At Vivamus, we’re incredibly excited to be collaborating with The Hanover Band to bring you our spring baroque concert. Founded by Caroline Brown in 1980, The Hanover Band is widely regarded as one of Britain’s leading period instrument orchestras. We’re delighted their masterful sounds will be part of our spring concert.
To find out more about The Hanover Band, we spoke to baroque violinist Julia Black about her experiences.
Can you tell us a bit about yourself?
My name is Julia Black and I play the baroque violin. I started playing the violin when I was 10, having group lessons with the Buckinghamshire Music service. I ended up studying violin and piano at the Royal College of Music and I then started playing baroque violin in my postgraduate year. I moved to the Netherlands to study further.
How did you discover The Hanover Band?
Firstly, I heard their recordings of many different classical symphonies, and then, when Madeleine Easton was leader, she invited me to come and play violin with the band.
What do you enjoy about being in The Hanover Band?
I love the music we play; we have a very varied repertoire and do some great projects. I also very much enjoy working with my Hanover Band colleagues – there’s a friendly and collaborative vibe.
Do you have any recent performance highlights?
Doing socially-distanced video recordings of all the Beethoven symphonies at the end of the 2020 COVID lockdowns was a very special experience, especially as it was such an unusual thing to be playing alongside other people through much of 2020.
What are you looking forward to about working with Vivamus for Faire is the Heaven?
I’ll be very interested to hear and play the new piece by Rufus. And I always look forward to playing in St James’s Church Piccadilly – it’s a very special place.
Book tickets for Vivamus and The Hanover Band’s Faire is the Heaven concert, May 13th at 7pm, St James’s Piccadilly.