Next concert: Sunday 14th February - Sean Shibe on guitar

To call Sean Shibe a natural talent would not be an exaggeration.

Aged 15, he auditioned for musical scholarships and received offers from the RSAMD, Trinity College and the Royal College of Music in London. In addition to winning international competitions, he has been described by those in the know as "spectacularly talented" (Classical Guitar Magazine) and "the finest acoustic guitarist I have ever heard" (The Herald).

The performance is at 3.30pm on Sunday 14th February 2010. Tickets cost the usual £5 for adults (free for under 16s, seniors/students £3) and are available at the door.

Next concert: Calum Huggan on marimba - Sunday 10th January 2010

Calum Huggan may only be 19 and look more like a pop star than a classical musician but this young man has been studying music since the age of four.

Starting with piano, he moved on to percussion in 2001 with Scott Arnott at Lenzie Academy. Calum subsequently auditioned succesfully to gain a place at the Royal Scottish Academy of Music and Drama Junior School. Calum is currently in his 3rd year (BMus hons) at the RSAMD.

Calum is already an accomplished performer. In 2009 he won the RSAMD Governors' Percussion competition and was invited to record a solo marimba performance for BBC Classics Unwrapped which was broadcast in July 2009 on BBC Scotland.

In July 2009, Calum gave a solo concert in the Kolberg Percussion factory after studying with Jasmin Kolberg in a private summer seminar for marimba.


Calum is very much involved in teaching and workshops; he has taught children from ages 2 to 14 in Glasgow and Aberdeen with the company "Little Larks" and he also assists with the RSAMD Early Years working with children upto 7 years of age using the Kodaly approach to experential learning.

We believe this may be the first time that the marimba has made a solo appearance in Newlands. We hope you will join us for what promises to be a unique experience.

The performance takes place at 3.30pm. Tickets are available at the door.

Next concert: Sunday 13th December

December sees Scott Mitchell (piano) paired with Yvonne Patterson (flute) performing works from Copland, Glass and Enesco amongst others.

SCOTT MITCHELL has performed widely as a chamber music pianist across three continents. He has appeared at many of the world's major music festivals, including the Edinburgh Festival and the Festival Wiener Klassik. He continues to perform regularly at the Purcell Room and the Wigmore Hall in London.

He has released CDs on labels such as Chandos Records, ASV and Collins Classics and continues to perform on BBC Radio 3 and Classic FM as well as Channel 4 and the satellite Arts Channel.

In competitions, he has been awarded the Lisa Fuchsova Prize for outstanding chamber music pianist and the Eric Rice Memorial Price for outstanding accompanist, both at the Royal Overseas League Music Competition in London.

Scott is one of the founding members of the Cantilena Festival for Strings on the island of Islay, taking place every summer. Scott teaches piano at the Junior Department of the Royal Scottish Academy of Music and Drama (RSAMD) where his other responsibilities include that of senior staff accompanist and chamber music coach.

Paisley-born YVONNE PATTERSON graduated with a First Class Honours Degree from the Royal College of Music in 2006 and has most recently completed her Masters with Distinction on a full scholarship at the RSAMD.

As a freelance musician and soloist, she has performed with the BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra, Scottish Chamber Music Orchestra and Northern Sinfonia.

Competition and scholarship success include being a finalist in the 2009 Royal Overseas League Wind, Brass and Percussion Section, 2nd Prize in the 2008 "Performing Australian Music Competition", the RSAMD Governors' Chamber Music Prize, the John McGregor Flute Prize for outstanding achievment and winner of the 2008 RSAMD Classical Concerto competition.

She is a founding member of her flute quartet "Flutes en Route". Yvonne has also played solo flute with the pop group "McFly" on numerous television shows and their 2005 Wonderland Arena tour.

Her playing has been described as "dazzling" by Michael Tumelty in The Herald.

Stuart Ellam on Pianoforte

Sunday 8th November sees the third in this season's series of concerts.

Stuart Ellam began his musical studies at the age of six with voice and violin lessons. He has since studied piano with noted teachers in Liverpool and London and performs as soloist and accompanist in these cities and in Windsor, where he lives.

As musical director Stuart has conducted productions of Donizetti's ‘Lucia di Lammermoor’, Verdi's ‘Macbeth’ and ‘Un Ballo in Maschera’, Gounod's ‘Faust’ for West London Opera, and 'Oh! What a Lovely War'. He staged and conducted Wagner's ‘Die Meistersinger von Nurnberg’ for East End Opera. In addition to this he has worked in musical theatre productions both as assistant conductor and repetiteur on productions including ‘Don Giovanni’, ‘La Belle Helene’, ‘Orpheus in the Underworld’, ‘The Mikado’ and ‘HMS Pinafore’.

Stuart has given great thought to the pieces being performed as evidenced by his notes:

Beethoven: Piano Sonata in E-flat major "Quasi una fantasia", Op. 27 No. 1:
'experimental, 'like a fantasia'; freely flowing ideas that Beethoven throws out almost like a stream of consciousness. It has an improvisatory feel about it...exuberant to begin with...moving into a meditative adagio section..giving way eventually to a boisterous fugue.'

Bach: Chromatic Fantasia & Fugue BWV 903
'one of Bach's best known works... by turns florid, emotional, sprawling and unique compared with much of Bach's output...a virtuosic firework display of brilliant passage work and weird harmonies. The fugue opens with a long, complex and chromatic theme...moving from D minor to more distantly related keys, we eventually return to D minor and to a grand restatement of the theme in the bass, ending with a final flourish reminiscent of the opening fantasia.'

Chopin: Sonata No2 Op 35 B-flat minor
The key is B flat minor, the "black key". The music is pretty intense..the well known funeral march forms the core of the work. The central section is a sublime, simple melody yet carrying a sense of sadnessm yearning. The final movement is unknown music territory: weirdness increases by many orders of magnitude. There are no chords, no harmony (at least not on the page, he’s very clever, he gets your ear to make up the harmonies as the piece moves along).'

The performance starts at 3.30pm. Tickets are £5 (free for under-16s) with concessions available for seniors.

The Fejes Quartet

Fresh from their recent tour of Hungary, where their performance of Bartok's 2nd quartet was likened to the  Grammy-award nominated Takacs quartet, the Fejes String Quartet will perform at St. Margaret's very soon.

Formed as a temporary arrangement as part of the Royal Scottish National Orchestra's outreach initiative, the Fejes Quartet have now found permanence in their shared love of chamber music.

Consisting of Tamas Fejes and Elita Bungard on violin, Mike Lloyd on viola and Rachael Lee on cello, these musicians are arguably rising stars on the classical music scene, evidenced by an upcoming tour in the United States and a scheduled performance in April 2010 as part of Pollock House Arts Society's ''Golden Jubilee'' anniversary season. They record their first commercial album in March 2010.

The Fejes Quartet will perform on Sunday 11th October at 3.30pm.

For further details on their impressive musical credentials, visit the Fejes Quartet website.

This Season's Concert Listings published

We're pleased to announce the full programme of this season's concerts taking place on the Second Sunday of every month at St. Margaret's Scottish Episcopal Church on Kilmarnock Road.

You can find the dates of events in the panel to the right.

All performances start at 3.30pm and cost £5 for adults and £3 for seniors and students. Under 16s enter for free.

The very next event will see the Fejes quartet performing works by Haydn and Prokofiev with some help from their friends at the Royal Scottish National Orchestra, setting a very high standard indeed for the rest of the year. More details here as they develop.

September, Schubert and Shakespeare

An unusually balmy Sunday afternoon  saw the start of our series of recitals for this season, taking place within the lofty reaches of St. Margaret's against a backdrop of woodwork and stone speckled by the brilliance of early autumn sun filtering through stained glass.

Introduced by  Michael Bawtree (Musical Director of Glasgow Chamber Choir and at St. Margarets), the performers this month were Edward Caswell, baritone, who performed a selection of Schubert's last fourteen songs, accompanied by Walter Blair on pianoforte. Touching on themes of love and loss, of departure and arrival, it was a moving experience.

Edward Caswell is a widely respected chorus master and choral conductor, having trained at Oxford and the Royal College of Music in London. His recent work includes that as Artistic Director of the Philharmonia Chorus, whom he oversaw in productions with the BBC Philharmonic Orchestra and the City of Brimingham Symphony Orchestra.

After their performance of Schubert's Swan Song, the pair rounded the afternoon off with a cycle of Shakespeare  set to music by Vaughan Williams.