Started off by snacking in the downstairs bistro bar at Debenhams, where we were served by a middle aged man, perhaps the manager. A throw back to the days when service at such a place was a perfectly respectable calling for a mature male, not just the preserve of young people from parts east. Coffee, cake etc all very good and very reasonably priced considering the comfort of the place. Entertained by various women in fancy dress (of the all over black variety) wandering around the equally fancy shoe department outside. Whoever had dressed this last knew his or her trade.
I liked the Britten more than I thought likely and the Bach was as good as expected, that is to say very good. Queyras was well turned out and had good stage manners, with a nice touch about being allowed to play what he liked now that the mikes were off when he gave us a very short Kurtág encore. Interestingly, there was a mike hanging very close over the cello, supplementing the usual clutch of four, hanging rather higher up. Still not got to the bottom of why live radio broadcasts from the Wigmore mostly really are live while those from St. Luke's never are.
Lunch at the nearby Coach Makers, distinguished by an unusual web site, themed for the Professor Branestawm whom I used to read about as a child. Engaging bit of web design on first engagement but which then irritates by being so slow to get down to things like opening hours and menus. Bread satisfactory. Wine fine. Chicken salad rather exotic and would have been very good had they gone a little easier on the salad dressing, fortunately of the oil & vinegar variety which one could drain off. rather than white goo. Pity about the dead flowers. The barmaid, possibly Latin, of the last visit (see reference 3) missing but there was a very pleasant & cheerful English replacement.
From there off to Regent's Park to see the rose gardens, which looked very well, even if the roses were a little past their best. With their having been a little before their best on my last visit, more than two years ago (see reference 4). The big thing here being large rectangular beds, each bed containing floribundas of just one variety. A plus of which being that with so many plants, even when the bed as a whole was past its best, one could usually find some good flowers. One or two very flashy beds and arrangements of other kinds of summer flowers, for example delphiniums, rather larger but along the same lines as the round beds at the entrance to the formal gardens at Hampton Court, being a sort of large scale, outdoor flower arrangement.
From the rose gardens to a small pond to admire the baby coots, with this particular pond being augmented, rather incongrously, by a large bronze eagle, wings outstretched, perhaps caught in the moment of grabbing something like a baby coot.
Closed the visit to the park with a visit to the heronry, in and around the southwestern pond. Must have been getting on for a score of them, some very tame. Not seen so many in one place since we saw a flock on them in some water fringing trees in Battersea Park, quite some years ago now. Still get a few in that park, but never a flock.
Well not quite closed, as on exit we came across a college, now called Regent College, which I was sure had once been called Westfield College. On enquiry, however, I found that it had once been called Bedford College and I find this morning that Westfield College used to be in Hampstead, before being swallowed up as part of the consolidation of the University of London into large lumps; no room any more for the small and idiosyncratic. Don't know why the name had stuck as I don't think I could ever have visited the place.
Now we have worked out how to catch a taxi from the Wigmore Hall to the park, must try and get there a little more often. Maybe even take a boat on the boating lake, which we last used, probably more than forty years ago, when you could still row in proper wooden skiffs. Maybe even get there by going to Baker Street from Waterloo, the way we got home on this occasion, having forgotten how close Baker Street tube was to the park.
Reference 1: http://www.jeanguihenqueyras.com/.
Reference 2: http://www.thecoachmakers.com/.
Reference 3: http://psmv2.blogspot.co.uk/2015/02/the-leather-thongs-which-hold-toggles.html.
Reference 4: http://psmv2.blogspot.co.uk/2013/06/splice-mainbrace.html.
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