A Cultural Saturday

The first event was at the cathedral where we listened to a short organ concert. The former organist and musical leader at the cathedral, Lars G Fredriksson played two pieces as a sort of farewell performance after ten years at the cathedral. He's retiring a little early, basically to enjoy life without the politics of the church. It's the town's loss as he really is an excellent musician, choir leader etc. Of course, since he is a friend of ours I may be a little partial!
I don't even generally like organ music but his choices, Bach's Passacaglia and Fugue in C-minor, and a piece called Carillon de Westminster by Louis Vierne, were interesting to listen to and didn't get too noisy until the final few notes.
We had lunch with Karin in Cafe Sigrid and enjoyed good conversation and food both lovely and healthy! Ruth dropped in a stayed for a chat and various other people flowed by our table by the door, stopping for a few words.
Home for a cup of tea and a bit of a rest, and then back to town to listen to Slagverk Ensemble (percussion ensemble). The concert started with 32 drums on stage, and soon 32 young people to play a "salute" which is always their opening piece .That was my first choice for blip but my picture was almost identical to Jan's so I took one from another part of the concert.
The musicians come from the 6th form college and the local community college. The 6th form group are sometimes complete beginners when they start, the community college group have to be fairly proficient to get in, but nearly all come from the first group. They do two concerts a year and we go to most of them, so we have followed some of these youngsters for 5 years, and seen them go from beginners to young people on their way to the Royal college of Music. Very professional performances and so good to see these young people blossoming.
I've added an extra of this morning's sunrise, just for the snow-lovers among you.