Sinfonia d'Amici: Hansel and Gretel

With the help of animated projections and story telling, Sinfonia D’Amici bring to life this opera for children and adults alike. Prepare yourself for a surprise at the end of Act Three! 

We are proud to be supporting the incredibly talented Sinfonia d'Amici for their upcoming concert performance of Hansel & Gretel at LSO St Luke's on 5th April. Should be an amazing evening!

Click here for tickets

March 10th 2013: Nottingham Spring SaxDay

Vandoren UK will be attending the Spring Nottingham Saxophone Day at University of Nottingham, Sarah Markham Vandoren artist is one of the tutors for the day. Come and try a new Vandoren Sax mouthpiece, Ligature or trial a new Vandoren reed. If you need anything specific, contact Windblowers. See you there!

Stop CARDIFF COUNTY COUNCIL from making 100% Cuts to their County Music Service

CARDIFF COUNTY COUNCIL: Stop them making 100% cuts to their County Music Service.  

This is appalling news - please do what you can to voice your concern. If you would like to sign the petition, please click here.

Cardiff County and Vale of Glamorgan Music Service (CCVGMS) is deep in history and has benefitted thousands of young people in introducing them to music. These cuts would take away its inclusion and access for all students. The council MUST continue to support the Music Service in order for it to carry on its high quality of music tuition it offers.

Superbrass: Under the Spell of Spain

     

A live take from the sessions for the Superbrass CD: "Under the Spell of Spain". 

The recording took place at Music Bank Studios, London on March 10th & 11th 2001. It features Mike Lovatt on lead trumpet and Andy Wood on baritone. The track is called Juanear and was written by Jim Rattigan especially for this album.

It's brilliant and the sheet music for it is available from June Emerson Wind Music...

 

                            "Juanear" written by Jim Rattigan from the Superbrass CD: "Under the Spell of Spain".

We wish you all a wonderful 2013

Left to right: Stewart, Jeremy, Graham, John, Tracy, Sarah, Alison.

18th December 2012: Here we all are having our staff Christmas lunch at The White Swan in Ampleforth – our wonderful friendly local pub which does excellent food too! 

That day was a significant birthday for Alison (not telling...), Rachel's birthday, the day after Stewart’s birthday, a week after Tracy’s birthday, a week before John’s birthday and 2 weeks before Jeremy’s birthday!

CHRISTMAS CLOSING
Just a reminder that our office is currently closed and will re-open at 9am on Wednesday 2nd January 2012. You can continue to place online sheet music orders at any time during this period, but they will not be dispatched until the office re-opens. 

Also, don't forget our 10% DISCOUNT DAY on Saturday 5th January 2013 from 10.30am to 4.30pm.

COME AND SEE US - we'll be open for anyone who'd like to come and browse through hundreds of feet of wind music on our beautiful North Yorkshire hilltop!

We hope all our customers are having a Very Merry Christmas and we wish them all a Wonderful 2013.

Christmas Closing and 10% Discount Day

Windmill Farm house

CHRISTMAS CLOSING

Please note that our office will close at midday on Friday 21st December 2011 and will re-open at 9am on Wednesday 2nd January 2012. You can continue to place online sheet music orders at any time during this period, but they will not be dispatched until the office re-opens. If you need your order to be despatched before Christmas, please let us know and give us plenty of notice - we cannot guarantee that the music you want will be in stock, but we will do our utmost to get it to you in time.

10% DISCOUNT DAY - Saturday 5th January 2013 from 10.30am to 4.30pm

COME AND SEE US - we'll be open for anyone who'd like to come and browse through hundreds of feet of wind music on our beautiful North Yorkshire hilltop!

DISCOUNT - to make the day even better we're offering a 10% discount on everything bought or ordered by those present on the day.

DON'T JUST BROWSE THROUGH IT, PLAY IT - we have an adjoining room where you can play through the music. Stands and an electric keyboard are available if required. Please contact us if you'd like to make use of this facility.

For contact information and directions, click here. We look forward to meeting you!

Please note - in case of heavy snowfall we may need to cancel the Open Day. This information will be posted on our website and Facebook Page as soon as the weather starts to look bad, so please check before setting out.

Albanian Academy of Arts Honours June Emerson

Our founder, June Emerson, was awarded a special presentation earlier this month by the Albanian Academy of Arts for her years of hard work and tireless efforts to help Albanian musicians.

left to right: Fatos Jaho, bassoon professor at the UA and principal bassoon of the Albanian Opera Orchestra. (It was Fatos who put forward the case for the award to the Rektor together with Edmond Sinani, pictured below); Petrit Malaj, Rektor of the University of Arts presenting the Letter of Gratitude to June Emerson for services rendered to Albanian musical life and for the enrichment of the UA library; Miranda Bakiasi, the Chief Librarian of the UA, holding the elegant award 

More information (in Albanian) about the occasion is available here.

June, herself, gives us the background to the story:

"In 1987, purely by chance, I went to Albania on a small and heavily supervised weekend tour. (Full story in "Albania - the Search for the Eagle's Song" by June Emerson, published by Emerson Edition Ltd.)

When I got there, I was amazed to find that in a country the size of Wales with a population of only 3 million, there were 27 music schools, a Conservatoire, an Opera Company, a Ballet Company and seven symphony orchestras. Not only that, but the standard of playing and scholarship was extremely high. Enver Hoxha, former Prime Minister of Albania, for all his faults, put culture at the top of his agenda.

The award presented to June Emerson is inscribed: "University of the Arts, Tirana' - 'Gratitude'

I managed by various means to get invited back to find out more. I did some BBC broadcasts, wrote the above book and contributed some entries for the New Grove Dictionary of Opera.

When the communist regime fell in 1991, there was chaos for a while and the last thing anybody was interested in was Albanian classical music. I desperately wanted to help, so together with a couple of friends, I founded The Albanian Musicians' Trust. We did as much as we could to help children, students and professional musicians over the subsequent 15 years until the country had found its feet a bit. It was wound up, with a concert in Helmsley by a couple of Albanian musicians, in 2006. Very soon afterwards Miranda Sinani was offered a couple of years to do a Masters at the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland, so there was another energetic round of fund-raising for her for a couple of years.

With my contacts in the music business, I was able to obtain quantities of printed material and strings and accessories for the music schools and the Conservatoire (now called the University of Arts). They had not had access to good quality materials before and it made a lot of difference to their teaching and performance possibilities. Emerson Edition still sends a copy of each of its new publications to the UA library which,  though still somewhat sparse, is growing.

I visited most years from 1988 onwards to see how things were going and to make notes of requests and needs. I last visited in 2002, but David found it rather tough going (lots of walking, no lifts, rough roads and not a handrail in sight!) However I've kept in touch with key people and this year, I couldn't bear it any longer and went back for a week on November 2nd.

It was wonderful to meet up with all the old gang again - much hugging, many cups of lethal coffee and several exotic meals.

From the emails I received before the visit, I knew they were cooking something up, but wasn't prepared for the ceremony that was held at the University of Arts on Monday 5th November. 

Petrit and June both smiling after June had managed some sort of speech of thanks, despite the tears

About 50 of my musician friends turned up and I was given a beautifully inscribed document and a sort of 'Oscar' award in recognition of services to Albanian music. I was completely bowled over, cried quite a lot and was distinctly wobbly for a couple of days afterwards. Hugely proud and delighted though. Apparently they've given this award before to a few musicians but never to a foreigner."

June: "Edmond Sinani who is central to everything I've done over the years - fixing meetings, interpreting, translating, negotiating etc. As he is such a modest chap, he rarely gets any credit for what he has done, so I would very much like to acknowledge him here. He is, incidentally, Albania's first violin maker. He also repairs stringed instruments and is a teacher with a magic touch."