Friday 7 December 2012

The Queen and Maxim Vengerov

The Queen with Kathryn McDowell of the LSO and Nicholas Kenyon of the Barbican

Peter Maxwell Davies’s tenure as Master of the Queen’sMusic has produced one innovation worth celebrating: the Queen’s Medal forMusic. Rumour has it that Her Majesty’s not the biggest classical music fan, but it’s good to see her clout being lent to the music world. Previous winners have included Colin Davis, Judith Weir and Emma Kirkby. The 2012 medal was awarded to the National Youth Orchestra, the first organisation to receive the honour, at a gala concert given by the London Symphony Orchestra on Wednesday. Violin fans will have known that this marked Maxim Vengerov’s return to an orchestra he played with often before his period of retirement, but it wasn't all plain sailing for the returning king of the violin. I was at the concert and wrote areview for Classical Source.

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