A Weekend of Music and History

There's a lot happening in Hay at the end of this month, the weekend of 27th -29th September.
I don't often mention the very fine classical music that is performed regularly in Hay, at St Mary's Church and Booths Bookshop in particular (there's also jazz at the Black Lion, but jazz is a style of music I've never been able to take to).
However, this is going to be something rather special - the Fitzwilliam String Quartet will be performing at St Mary's Church on Friday 27th at 7pm, with a pre-concert study session in the afternoon to discuss the Schumann and Elgar piano quintets which will be played later that evening.
On Saturday 28th, the pre concert study session is with the Fitzwilliam Quartet and the Dragonfly Trio, discussing Tchaikovsky's "Souvenir de Florence" before it is performed later in the evening at Booth's Bookshop - the concert will also have music by Borodin, Dohnanyi and Suk. I'm most interested by the Suk piece, after hearing Suk's beautiful and haunting Fairy Tale music being used as the theme music of an obscure audio SF drama called The Minister of Chance. Tickets for the concerts, and the pre-concert study sessions, are £15 each, but I think it will be well worth it.
There are two pre-concert sessions, at £7.50 each, the second one being an interview with the members of the Fitzwilliam Quartet by Richard Wigmore.
Meanwhile at Booths Cinema, they're showing Elgar - The Man Behind the Mask at 2.30pm on the Saturday, followed by a discussion with Diana McVeagh, a writer on British music. The tickets for this are £10.
And on the Sunday, the pre-concert session will be discussing Shostakovich's 10th and 11th String Quartets (tickets are £7.50 each) at the Swan Hotel from 10 - 11am. The concert takes place at Theatr Brycheiniog in Brecon that afternoon, starting at 3.30pm and is called Shostakovich Inspired! As well as the string quartets, there will be readings from Shostakovich's diaries and memoirs.

So that's the weekend for classical music lovers.

Meanwhile the history lovers will be enjoying Hay's contribution to the Brecknock History Festival, which has events all over the area. There's music involved in this too, as they are celebrating 100 years since the death of Adelina Patti the opera singer, who lived at Craig-y-nos in Powys. They used to have one of her stage costumes on show at Brecon Museum - maybe they will again when it finally re-opens....
In Hay there will be a pop-up museum from 12 noon to 4pm on Sunday 29th September at the Parish Hall. Hay History Group and Cusop History Group have teamed up for this, and it will be a good chance to talk to local historians about the research they've been doing, and the history of the local area.
At 4pm there will be a talk by Tim Hoverd, the Archaeology Projects Manager for Herefordshire, who will be presenting a round-up of recent research on Marcher castles. He's involved in research and conservation works at Snodhill Castle at the moment, which should be fascinating, and further afield he's been working on a community project at a gunpowder factory!
Entry is free, and there will be tea and cake to buy.