This musical and theatrical collaboration between multi-award-winning actress Dame Patricia Routledge and international concert pianist Piers Lane, tells the extraordinary, inspiring story of Myra Hess and her famous wartime National Gallery concerts.
The script for Admission: One Shilling was compiled by Myra’s great-nephew, composer Nigel Hess from her press and radio interviews during World War II, as well as a few BBC broadcasts where she said a few words before playing. This is Myra in her own words: redoubtable, courageous and inspiring.
Through spoken word performance taken from letters, books and interviews given by Myra, interspersed with short piano pieces by Schubert, Schumann, Brahms, Beethoven and JS Bach - hear how the ‘great adventure’ of these lunchtime concerts began, and how they continued while bombs rained down on London.
Dame Myra was most renowned for her interpretations of the works of Mozart, Beethoven and Schumann, but had a wide repertoire rangning from Domenico Scarlatti to contemporary works. Her 'signature' piece, and the one which became most associated with her, was her own arrangement of Bach's chorale prelude Jesu, Joy of Man's Desiring.
Performances - Saturday 17 November (14.00 and 19.00)