Peel Building, Salford
“Tonight we request that you forget what you thought you knew about orchestral concerts and do turn on your mobile phones and tablets.”
This is the tag line for The Red Brick Sessions, a series of concerts on BBC 3 Radio, played by the BBC Philharmonic. As you can imagine, I was hooked from the moment I read it. Multimedia concert performance? Programme notes not on paper, but delivered live to your phone or tablet? What would it be like? Would it even work? I was lucky enough to get a free ticket to the concert, and I was excited. Not only because I’d never seen the BBC Phil perform before (I know, shame on me), but also because seemed to be exactly the kind of thing I think orchestras these days should do – go with the times, make access to concerts and classical music easier, and just make it a good time both for the musicians and the audience.
So without further ado, here’s my account of the evening!
Distracted Cellist 