Patricia Hammond

It has been a while since I’ve made a new post; like everyone else with an email account or two, I am always drowning in “posts” and “updates” and am loath to add to anyone else’s load!

But never mind!

I’ve been to Canada, bought a new corset, done some concerts, am getting married, and also decided that it was time that Youtube had some samples of my Juvenilia (ie Le Charme) so that I could sell some copies of what is, after all, a pretty good effort, and very very idiomatic of the French Salon Belle Epoque era. I’ve made slideshows of myself and pianist Zoë Mather, taken at the time of the recordings.

Also, I have taken part in a gala or two, this one for the Festival of Remembrance in York. Listen to how Matt’s vintage banjo carries over the Royal Signals Band, without mics!

This will be useful for when we are performing at the hundredth anniversary of Verdun, near Romagne-Sous-Montfaucon at the end of May, for the German War Graves Commission. We are tremendously excited about this. It is an enormous honour. We may even be able to perform “Bald, allzubalde” over the grave of Ernst Brockmann, which the excellent Volksbund Deutsche Kiegsgräberfürsorge are trying to find. It would be difficult to find anything more amazing for me to do than that.

Also coming up will be a fascinating demonstration of wax cylinder-making, at the Swaledale Festival…information HERE.

Our First World War CD has been reviewed in “Ragtime Music Reviews”, and it’s now quoted in the “Press” link on this site. I continue to write for Chap magazine, and the one on the newsstands now is on the subject of three stylish tenors of the past who went back and forth between “serious” classical music and “light” music with ease. As usual, I try to add tidbits not found on Wikipedia! Being a bookish girl does have its uses.

In any case, please do subscribe to the YouTube channel if you haven’t already! And thank you for reading this! I do realise how many notifications you must get, and they are a bore.