WELCOME TO HAWICK
MUSIC CLUB
Hawick Music Club celebrates its 71st season of live concerts in the town. A wide variety of Scottish-based musicians will be performing in the 2022/2023 season.
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How did Hawick Music Club begin?
Hawick Music Club was founded in 1951 and the Club is thrilled that some founder members are still active supporters!
The aim of the Club was to “promote and encourage the study, practice and knowledge of music and the arts in Hawick and surrounding districts”. The Club presented concerts by professional musicians but also in the early years, in two concerts per season, gave a platform to local musicians.
Hawick Music Club adopted the marketing tag ‘Bringing live music to the heart of Hawick’ to reflect our aim. The club is an Unincorporated Charity {SC008473} registered with and regulated by OSCR-Office of the Scottish Charities Regulator.
Following the opening of the Heart of Hawick complex, the club moved in 2008 from Drumlanrig School Hall to the Tower Mill Theatre where audiences enjoyed the enhanced environment, with comfortable seating offering excellent sightlines, with stage lighting. The Club became an integral part in Heart of Hawick’s activities; with concert tickets sold through their box office.
In 2019 it became more difficult to obtain dates from the Heart of Hawick early enough to secure the booking of visiting musicians and this inevitably led to seeking out new venues. The Cornucopia Rooms was chosen and proved very successful with its intimate surroundings and Julie Witford’s goodwill.
Covid hit in March 2020 and following a cancelled season the Club ventured into uncharted waters offering members two online concerts - featuring the Broen Ensemble and Kowalski Reyes Duo. In 2021 with the re-opening of society, two new large airy venues were chosen - the Hawick Rugby Football Club function room at Mansfield Park and St Cuthbert’s Church. For the first concert in 2021, the Club reinvented itself again offering the Rugby Club’s bar and refreshments to attendees before and after the concert and the option of a pre-booked evening meal afterward. An experiment that may be repeated, judging by the positive reaction. Large round tables encourage a convivial atmosphere and being a large airy space, the function rooms lend themselves to social distancing and a bigger audience. St Cuthbert’s Church will offer another airy space with good acoustics.
Next Up
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UPCOMING
EVENTS
Pre – Season Concert in conjunction with String Theory Festival
Saturday 6th August 2022 –
Ross Milligan & Malcolm MacFarlane
Venue - Hawick Rugby Football Club at 12.30pm Tickets £5 (+ Sandwich lunch by donation)
Ross & Malcolm have worked together for 15 years as Jazz guitarists to the Scottish Guitar Quartet and with the Royal Scottish National Orchestra. Together
they made up the formidable guitar section for the world premiere run of Mark Knopfler’s new musical Local Hero. Two acclaimed Scotsmen to promote an award-starred programme of performers for the Club!
Programme of Concerts 2022 - 2023
Friday 9th September 2022 – Djordje Gajic & Ryan Corbett Venue - Hawick Rugby Football Club at 7pm (Optional evening meal at 5.30pm)
Djordje began his musical studies in Serbia aged six. He has won International Accordion Competitions in Italy, Serbia & France & CMA World Championships in France. Ryan is a classical
accordionist in his final year at the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland, beginning playing aged eleven and taught by Djordje from fourteen. He, also, has an impressive list of awards to his name. This international collaboration offers a real treat to our Hawick audience.
Sunday 16th October 2022 - Gaia
Venue - St Cuthbert’s Church at 2.30pm
Katrina Lee & Alice Allen are an award-winning violin & cello duo, who won Chamber Music Scotland’s two-year residency. Their exciting, bold, and daring performances push the boundaries of string duo performance and creative programming. Between them they boast an impressive array of instrumental awards. One of today’s most exciting and dynamic duos of our times.
Thursday 10th November 2022 – Bone-Afide
Venue - St Mary’s & Old Parish Church Halls, 7pm (Optional evening meal at 5.30pm)
Performing works from all genres and periods with the aim of defying
stereotypes surrounding the instrument, this group of friends, based in London, strives to
showcase the versatility of the Trombone, as chamber musicians. Robert Mosley, Angus Butt, Isobel Butt and Merin Rhyd also play with international orchestras. This will be a big and exciting sound to enjoy.
As an experiment, there are no concerts scheduled for the dark winter months of December, January & February this year.
Sunday 19th March 2023 - Eden Baroque
Venue – St Cuthbert’s Church 2.30pm
Katharine May & Michael Sanderson established Eden Baroque after moving to Cumbria in 2017 with the aim of bringing well-known and less performed baroque chamber music to as wide an audience as possible. Katherine, once described by a
critic of the Times as ‘the evening’s feisty and urbane harpsichordist’ and Michael, solo singer and folk-fiddle player offer a varied programme to whet our appetite.
Saturday 15th April 2023 – Clyde Duo
Venue – St Cuthbert’s Church 7pm
Formed in 2010, the Clyde Duo consists of Flautist, Aisling Agnew and Harpist, Sharron Griffiths who met while working together at St Andrews University where they both are active teachers and performer’s, they discovered they share a compelling interest in the flute and harp repertoire and since then have performed together across the UK and internationally.
Has Hawick Music Club ever hosted a Harp and Flute duo in the past?
Saturday 20th May 2023 – Resol String Quartet Venue – Teviot Church 7pm
With a vision to make classical music more inclusive both in the present and in the future, this group of friends formed the Resol String Quartet in 2018 through their love of chamber music. Representing the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland, they won First Prize and Audience Prize in the CAVATINA competition at the Wigmore Hall. They have toured across the UK and Europe and now perform their debut concert in Hawick!
Djordje Gajic and Ryan Corbett
Gaia
Clyde Duo
Resol String Quartet
appear courtesy of
Chamber Music Scotland
Annual Membership gives members very generous discount on entry to all six concerts in the programme. Adults £60
Contact Membership Secretary: Mrs Muriel Wilson
Main Street
Denholm, Hawick TD9 8NU
Telephone 01450 870514
or E-mail:
Non-members are always welcome. Entry to each concert costs £15 and is free for accompanied people under 18 years.
Book to attend any concert by contacting Mrs Muriel Wilson (see above). Meals prior to a concert must be prebooked – contact Carol Peat cspeat@live.co.uk or phone 374741.
Hawick Music Club was formed in 1951 with the aim of promoting and encouraging music in all its different forms. Charitable status was granted in 1983.
Hawick Music Club is helped financially by Chamber Music Scotland
through funding
provided by Creative Scotland.
Charity # SC008473
Season flyer
Previous Events
A violin from the WW1 trenches to feature in Hawick Music Club concert
The forthcoming concert on 20th February of Hawick Music Club will feature violinist Andy Sherwood and pianist Jim Letham.
Their programme contains a special surprise element. This is an arrangement of the ‘Road to Passchendaele’, (about the brutal WW1 battle in 1917) by local musician Alan Brydon using a violin that has been loaned to Andy and which was actually played in the WW1 trenches.
The duo will also play 3 Old Viennese Dances written before the first world war by Fritz Kreisler who himself served in the Austrian trenches and wrote of his experiences in a book called ‘Four Weeks in the Trenches’
The concert starts with sonatas by Mozart and Beethoven. Other repertoire includes beautiful lyrical music from Sweden. Andy and Jim have just released a new CD of popular classical repertoire for Violin and Piano a couple of those pieces will be played at this concert.
Andy Sherwood lives near Hawick. He has and still does, perform in many parts of the world as a conductor and violinist. He has been Professor of Violin at TrinityLaban Conservatoire in London for about 30 years. Jim is an extraordinary pianist, choir director and composer who lives in the Borders and probably needs no introduction to music lovers in the region. He was for many years head of music at Hawick High School. These two musicians who go by the title ‘Agapanthus Duo’ really do bring their enjoyment of playing together to their audiences. Their manner of presentation is fun, informative and informal.
Concert Sunday February 20th at 2.30pm , ST Cuthbert’s Church, Slitrig Crescent, Hawick, TD9 0EN.
Tickets available on the door and there will be refreshments.
The attached picture is of Fritz Kreisler in his uniform from the time he served in the trenches in WW1.
NEWS
Musicians save the day for Hawick Music Club Concert
19/01/22
Hawick Music Club was notified last week that their planned concert for 16th January could not take place due to the booked singer testing positive for COVID 19. By good luck two wonderful musicians, mezzo-soprano Grace Waine and pianist Michal Gajzler , stepped forward at just three days notice to save the concert. Amazingly with so little time to prepare, they put on a stunningly good performance in Hawick’s beautiful St Cuthbert’s Church. The manner of presentation was lovely. Grace communicated her enthusiasm and enjoyment of the music with her appreciative audience. With a powerful and beautiful
voice, Grace sang her whole programme from memory. Uninhibited by stands and music, Grace sang from a collection of songs and arias with a real sense of drama and style interspersed with short explanations of the meanings of each work. Grace was accompanied by Polish-born Michal Gajzler , a sensitive and accomplished pianist in his own right. He treated us to a solo performance of Winter from The Four Seasons by Vivaldi was specially adapted for piano. The concert was well attended and from comments overheard on leaving, very much enjoyed too.