’s biographer Lewis Foreman gave what seemed like a lightning tour of Bax’s life in photos, commentary and music – it did in fact last over an hour, but you’d have thought more like 20 minutes. I will however try to avoid, in future years, allowing people to have such a good time without listening to any live music.

Friday’s concert was just wonderful. I’d been looking for an excuse to invite the Frank/Dickinson/Wakeford trio back since their gorgeous Debussy performance in 2006, and when Rob Fairley (www.room13scotland.com) requested a concert featuring Arnold Bax, they were an obvious choice. It’s an inspired combination, flute viola & harp; at times it sounds like a bonsai symphony orchestra, and the range of the three instruments is astonishing. So we got three major Bax works, the Debussy (again) and a couple of little lollipops by Telemann (unfairly neglected in confectionery circles) and Rachmaninov.

Where on earth could you find a concert like that, apart from here?

What’s on the cards for 2010? I can’t possibly tell you very much at this point – except except that we will be actively seeking to overturn the rule that says concerts are only worthwhile if there are more people in the audience than on stage...

Charles Mutter