BAUMHOLDER HIGH SCHOOL
MUSIC STUDY TRIP
2000 TRIP INFORMATION
This year variety is in store for our London travelers. We begin our musical adventure with Swan Lake . Based on Petipa and Ivanov's original ballet of 1895, Matthew Bourne's new scenario offers a fresh and original contemporary version of this tragic tale of obsession and desire; creating a Swan Lake to stir the emotions - not only stylish and witty but also moving and provocative Click here for a completeSynopsis of Swan Lake.
Firday night the group is divided between Fosse and Blast!. Fosse is the same production that won 3 Tony Awards in New York last year, including "Best Musicial". The band members are sure to be impressed with the 40 brass players, 12 drummers, and 16 flag corp members in Blast!.
Saturday night will be the highlight of London 2000. We purchased these tickets in February of 1999 to make sure we had tickets for all 144 of us! The Lion King, a London West End transfer of the smash-hit Broadway musical, was the winner of 6 Tony's on Broadway including for Best Musical, Best Director of a Musical, Best Scenic Design, Best Lighting Design, Best Costume Design and Best Choreography.
GENERAL INFO
Classical & Opera
Home to some of the world's greatest orchestras, London is also blessed with an abundance of the finest classical venues. On almost any night of the year, more classical music is performed in London than in any other capital - in concert halls, recital venues, churches and music colleges - yet London barely has the audience to fill them all.Major Venues
Barbican Centre
Silk Street, EC2 (0171 638 8891). Barbican tube or Moorgate tube/BR .
Open box office 9am-8pm daily. Tickets £6-£30.
Credit A, AmEx, V.This grim cultural stalag was the City's gift to London'sarts world. And London never stops grumbling about it. The Barbican concert hall is home to the London Symphony Orchestra and the English Chamber Orchestra - though both bodies hop across the river to the South Bank (see below), for large-scale choral and orchestral works that the Barbican's designers neglected to plan for. Despite the whining, the Barbican is well worth checking out, as it maintains an excellent standard of music festivals and theme cycles, and, better still, you can now find the entrance. The erection of the seven gold muses above the porch in 1995 and the hanging of tiny waving, glinting mirrors on the underside of the entrance canopy have at last given the Barbican Centre a front door that looks like one. Car Park.
Disabled: access; toilets. Restaurant & cafés. Shops.
St Martin's Lane, WC2 (box office 0171 632 8300/booking for disabled patrons 0171 836 7666). Leicester Square tube or Charing Cross tube/BR.
Open box office 10am-8pm Mon-Sat. Tickets £5-£50; day tickets available from 10am each day to personal callers: 100 balcony seats, £5; 46 dress circle seats (weekdays only), £25.
Credit A, AmEx, DC, £TC, V.The largest auditorium in London (2,500 seats) has in its time been a cinema, variety house, theatre and freak show venue where the great 7ft 11in Fräulein Brunnhilde, the tallest pianist in the world, made her name. Since 1968 it has been an opera house and home of English National Opera (ENO), a company which hires home-grown talent and always sings in the vernacular. This practice was a way of making sense of foreign opera to people who, unlike the Covent Garden crowds, made no pretence at understanding other languages. However, now the Royal Opera has stolen a march on ENO by introducing sur-titles, and the current debate is whether ENO will do the same. ENO productions range through the repertoire, from Monteverdi to the moderns, but above all, they exist as theatre - sometimes controversial, sometimes outrageous, sometimes a brilliantly successful gamble. The nearby Coliseum shop has an excellent selection of records, videos, libretti, books and magazines.
Disabled: access; toilets. Group & family discount (0171 836 0111 ext 318). Shop (10am-7.30pm Mon-Sat)
Kensington Gore, SW7 (information 0171 5893203/box office 0171 589 8212). High Street Kensington or Knightsbridge tube.
Open box office 9am-9pm daily. Tickets £3.50-£30.
Credit A, AmEx, V.The Royal Albert Hall is the major host of the best music festival in the world, the BBC Henry Wood Promenade Concerts. The Proms run from mid-July to mid-September and include a variety of orchestras, ensembles and performers from all over the world; tickets are at subsidised prices. The hall is rich in atmosphere and has been a well-loved venue for over a century. It has had acoustical problems but there have been improvements in recent times. The old place comes into its own with massed choirs and big orchestral forces. The 'Kensington Bowl', as Proms audiences have fondly dubbed it, won a clutch of 'best venue' awards in 1994 and the refurbishment and general updating are not even finished yet. It is now the home to the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra under new music director Daniele Gatti in a move designed to encourage audiences away from the Barbican and South Bank. There's nearly always a queue for the 1,600 prom tickets on sale each evening.
Disabled: access by prior arrrangement; toilet. Guided tours (May-Oct). Induction loops for the hard of hearing.
Covent Garden, WC2 (0171 304 4000). Covent Garden tube.
Open box office 10am-8pm Mon-Sat. Tickets £2-£130; day tickets 65 rear amphitheatre seats for sale on day of performance from 10am, £12.50-£29.50 (one per person).
Credit A, AmEx, DC, £TC, V.The Royal Opera House is London's answer to La Scala, the Met, the have risen to levels previously unheard of, and the Royal Opera has painted Bastille and the Vienna Staatsoper. Government cuts have meant that seat prices itself into a Thatcherite corner by its emphasis on private funding, sponsorship and business support. There are signs that the Royal Opera House has taken criticisms to heart and is struggling to be more accessible, but prices are still outof reach for the average music lover. Audiences, including the block-booked businessmen who off-set the exorbitant prices against tax, pay as much as £134 a seat in the Grand Tier (only they know whether it is worth it or not); the impecunious queue patiently for a seat in the gods at £12.50 (definitely worth it).
Disabled: access; toilets. Opera and ballet education officers. Shop
South Bank, Belvedere Road, SE1 (box office 0171 928 8800/recorded information 0171 633 0932). Waterloo tube/BR.
Open box office 10am-9pm daily. Tickets £5-£50.
Credit A, AmEx, DC, V.The South Bank Centre consists of three concert halls: the daddy-sized Royal Festival Hall for symphony concerts and amplified events with large popular appeal; the mummy-sized Queen Elizabeth Hall for chamber orchestras and concerts which attract smaller audiences; and the baby-sized Purcell Room for solo recitals and debut concerts. The South Bank Arts Centre has come to emphasise the 'theme' series as a way of beating the jaded palates of the musically over-fed. The centre is also the home of Opera Factory, whose abrasive productions under director David Freeman frequently shock, jolt and even - as with their dolce vita beach-bum version of Cosè fan tutte - prove a revelation. The complex has a more friendly, welcoming atmosphere than most international venues with its restaurants and bars, its bookshops, record stalls and art galleries.Car park.
Disabled: front seats for the partially sighted by prior arrangement; infra-red audio for the hard of hearing; wheelchair access; toilets. Free exhibitions. Poetry Library. Restaurants & cafés. Shops for books, music and records.
36 Wigmore Street, W1 (0171 935 2141). Bond Street tube.
Open box office 10am-8.30pm Mon-Sat; Dec-Mar 10.30am-1pm, 3.15-5.30pm, Sun; Apr-Oct 10.30am-1pm, 6.15-8.30pm, Sun.
Performances 7.30pm Mon-Sat; Dec-Mar 11.30am, 4pm, Sun; Apr-Oct 11.30am, 7pm, Sun. Tickets £6-£30.
Credit A, AmEx, DC, JCB, £TC, V.The perfect concert hall. Acoustically it is unbeatable, wherever you sit. Since its recent refurbishment, it is also one of the most comfortable and well-equipped. The hall is a favourite location for recitals and chamber music and offers the most civilised pastime for Sunday morning in its mid-morning concerts which include coffee or sherry. There is an old-fashioned, unhurried atmosphere that suggests management untainted by the late-twentieth-century need to sell, sell, sell. With just one concert a night, there is no danger that the staff will have to share their priorities and indeed there is every indication that the music is what is treasured above all. Prices are reasonable, but popular concerts sell out fast. Cafébar Open 11.30am-one hour after performance, 5.30pm-one hour after performance, Sat).
Disabled: access. Restaurant Open noon-3pm, 5.30-8pm, Mon-Fri; 5.30-8pm Sat; noon-4pm Sun).
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