Problem
What kind of music festival can I go to? Are you looking for a birthday or holiday event for a specific date, or just entertainment?
Answers
BY TYPE OF MUSIC
Tribute Acts
Christmas Carols
Events at churches in London and worldwide. Midnight Mass.
Classical
Lucerne Congress and Culture Centre, Lucerne, Switzerland, August 10 - September 8, 2018
.(Provisional dates. Check with booking agency.)
Comic Operetta
Country & Western
USA
Singapore has had a Country Music station on Saturday afternoons. It keeps disappearing I presume because of diminishing interest or people in charge wanting a change, then is brought back by popular demand.
Hymns and Sacred Music
Jazz
Opera
Verona. Outdoors in ancient arena. (Take warm wraps for shoulders and legs. The daytime is warm but nights even in high summer can be very chilly.)
Pop
Glastonbury is not taking place in 2018. The field and the organisers are having a Sabbatical.
Rock
MUSIC BY COUNTRY
Germany
Festivals and parades in Cologne and Mainz. Hear the traditional Mainz festival march on YouTUbe.
Italy
Verona - outdoor concerts in summer
Milan
Book online at La Scala opera house, Milan. We booked cheaper seats in a box at the top and side still very expensive, in my view. If you are a family and have the whole box, you can take turns sitting at the front and looking over. I was very disappointed. In the first half most of the time the singers were on one side of the stage below.
We had cheaper seats sitting at the back and we saw nothing. Why? Apparently boxes were designed like that so patrons could be behind curtains and secluded for a evening out with who knows who.
In the interval we complained. I would have wanted my money back. The box office said we should have told them earlier that we could not see. They moved us and put us down in the more expensive stall seats, in a back row, for the second half, which was much better.
Other music centres include Cannara.
I visited the house of the composer Puccini. A statue of him shows him smoking. He died of cancer.
Romania
We drove from the capital of Romania, Bucharest, to the second largest city, Brasov, to join a walking group. Near Sinai I saw a sign to the home of Romanian composer, George Enescu. It was late in the day and the place was closed but we and many other tourists gathered around the gate taking photos of the picturesque house in the woods. He designed this house himself, with the help of an architect.
George Enescu lived from 1881-1955. He taught Lord Yehudi Menuhin. Enescu was a composer and violinist. He travelled to the USA to perform, and lived in France. He is buried in Pere Lachaise cemetery, which has many dramatic graves of famous people and is a tourist attraction where devotees pay homage to their favourite artistes.
You can see a seated sculpture of him in Bucharest. Vienna has a wall plaque of his face on a bas relief on a house where he lived.
Switzerland
Festivals in Lucerne and Basel
Composers by Country
Poland - Chopin
UK -
London Beatles walking tour. You can walk across the zebra crossing which appeared on one of their covers.
Gilbert & Sullivan comic operetta (events at Grimsdyke Hotel, which was Gilbert's home).
Kenwood House, Hampstead.
Last Night of the Proms, Royal Albert Hall. Cheapest tickets are standing in the gallery.
Glyndbourne, opera, with strawberries and champagne picnics and deckchairs for hire.
Liverpool - statue of the Beatles
Many seasides have free concerts given around bandstands in parks in summer.
Musicals - look for two booths in London selling reduced price unsold or returned tickets on the day. You have to arrive early and queue up.
Tune your hire car radio to the BBC classical music stations. Or ask for a car which can play CDs and take your own discs with you to play on long journeys and in traffic jams.
You cannot get out your guitar and play it in a pub or restaurant unless they have a music license. The same goes for a Britain's Got Talent competition. I was in an event as a stand up comedy turn and we had to be moved out of the pub into a cricket club hall a week later because one of the turns was singing and the pub had no license.
Tribute Turns in Restaurants
Orama in Hatch End has regular tribute act evenings, very good value.
Greek restaurant
The Chinese Elvis performs regularly at a restaurant in Ruislip.
Wales
Cardiff Eisteddfod.
Welsh male voice choir performs at Writers Holiday in February in Fishguard, Wales.
The harpist showed me that the strings of the harp are coloured to help the player find the notes.
USA
All over America I saw items once owned by Elvis. A car in one museum, a suit in another, a guitar in another, a disc in another.
The great thing about America is that you are more likely to be able to hear country music on the airplane. You can do an Elvis tour.
Nashville.
Opryland. When I stayed at the Opryland hotel, I would go out in the morning, having had the radio off so I could sleep at night. I would come back and find the radio tuned to play Country music.
Graceland, home of Elvis.
YouTube
If you are looking for a national anthem or classic song, you are likely to find it on YouTube. I found several versions of the comic song about Romania. One was by Shirley Bassey. An even better one was by a Yiddish comic theatre group with a great tenor.
Several websites specialise in booking music events.
(I shall be adding more websites later. Come back tomorrow.)
Author
Angela Lansbury, travel writer and photographer, author and speaker,
What kind of music festival can I go to? Are you looking for a birthday or holiday event for a specific date, or just entertainment?
Answers
BY TYPE OF MUSIC
Tribute Acts
Obama Greek restaurant. Photo by Angela Lansbury. Copyright.
Photo by Angela Lansbury. Copyright.
Carnival ParadesChristmas Carols
Events at churches in London and worldwide. Midnight Mass.
Classical
Lucerne Congress and Culture Centre, Lucerne, Switzerland, August 10 - September 8, 2018
.(Provisional dates. Check with booking agency.)
Comic Operetta
Grimsdyke Hotel Restaurant.
You can also stay in the hotel in a suite.
Country & Western
USA
Singapore has had a Country Music station on Saturday afternoons. It keeps disappearing I presume because of diminishing interest or people in charge wanting a change, then is brought back by popular demand.
Hymns and Sacred Music
Jazz
Opera
Verona. Outdoors in ancient arena. (Take warm wraps for shoulders and legs. The daytime is warm but nights even in high summer can be very chilly.)
Pop
Glastonbury is not taking place in 2018. The field and the organisers are having a Sabbatical.
Rock
MUSIC BY COUNTRY
Germany
Festivals and parades in Cologne and Mainz. Hear the traditional Mainz festival march on YouTUbe.
Italy
Verona - outdoor concerts in summer
Milan
Book online at La Scala opera house, Milan. We booked cheaper seats in a box at the top and side still very expensive, in my view. If you are a family and have the whole box, you can take turns sitting at the front and looking over. I was very disappointed. In the first half most of the time the singers were on one side of the stage below.
We had cheaper seats sitting at the back and we saw nothing. Why? Apparently boxes were designed like that so patrons could be behind curtains and secluded for a evening out with who knows who.
In the interval we complained. I would have wanted my money back. The box office said we should have told them earlier that we could not see. They moved us and put us down in the more expensive stall seats, in a back row, for the second half, which was much better.
Other music centres include Cannara.
I visited the house of the composer Puccini. A statue of him shows him smoking. He died of cancer.
Umbria, Italy, where the musical school has held open air concerts since 1843. Photo by Angela Lansbury, copyright.
The Athaneum, Bucharest, where George Enescu first performed his orchestral Romanian Rhapsody.
Photo by Goldmund100 in Wikipedia.
www.festivalenescu.ro (Previous festivals in September)
Romania
We drove from the capital of Romania, Bucharest, to the second largest city, Brasov, to join a walking group. Near Sinai I saw a sign to the home of Romanian composer, George Enescu. It was late in the day and the place was closed but we and many other tourists gathered around the gate taking photos of the picturesque house in the woods. He designed this house himself, with the help of an architect.
George Enescu lived from 1881-1955. He taught Lord Yehudi Menuhin. Enescu was a composer and violinist. He travelled to the USA to perform, and lived in France. He is buried in Pere Lachaise cemetery, which has many dramatic graves of famous people and is a tourist attraction where devotees pay homage to their favourite artistes.
You can see a seated sculpture of him in Bucharest. Vienna has a wall plaque of his face on a bas relief on a house where he lived.
I wanted a musical souvenir of Roumania. I bought this music box which plays Rhapsodie Roumaine.
Switzerland
Festivals in Lucerne and Basel
Composers by Country
Poland - Chopin
UK -
London Beatles walking tour. You can walk across the zebra crossing which appeared on one of their covers.
Gilbert & Sullivan comic operetta (events at Grimsdyke Hotel, which was Gilbert's home).
Kenwood House, Hampstead.
Last Night of the Proms, Royal Albert Hall. Cheapest tickets are standing in the gallery.
Glyndbourne, opera, with strawberries and champagne picnics and deckchairs for hire.
Liverpool - statue of the Beatles
Many seasides have free concerts given around bandstands in parks in summer.
Musicals - look for two booths in London selling reduced price unsold or returned tickets on the day. You have to arrive early and queue up.
Tune your hire car radio to the BBC classical music stations. Or ask for a car which can play CDs and take your own discs with you to play on long journeys and in traffic jams.
You cannot get out your guitar and play it in a pub or restaurant unless they have a music license. The same goes for a Britain's Got Talent competition. I was in an event as a stand up comedy turn and we had to be moved out of the pub into a cricket club hall a week later because one of the turns was singing and the pub had no license.
Tribute Turns in Restaurants
Orama in Hatch End has regular tribute act evenings, very good value.
Greek restaurant
The Chinese Elvis performs regularly at a restaurant in Ruislip.
Wales
Cardiff Eisteddfod.
Welsh male voice choir performs at Writers Holiday in February in Fishguard, Wales.
The Welsh harp, performance with the Welsh male voice choir at Fishguard, Wales. Photo by Angela Lansbury, copyright.
Welsh Male Voice Choir performing at Writers' Holiday, Fishguard. Photo by Angela Lansbury. Copyright.
USA
All over America I saw items once owned by Elvis. A car in one museum, a suit in another, a guitar in another, a disc in another.
The great thing about America is that you are more likely to be able to hear country music on the airplane. You can do an Elvis tour.
Nashville.
Opryland. When I stayed at the Opryland hotel, I would go out in the morning, having had the radio off so I could sleep at night. I would come back and find the radio tuned to play Country music.
Graceland, home of Elvis.
YouTube
If you are looking for a national anthem or classic song, you are likely to find it on YouTube. I found several versions of the comic song about Romania. One was by Shirley Bassey. An even better one was by a Yiddish comic theatre group with a great tenor.
Several websites specialise in booking music events.
(I shall be adding more websites later. Come back tomorrow.)
Author
Angela Lansbury, travel writer and photographer, author and speaker,
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