Last weekend was my first living in London and if it is any sort of indication of what life in London will be like, I’m excited 🙂
We started off the weekend Friday evening meeting at the Tower of London after work for The Tower Festival. Ann had managed to get us tickets for two days at the festival and Friday it was The British Philharmonic Orchestra playing Classic Extravaganza. Before the concert we met up with a couple of local CouchSurfers at a pub and went to the venue with them afterwards. The concert was good and it was quite amazing sitting outside in central London listening to classical music. Here are two short video clips of the concert.
Saturday we went to The Barbican Centre which is a huge modern complex in the middle of London. It is a maze to figure out and although some call it The Ugliest Building in London I kind of like the place especially the inside has a very clean design in a 70s way with wood and concrete.
We went to hear a special concert to commemorate the 250th anniversary of Händel’s death called Handel Remixed. For that celebration they had asked a couple of composers to reinterpret some of Händel’s works. The composers were at the concert as well taking applause after their piece had been played. I wasn’t really expecting much before the concert but was blown away once it started. Compared to the day before the sound was so crisp and clean. The music was also very captivating and I really enjoyed it even though I don’t know much about Händel or classical music.
Sunday we went back to The Tower of London for a day of World Music at The Tower Festival where five bands were playing. It started in the afternoon and they had encouraged people to bring a picnic, so that was what we did.
The bands we saw were Siyaya from Zimbabwe, Abdullah Chhadeh from Syria, Justin Adams and Juldeh Camara from UK/Gambia and Tony Allen from Nigeria. They were all good in their own ways but the one I enjoyed the most was Adams on electric guitar and Camara on a one stringed ritti playing “Afro-Blues”. It doesn’t get more worldly than that 🙂 Here is a short video of them playing.
What a weekend! Three separate events and we had more things planned that we didn’t make it out the door to. I’m looking forward to keep exploring London 🙂 Ann has written a lot more about the event’s of the weekend. Here are here stories for Friday, Saturday and Sunday.
Being in a big city like London there is such a multitude of things to do that our biggest problems are finding out what’s going on and choose what we want to do.
We have started an open calendar for the events we would like to do in order to keep track of things. If you are in London feel free to subscribe to it and let us know if you wan to join us for something.
Comments
4 responses to “Extravagant weekend in London”
Wow! What a weekend! And what a great pic of Ann and her smile. Wonder who caused that? I too, just discovered how much fun it is to hang with local couchsurfers. I had only been using the lodging portion of couchsurfing, but when I came to Madison I met up for dinner with a bunch of them and they were all fun, interesting people.
that’s a very busy weekend in London, Michael. 🙂 Looks like you’re settling in well.
Cau Michael, your weekeend indeed sounds mindblowing. Smaller cities may compete though, Justin Adams+Camara and Tony Allen we heard in Prague this and last year.
If you have a taste for Händel, try catch his opera Rinaldo in the Estates Theatre next time in Prague.
Miss meeting you at concerts, best
Yeah Helge, I remember the Tony Allen concert we saw at Akropolis last year for your birthday 🙂 Very cool. Their set at the festival was rather short. Too bad I missed out on Justin Adams and Camara would have loved to see a full concert with them.