Last night Viv gave me lift up to Manchester to see Kimmo Phjonen at the Royal Northern College of Music in Manchester. Kit came down from Lancaster for the event but his train was late so he arrived two minutes after the show started. By then I was convinced he had not been listening and taken the train to Manchuria instead of Manchester or was searching for the Royal Northern College of Mosaic.
A similar thing had happened to us that afternoon when Viv's niece arranged for us to meet her at Bale St. A helpful man sent us off to outer suburbs of Manchester rather than admit there was no such place. We did meet eventually in the more prosaic Dale Street near the city centre.
The show was not quite as I had expected and was something like a history of of Finnish wrestling told in modern dance with accordion accompaniment.
I was also surprised to see a packed house, but apparently the work had received rave reviews in the papers. Here is the Guardian review.I had not heard of Kimmo Pohjonen but apparently he is a world famous musician and composer and won numerous awards but I am a little out of touch with contemporary music these days.
It was an extraordinary event however, even though it only lasted and hour or so and we felt an encore of solo accordion would have been appreciated to round off the show.
You can get some idea of what it was like from the clip above, but really, you should have been there.