Our drive to Davidson was a mere 90 minutes – child’s play compared to some of the epic voyages of our last trip Stateside. With plenty of space in the schedule we stopped off at California Dreaming for lunch, and couldn’t resist trying such local delicacies as onion ring loaf and fried crab claws. It’s […]
It was two years since our last tour around the USA. The previous one – an epic ten day dash, many six hour drives, culminating in some remarkable, against-all-odds concerts – had left us with some great memories, but a little anxious as to what might be letting ourselves into this time. On paper it […]
Septura’s recording of Tchaikovsky’s The Nutcracker was released in November 2019, and was picked as one of the Christmas highlights of 2019 by both Classic FM and the Daily Mail (UK), and was AllMusic.com’s December Editor’s Choice. Throughout the recording the Septura members play with wonderful precision and commitment. Their sound is clean and well […]
Day 3 started slowly, at least by Septura’s touring standards. We didn’t have an early airport call to contend with so a few of us began with a leisurely breakfast at the hotel in Bad Horn Meinberg. Others took the opportunity to catch up on some sleep or adhere to strict fitness regimes in the […]
Septura’s 2019 season started with a 6 a.m. check-in at Heathrow, as we made our way to Detmold (via Hannover) in Germany. Despite my calm and exacting instructions from the navigation seat, Simon Cox’s driving of the battle bus filled the group with trepidation – he requires constant reminding to drive on the right side […]
Monday began with that rarest of Septura touring experiences: a lie-in! Having been awake for approximately 22 hours the previous day, it was a welcome opportunity for us to recharge the batteries, enjoy a hearty buffet breakfast, and bask in the glorious natural surroundings of our Dolomitic mountain chalet. Thereafter began the drive from Trentino […]
The final concert day of a Septura tour (or ‘SepTOURa’ – a cringe-inducing term which I unsuccessfully tried to moniker earlier this week) is always bittersweet. It’s fun performing and socialising with great friends in a new and exciting country, but by the final day I find the desire to get home and reunite with […]
Monday morning began rather unconventionally, with a brief tremor measuring 5.2 on the Richter scale acting as my 8am wake-up call! Fortunately we were some 100km southwest of the epicentre (near Mito, where we had performed the previous day…), so there were no pictures falling off the walls or tables sliding around the room, although […]
With two concerts behind us, Sunday marked the middle of the tour, and brought with it the group’s concert in Mito, a city near Japan’s south east coast. We had been informed that over a thousand tickets had sold for our concert in Mito, which mustered an additional hubbub of an anticipation within the group […]
The tour almost finished before it began. We’d met in central London to rehearse before heading to Heathrow Airport, and the easiest way to get there afterwards seemed to be some split-fare Ubers (or ‘splubers’ in common parlance). For some reason the trumpets’ driver didn’t seem to think it was a problem to start driving […]