Edinburgh University Reid Memorial Concert
Reid Concert Hall, Edinburgh University - 27/09/22
Welcome return of University concerts
The Edinburgh University Music School has over the years provided free lunchtime concerts often twice a week in term-time which have been an important part of Edinburgh’s musical life. These concerts gave the chance to young musicians, including students, to perform in front of an audience, and also provided opportunities for visiting musicians and faculty members to show off their talents. These concerts are free and that’s also important because for many people the price of going to concerts is getting more of a burden. It’s an important part of the University’s contribution to the community. Of course for the last 2 years, because of the pandemic, we have missed these concerts which is why this first concert in hopefully a full series was so welcome.
This concert was headlined the Reid Memorial Concert, in honour of General John Reid whose will bequeathed a substantial amount to the University to endow a Chair in music. This led to the setting up of the University’s music department, now one of the leading university music departments in the UK. General Reid was a musician as well as a soldier, a flute player as well as a composer, and this concert was of mainly Scottish music in his honour.
It began with three lovely Gaelic songs by Mairi Callan, accompanying herself on the clarsach, the Gaelic harp. Mairi is a fourth year student in the School of Music and on the basis of today’s performance I have no hesitation in saying that she will be a star of the future. Her voice is a lovely instrument with melody and colour, and her clarsach playing was a perfect accompaniment. She is I think of a quality to follow the great Gaelic singers of past, like Ishbel MacAskill, but I think could also be important in Scottish folk music. I would also be interested to hear Mairi’s classical repertoire. Her first two songs were traditional Gaelic songs and were lovely; the third song ‘Build Bridges, Tear Down Walls’ showed that Gaelic songs can be topical and political as it is a response to Trump’s attempt to keep out immigrants from the USA by building walls, a policy of questionable moral worth, given that his mother was an illegal immigrant from Scotland and his grandfather an illegal immigrant from Germany!
Our second performer was Richard Craig, who is director of performance in the School of Music and a very good flute player. General Reid was a flute player and composed for the flute. Richard played one his compositions on a German flute, accompanied by John Kitchin on a lovely harpsichord. Richard also played a Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach’s Solo Sonata in A Minor, which was composed for German flute, and which General Reid would in all probability have played.
Our final musicians were three young students, Robert Phillips on guitar, Theo Vickers on piano, and Rhona McDonald, a very good double bass player. They showed the versatility of music by giving a jazz treatment to two traditional Scots songs ‘O-a-the-Airts-the-Wind-can-Blaw’ by Burns (arranged by Robert Phillips) and ‘The Auld House’ by Lady Nairne (arranged by Theo Vickers). The arrangements worked, and it was a delight to hear Rhona picking out the traditional melody on the double bass.
So a great start to the concert series, which was well attended by music students, but few of the regular older lunchtime concert audience. I suspect many of them haven’t noticed that the concerts are back. Perhaps the University needs a little advertising and a fuller programme.
